"The media doesn’t understand life membership in the NRA; they don’t understand getting up at 3 a.m. to hunt a moose; they don’t understand eating a mooseburger; they don’t understand being married to a guy who likes to snowmobile for fun," Rep. Adam Putnam, a Florida Republican, explained in a Politico interview on Monday. "I am not surprised that they don’t get it. But Americans get it. A mooseburger means she is like one of us." Politico
If our political culture hasn't hit rock bottom with this quote, it's surely scraping against it.
Information on mooseburger consumption is hard to come by; mooseburger.com is of little help. (If you want a recipe, check here; the secret, evidently is a 3:1 mixture of moose to pork.) Google coughs up no hits for "mooseburger consumption," but I will take a wild guess that most Americans -- even most residents of Bartow, Florida, like Rep. Adam Putnam -- have never eaten a mooseburger. But I'm a vegetarian, so what do I know. The poll below may shed some light on this.
The statement of Rep. "Moose" is fascinating and revealing for several reasons. First, and most absurdly, he tries to established Gov. Palin's "regular guyness" on the basis of something that most Americans never do and probably never even want to do: hunt moose at 3 a.m., have them ground up, and eat them. This may, from a certain perspective, be admirable, I guess, but can it really mean she's "one of us" if few of us ever do this? Paint her as a rifle-toting Supermom if you must -- though these days it looks like she's relying more on her shotgun to get her underage daughter to her own wedding -- but it's only in the fevered imagination of an out-of-touch Floridian that Palin's mooseburger jones binds her to the rest of the country.
The worst aspect of Putnam's comment, of course, is that it assumes that Gov. Palin's moose-chewing should matter. "This election is not about issues," John McCain's campaign manager reminds us. It's about ... mooseburger? The Republicans seriously want to tell us that we should be electing a Presidential ticket based on who eats what ground-up game? Mooseburger is implied to indicate ... something, I'm not sure what ... but it sure isn't anything having to do with ending a war in the Middle East, breathing life into the U.S. economy, giving people health care, reaching energy independence, or restoring the Constitution.
In fact, Putnam's statement is audaciously not about those things. This is as brazen as the Republicans get. "It's the mooseburger, stupid!" is their new battle cry. Those other problems -- those so-called "real" problems -- they will just melt away under the leadership of a woman who eats moose!
The is beyond accidental stupidity: this is wielding Stupidity as a sword and shield. It is aggressive childishness: the assertion that nothing of consequence -- qualifications, experience, judgment, whatever it is we Democrats are so exercised about -- matters at all. Problems can be solved simply by being a regular guy -- like the regular guy in the White House who has watched the country deteriorate on his watch and is now waiting for time to expire so he can get to the showers. God will provide, they promise us -- and God helps those who help themselves to some fried moose.
Rep. Putnam's comments are an insult to the political system itself; it's a wonder the Founding Fathers don't rumble out of the ground and smack him.
We've seen this from the Republicans before when they try to act like they're solving problems. With a little luck, a little faith, and a little regularness, they assure us that everything will work out all right. (They assure themselves that they'll get away with it if it doesn't.) They imitate, in fact, the most famous moose in cartoon history:
Republicans: Hey, watch me pull this rabbit out of a hat!
Democrats: That trick never works!
Republicans: This time for sure!
(The equivalent of Alberto Gonzalez is pulled out of the hat.)
But not this time, Rep. Putnam. Gov. Palin may be like one of you, but she isn't like one of us. We give a damn what happens to the country. You think politics is mooseburger. Well, you are what you eat.
Update: Lithium Cola offers this below, and it's too good not to steal. God will forgive me.