I haven't said a peep about the whole tempest in a Beltway teapot over Helen Thomas' declaration that Isrealis living in the occupied territories need to "go home" to Germany and Poland because, frankly, I couldn't care less. After all, it isn't like anyone in a position of authority - which Ms. Thomas does not have - has ever declared that the Palestinians should be expelled from . . .
Oh, wait. That happens all the time. Sorry about that.
It isn't like we in America are so over our own racism that we would even think of having people who hold elected office make racist . . .
Gah. Sorry. My bad.
In all seriousness, Ms. Thomas' statement was idiotic, but no less so than hundreds of statements by people with far more authority, power, and influence - think Rush Limbaugh on the radio three hours a day five days a week - and you just gotta wonder. Here's this convicted drug addict, who traipses off to a sex-tourist spot with a bag full of Viagra that isn't even on his scrip, who has racist tourettes and I gotta ask why no one - not a single solitary soul - is demanding he stop his fulminating via the AM airwaves. Well, they do, but it isn't happening. Thomas, sad to say, is long past her prime, and in this instance was low-hanging fruit.
The sad fact is this: I don't think what she said matters all that much, or reveals some inner Himmler ready to gas all those Polish Jews in the occupied territories. Instead, it reveals, at worst, a tendency to allow whatever thoughtless words enter her brain to flow unimpeded out her mouth. Unlike, say, Beck or Mark Levin or Michael Wiener Savage, who spew out false and horribly racist things each and every day, Thomas is long past the point when she commanded either respect or (far more important) big bucks. So, I do not believe this has anything to do with the words Helen Thomas said. It had to do with filthy lucre, pure and simple.
Virtual Tin Cup
