Christine O’Donnell, shedding brain cells before our eyes

By R.K. Barry

You may have seen this, but it’s so damn much fun that I have to post it myself.

 

Christine O’Donnell, the Republican candidate for the U.S. Senate for Delaware was debating her opponent Chris Coons. She asked Coons where in the Constitution one can find a reference to the separation of church and state. The audience gasped and giggled because, as a group with at least a basic education, they knew instantly that it was in fact the First Amendment that sets out this seminal doctrine. The text is as follows:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

In the clip below, the audience howls, and Coons schools O’Donnell, as she proves herself to be woefully unqualified to be a U.S. Senator. All is right with the world.

Now the fun starts. What follows reminds me of that Hunter S. Thompson quote: "When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro."

O’Donnell was not only schooled in this pathetic episode, but she was too stupid to know she was being schooled. In an interview on ABC television shortly after, she claims that all the press got it wrong and it was she who embarrassed Coons in the exchange. I’m not joking. Here is what she said:

It's really funny the way that the media reports things. After that debate my team and I we were literally high fiving each other thinking that we had exposed he doesn't know the First Amendment, and then when we read the reports that said the opposite we were all like "what?"

 O'Donnell explained that her line of questioning to Coons was not because she didn't know the First Amendment, but to make the point the phrase "separation of church and state" does not appear anywhere in the Constitution.

So, her explanation was that the exact words “separation of church and state” do not appear in the text verbatim, despite the fact that anyone reasonably conversant with the English language would understand the intent of the phrase “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion."

Wow, she missed that. And we are going to miss her after election day. This has been too much fun.

Christine O'Donnell uses debate against Chris Coons to reveal her abject ignorance of the Constitution and the foundations of American democracy

By Michael J.W. Stickings

Yes, Christine O'Donnell really is stupid -- and, needless to say, utterly unqualified to hold public office, let alone a seat in the U.S. Senate.

It's one thing not to be able to name a Supreme Court decision you disagree with, quite another not to have a clue about something as fundamental to American democracy as the separation of Church and State -- not to mention the First Amendment.

Yesterday, during a debate at Delaware's Widener School of Law, O'Donnell and her opponent, Chris Coons, were discussing whether or not creationism (or so-called "intelligent design") should be taught in public-school science classes. Once again, as in their recent TV debate, O'Donnell refused to say whether or not, as she has said publicly before, she believes that evolution is a myth. But it was what followed that was perhaps even more troubling:

Coons said that creationism, which he considers "a religious doctrine," should not be taught in public schools due to the Constitution's First Amendment.  He argued that it explicitly enumerates the separation of church and state.

"The First Amendment does?" O'Donnell asked. "Let me just clarify: You're telling me that the separation of church and state is found in the First Amendment?"

"Government shall make no establishment of religion," Coons responded, reciting from memory the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. (Coons was off slightly: The first amendment actually reads "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion.")

"That's in the First Amendment...?" O'Donnell responded. 

And there was more:

Also during the debate, O'Donnell stumbled when asked whether or not she would repeal the 14th, 16th, or 17th Amendments if elected.

"The 17th Amendment I would not repeal," she said, before asking the questioner to define the 14th and 16th amendments, adding: "I'm sorry, I didn't bring my Constitution with me." 

Oh, you say, you O'Donnell apologist, most people don't know their Constitutional Amendments by heart, and Coons wasn't exactly perfect himself, so stop picking on her. Well...

Earlier in the debate, O'Donnell accused Coons of constitutional ignorance, saying that "perhaps they didn't teach you Constitutional law at Yale Divinity School."

She's amazing, isn't she? You gotta give her that.

(Oh, and where exactly did she study Constitutional law? Was it Harvard or Yale or Columbia or Berkeley or Stanford or Chicago or Cornell or Georgetown? I forget.)

Christine O'Donnell uses debate against Chris Coons to portray herself as supremely unqualified for U.S. Senate

By Michael J.W. Stickings

I watched a bit of the Coons-O'Donnell debate last night on CNN, but I just couldn't be bothered to pay much attention to it. O'Donnell is way behind in the polls, the debate was only televised nationally because O'Donnell is a Tea Party celebrity and media sensation, and, well, it was just plain embarrassing. Coons is a smart, thoughtful man who answered the questions with confidence and a firm grasp of the issues, while O'Donnell is an extremist fool who is in way over her head and who revealed herself to be pretty much what we already knew she was, a woman who is supremely unqualified for any office, let alone the U.S. Senate.

Asked by Wolf Blitzer -- during a part of the debate I was watching -- whether she believes evolution to be a myth, as she has said publicly, she dodged the question, calling her views "irrelevant." That's just sheer cowardice. Of course her ignorant theocratic views are relevant. Blitzer pressed her again and again on this, but she repeatedly refused to answer the question. Instead of defending herself or laying out sensible policy proposals, she resorted to right-wing soundbites and preferred, predictably enough, to attack Coons, calling him a Marxist at every opportunity, seeking to discredit him simply by calling him names. Coons did once write an article about his study-abroad year in Kenya that referred to "bearded Marxists," but of course O'Donnell and others on the right have grossly misrepresented what he wrote, and, as he said during the debate, it was a "joke." (That whooshing sound you hear is the truth going right over O'Donnell's head.)

