Sarah Palin June 2009:

She opens the introduction praising Reagan’s son, a talk radio guy, for his willingness “to screw the political correctness that some would expect him to try to adhere to.”

She blasts “self-proclaimed intellectuals, and the smug lobbyists who dominate Washington, and the liberal media.”

Sarah Palin February 2010:

Sarah Palin took out after White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel today for referring to a group of liberal activists as “retarded.”

“Just as we’d be appalled if any public figure of Rahm’s stature ever used the ‘N-word’ or other such inappropriate language, Rahm’s slur on all God’s children with cognitive and developmental disabilities — and the people who love them — is unacceptable, and it’s heartbreaking,” Palin wrote on her Facebook page.

I find this kind of shameless, in the way values-crusaders like David Vitter and Mark Sanford are shameless.

It’s very difficult to converse in a country when there is no consistency in the arguments that our leaders make.  Which is it: are we going to be politically correct, or not?  If you decide to take a stand against political correctness as Palin did–to Republican cheers–then to back-track for cheap political points is…shameless.

It’s also confusing to those of us who care to try to figure out what our leaders believe and how they think.

Regardless, the N-word has a long history of use for oppression of blacks; whereas the word “Retarded” has simply fallen into disfavor and is akin to calling someone “Insane” instead of “Pathological”.

Additionally, there are many uses of the word “Retarded” that could apply to, in the words of Rahm Emmanuel, “fucking retarded” liberal activists:

• retard – cause to move more slowly or operate at a slower rate; “This drug will retard your heart rate”
• retard – be delayed
• retard – check: slow the growth or development of; “The brain damage will retard the child’s language development”
• retard – decelerate: lose velocity; move more slowly; “The car decelerated”
• retard – idiot: a person of subnormal intelligence

Source: Princeton Wordnet

Of course, he probably meant the last, but I’m just sayin’.  Don’t forget all the hot water people have found themselves in over the word “niggardly“.

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• Frank Rich misplaces the blame (2)
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• Sarah Palin’s had it rough? Not compared to Hillary Clinton (3)
• Ross Douthat on Sarah Palin: is this the best the Times can do? (0)