"The Palin-haters are trying to do a guilt-by-association smear"

"I was still the same person God created me to be," Vietnam vet Dave Roever (above) told Glenn Beck yesterday. His face had been blown off three decades ago by a phosphorous grenade, and the sight of it was so very disturbing to confront at first. But as Roever spoke and we learned a bit about the warm, stalwart human being behind the horrific scars, the strangeness receded. He was talking about Sarah Palin, "as wonderful a person as I've ever known." The "sad and moldering strangeness" of the Sarah Palin portrayed in that notoriously discredited Vanity Fair article we blogged about the other day was nowhere to be seen. Roever happened to have been in Alaska when Beck was taping the show, and Palin had offered her Wasilla studio for the broadcast. The grabber: When Beck's people said they'd send a makeup artist, Sarah said "Oh, I'll do his makeup." Click here to watch video (h/t Cubachi). Could anything be more Mama Grizzly Alaska "Frontier State" than that? They do what has to be done and don't wait around for someone from upstairs to do it for them. It echoed GOP senatorial candidate Joe Miller's "bringing it back home to the people" campaign mantra. Even leftist opinion blog Mediaite was smitten:

Think of it as the political opposite of the John Edwards hair-fiddling tape: here is Palin, a global superstar at this point, doing the makeup of a Glenn Beck guest and proffering her studio to help her pals out – the show must go on, after all. She doesn’t say a word in the clip, nor does she look like she is wearing any make-up (her hair might even be at the reasonably messy level most people’s is when they’re not on TV!). The message: Sarah is a team player.

Now a parallel and not unrelated situation raises its ugly head with our friend and fellow soldier in the Army of Davids defending the Shining City, Stacy McCain, whose hardscrabble reportage from on the ground in Anchorage and Wasilla we've been following here the last couple of days. Like Sarah, Stacy finds himself in the crosshairs of persons of the left who would silence dissenting narratives with accusations of racism":

Dear Blog Buddies: I would have ignored this crap myself, but the Palin-haters are trying to do a guilt-by-association smear — using me against Todd — so I've been asked to say something, and I'm obliged to request your help with the pushback. — RSM

Some things are predictable — i.e., that the Palin-haters would decide it was a good time to recycle the old SPLC/LGF attacks on me in order to exploit my interview with Todd Palin for a guilt-by-association smear. When Rachel Maddow tried the same trick last fall — based on my friend Lynn Vincent’s collaboration with Sarah Palin on Going Rogue — I made a few points in my response:

I don’t have to explain myself or prove a negative …
There is no obligation for me to speak a word in my own defense …

I do not hate, neither will I fear. There are important stories I need to be covering, and I've got better things to do than to seek vengeance on a bunch of pissant "progressives" whose only claim to fame is their vicious obsession with the Palins.

Freedom of speech isn't free. It must be fought for at every turn. The latest affront to grassroots dissenters is something called Teapartytracker.org, a new website sponsored by the NAACP and left-leaning media operations "seeking videographers and bloggers who will search out 'racism' and 'extremism' among Tea Partiers." The "impotent, limp and gutless" forces of darkness are forever waiting just outside the campfire of civilization to move in for the kill.

Update: Michelle Malkin "Buzzworthy" link!

Update II: Top billing at Doug Ross's Larwyn's Linx. Thanks!

Crossposted at Riehl World View and Liberty Pundits.

Comments

[Chuck]

An "Army of Davids" (ht Glenn Reynolds) blogging with much force has the leftist bloggers in a snit fit. To sub the letter "h" for "n" in "snit" would probably me more apropro.

The closer to election day, the more the left blogosphere acts like a fire ant bed that has been only slightly disturbed by a foreign insect.

Hither and yon they scamper, warning all who would listen of impending doom.

[goomp]

You know we the people are not capable of making judgements about anything let alone Sarah Palin without the leftist intellectuals to guide us.

[BorderPundit]

It is probably timely, given the rising hysteria among the left about November's mid-terms, that a brother site to teapartytracker be created, to search out racism and extremism among the Left, and within the NAACP and the Southern Poverty Law Center.

[Aine]

I'm not sure why, but when I first saw the footage of Sarah doing Dave's makeup on Friday, it delighted but did not surprise me.

My reaction was, that's SO Sarah: just do it. She is capable, willing, and generous.

Now, reviewing the video or photos, it's plain to see what a tender and caring person she is. We first glimpsed this Sarah on the campaign trail when she held her infant son, or met other children with Down Syndrome and their parents.

I'm really beginning to get why Sarah scares the sh*t out of the Left. She can blast your head off with deadly accuracy, but can administer a loving and tender touch to this deformed man and children with Down's. This beautiful woman who doesn't flinch when anyone else might. The Left doesn't have any such person in their ranks.

Yes, Sarah is a team player and a dark horse. Even her own party needs to wise up.

[Inge]

One thing I have to terms with is this: There is no sense in debating with liberals, they do not have anything in their arsenal other then to attack, label, smear, and hate.
Why would anyone waste a brath of air on these lunatics is beyond me. Ignoring these rascals is a better method, methodically making fun of their hate would bring better results: humiliation-something they can't tolerate at all.

[Karna @ Israel]

All this is really very very sad but it was not Vietnam who started the war but the US and now they'riping the fruit.

[Sherry]

I read your article. I still can't connect the title to the point of the article. What does Sara Palin's caring regard for a fellow human being have to do with guilt by association?

Palin haters: the liberal liars
Guilt: What is the article saying she has been accused of?
Association: Who has been made guilty alongside her and what have they been made guilty of?

You title may generate interest but the follow through lacks coherence.

[Sissy WIllis]

Sherry, dear: Talkin' about the difference between a real person and the disingenuous narrative spun by persons predisposed to project their own ugliness on to those whose political views they disagree with ...

[harkin]

The liberals will say she's now using a disfigured vet as a prop as opposed to a downs child. These people are beneath low.

[KingShamus]

Palin just keeps confounding the Left.

They'll be chasing their tails 20 years after the end of her second term.