"Why do you hate America?"
Every liberal in the country knows this question quite well. We heard it a thousand times in the aftermath of 9/11, through the opening phases of the Iraq and Afghan wars, basically for most of Dubya's two terms in office.
It was levelled at anyone slightly to the left of, say, Dick Cheney, who dared question ANYTHING the Bush administration ever did. The Dixie Chicks got it for a pretty innocuous comment onstage at a concert - "We're ashamed the president is from [their home state of] Texas."
You got it if you questioned the unconstitutional powers of the PATRIOT Act; if you asked why the hell we were invading Iraq at all; if you criticized ANY old thing Bush and Cheney saw fit to do - you were in danger of being hanged for treason by a righteously angry mob of Good Amurkans.
Why were you ATTACKING the PRESIDENT during a TIME OF WAR?! Why were you HELPING our ENEMIES?!?!?!? Why were you SPITTING ON THE TROOPS?!
(Forgive the caps and the superfluous punctuation - it just seems to go with the territory.)
It always rankled me because it equated ANY level of dissent, however polite or well-informed, with treason. As if liberals really were (to use words Andrew Sullivan probably regrets nowadays) a fifth column, out to destroy America and institute Sharia law.
I never thought I'd be in a position to throw that charge back at a Republican. Even though secretly, or not-so-secretly, hoping that the economy will fail, or blocking every last executive intitiative so that Obama will be a one-term President, both skirt dangerously close to "hating America," I have kept my mouth shut.
But now it looks like we're seeing the Real Deal in action. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you Mitt Romney.
We already know he doesn't consider the troops to be anything important. When he sees "the military," he sees defense contractors. When he sees the troops, he sees disposable employees like the ones he loves firing so much. Hates the troops: Check.
He's attacking the President, not just "during a time of war" (Obama's entire Presidency would qualify for that) but during an unfolding crisis when every word, every action could tip the scales one way or the other. Not only that, it was with false accusations that betray utter misunderstanding of the whole situation, all to score cheap political points. Attacking the POTUS in a crisis: Check.
And he made his false accusations with unbridled glee, and a smirk that manages to outdo even George W. Bush's for sheer slappability. You have to conclude that he was HOPING for a moment like this, for something awful to happen so that Obama could be made to look bad. And throwing out irresponsible accusations in the midst of a powder-keg situation - and unlike our criticism of Bush over the years, these were both factually wrong and irresponsible - seems to matter not at all to Mitt. Nor does the prospect of helping our enemies by giving them new reasons to attack us. Wanting America to fail: Check.
I've noticed something today, while paging through lots of pages and articles about the whole Libyan mess and Romney's astonishingly tone-deaf response to it. I've noticed that aside from a few mouthpieces at the top of the Republican Party apparatus (Limbaugh, Preibus, Palin), no one is out there defending him. Even the trolls that usually patrol all the comment threads, ready to insert nasty remarks about Obama at the slightest provocation, are silent in Mitt's defense.
Maybe even they finally realize that here, at last, is a GENUINE case. Not just political gamesmanship, not just wanting to win at all costs (though it's definitely both of those things) - Mitt Romney really does ONLY want to win. He couldn't care less if America has to be attacked, or fail, or expend the lives of troops - Mitt is just looking out for Mitt. After years of throwing the "hate America" meme in the teeth of all us awful libtards - they're finally witnessing what "hating America" really does look like.
So at long last, sir... at long last, have you NO sense of decency?
Mitt Romney, WHY do you hate America?