Incompetence Is No Vice

I’ve been playing with the above headline all week on Twitter to mock the sayings and doings of numbskull politicians – from Sharron Angle to Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer to Carl Paladino (the list seems endless).

It is a play on words derived from an infamous quote made by former Sen. Barry Goldwater, now deceased. During his speech at the 1964 Republican Convention, “Mr. Conservative” (as he was called) boldly declared: "I would remind you that extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice. And let me remind you also that moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue." (The irony is that Goldwater would fit right in among our current crop of crazy pols without missing a beat.)

My mock headline is especially applicable to Christine O’Donnell of Delaware. After SNL parodied her appearance in the now famous “I’m not a witch … I’m you” campaign ad, O’Donnell needs no introduction. The mainstream media and left-leaning pundits have ridiculed O’Donnell mercilessly. She debated her Dem opponent Chris Coons today – and promptly provided even more fodder for the Media Morlocks. Twitter is atwitter, again. And sure, I, too, have had a bit of good-natured fun at her expense. But I’ve also criticized others for piling on, and for the superfluous chatter about her. The fate of the free world does not hinge on O’Donnell’s fortunes. (She’s losing to Coons by double digits in the polls, and the odds of her seeing the inside of the senator chamber is remote.)

It is pointless to do a treatise on O’Donnell because she is, disturbingly, an empty vessel. That she is also more than a few tacos short of a fiesta platter is an understatement. And it underlines Christopher Hitchens’s point about the pathetic individuals we are attracting to politics today. The two observations below kinda say it all:

Stephen Stromberg (Washington Post): “Christine O'Donnell is that person who thinks she can say things she doesn't really know as long as she does it without a hint of doubt. That person in high-school debate who manipulates her audience with stage presence and an inventive approach to fact. [She] is just...wow...”

James Fallows (The Atlantic): “Christine O'Donnell could be more dangerous than Sarah Palin because she has the idiot bravado of the talk show regular. O'Donnell comes across as a perfect, unflappable product of the talk-show culture. Bill Maher thinks he has been laughing at Christine O'Donnell with his old clips of her appearances on his shows. If she wins, Bill Maher will have created her.”

Although Fallows raises an interesting (and horrifying) point, I’m not prepared to stipulate that America is stupid enough to elect either Palin or O’Donnell to high office. History, God help us, better prove me right.