Anyway, Coons should win this race easily and last night's debate just confirmed that O'Donnell is a moron.

Chris Coons and the Eleventh Thesis on Feuerbach

Guest post by T.W. Wilson

Ed. note: This is the pseudonymous Mr. Wilson's third guest post here at The Reaction. His first two were on Glenn Beck and the right's war on the poor (and Beck's war on Frances Fox Piven). -- MJWS

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Chris Coons, the Democratic candidate for Senate running against Christine O'Donnell in Delaware, is currently being vilified by right-wing pundits for a little joke made by friends about his state of mind upon returning from studying abroad in Africa. The joke was in a characterization that he returned as a "bearded Marxist" because he was beginning to see imperfections in America that he had not previously examined. Since the boobs on the right are having a field day calling him a Marxist, it is worth quoting what he actually wrote: 

I spent the spring of my junior year in Africa on the St. Lawrence Kenya Study Program. Going to Kenya was one of the few real decisions I have made; my friends, family, and professors all advised against it, but I went anyway. My friends now joke that something about Kenya, maybe the strange diet, or the tropical sun, changed my personality; Africa to them seems a catalytic converter that takes in clean-shaven, clear-thinking Americans and sends back bearded Marxists. 

The point that others ignore is that I was ready to change. Experiences at Amherst my first two years made me skeptical and uncomfortable with Republicanism, enough so that I wanted to see the Third World for myself to get some perspective on my beliefs. 

When I returned last summer, I traveled all over the East Coast and saw in many ways a different America. Upon arriving at Amherst this fall, I felt like a freshman at an unfamiliar school all over again. Many of the questions raised by my experiences of the last year remain unanswered. I have spent my senior year re-examining my ideas and have returned to loving America, but in the way of one who has realized its faults and failures and still believes in its promise. The greatest value of Amherst for me, then, has been the role it played in allowing me to question, and to think. I had to see the slums of Nairobi before the slums of New York meant anything at all, but without the experiences of Amherst, I never would have seen either. 

Never mind that the usual suspects, including his half-witted opponent, O'Donnell, have been doing their usual schtick of misrepresenting the facts to support their warped worldview. I don't really think that calling someone a Marxist will have much resonance these days – at least not amongst those with functioning brains. In Coons' case, it's simply foolishness because he never called himself a Marxist and friends were just having some fun by the reference.

But increasingly I find the rhetoric from the right so outlandish that it is necessary to "unpack" it in order for it to make any sense at all.

Here's my theory: Since most people haven't a clue what Marxism is or what Marx actually wrote (which is particularly true on the right), a good enough proxy seems to be that Marxism is a term for those who don't love America enough or at least not enough to deny her faults.

No, what is not acceptable is Chris Coons' admission that upon returning home he still loved America but that it was now "in the way of one who has realized its faults and failures."

These days, at least in the eyes of the right, it is not possible to love America without whole-heartedly embracing some vaguely held, though frankly indefensible, idea of perfection.

And where does this idea reside? It resides in a hodgepodge of frequently contradictory impressions about how good things used to be. It lies in embracing an incoherent theory about the original intent of the Framers of the Constitution; in pretending our economy isn't tied to international forces beyond our control; in the idea that massive deregulation will work in everyone's best interests; in denying the historical injustices of racism and sexism; in keeping gays out of the military; in returning to a time when it was not possible for a black man to become president; and in so many other status quo ante fantasy nuggets too numerous to mention. That it consists of no coherent vision is clear, but that is the point -- it's not rational but rather about a feeling that things used to better.

Lest you think I contradict myself, the right has plenty of criticism of America to offer too, but their concerns are focused squarely on the problems created by those who have strayed from the perfection of America's design. For conservatives, fixing America is not about change, it is about restoration. 

What they are ever so vigilant to oppose are the thoughts and actions of those who they believe threaten the very concept of America, its special place in world history, its exceptionalism, the idea of the City on the Hill.

Conservatism has always been about making things the way they once were in some imagined past. Progressivism is about changing things to meet the demands of new challenges, as difficult as this usually is.

Conservatism is mostly about the belief that we can return to a time when we had more control over our circumstances based on the infantile wish that we can go home again, that the world of a perfect imagined past is real. We can't and it isn't, but for some I suppose it's nice to dream.

Its criticism of the current political landscape is of government actions that they believe stand in the way of such a return.

When Coons writes that he was beginning to see America's faults and failures, he likely meant that positive action would be required to right wrongs that make America less than perfect. And this would not be a matter of going back, but of going forward.

It should come as no surprise that the Republican Party is the "Party of No." Perhaps we should also call it the Party of Dorothy and the Wizard of Oz. The world out there is very frightening and there is no place like home, so let's close our eyes, do nothing, intone the same fervent wish over and over again, and hope that we can simply return to a time and place when everything was fine.

It's simple and bizarre, but if you want to improve your country by working together to tackle the challenges that arise by the inevitability of change, believing that there is no perfect past to which we can return, you may actually be some kind of radical, or perhaps even a Marxist. 

If that is not what right-wing pundits mean when they call Chris Coons a Marxist, I am out of explanations.