August 2, 2004

Muzzles, Botox, and baffle gab.

Zell Miller turned in a sharp performance on "Meet the Press" yesterday:
Oh, the Democrats have changed. This time, it's the Democrats who have the party of division and diversion. Have you ever seen anything like this Democratic convention? We've been going to them for a long time. This is the first time I've ever seen the speakers issued muzzles before they went up to the speaking platform. I mean, you have to give them a C+, I guess, for discipline, but it was a convention that was completely deceptive in every way. Somebody back in Georgia said that it's the Botox convention: cosmetically enhanced. ...

I found [Kerry's] speech amazingly evasive. It was the same gobbledegook, same baffle gab that you have always heard from John Kerry. He said that he had a plan for Iraq, but then he never got around to telling you what that plan was. He said that he was going to increase troops by 40,000, and special ops, he was going to double, but I'm not going to send them to Iraq. I don't know exactly where he stands on these things still.
Miller is an excellent speaker, and he seems to represent a style of thinking characteristic of his region of the South. Some of the things he says sound elegant, but--unlike the quotes I've set out above--don't ring true at all to me. These two things jumped out at me:
[H]ow can a person say that they are for American values and for the American family whenever they vote or not vote but oppose an amendment to the Constitution that would define marriage as a union between man and woman?

How can a person ... talk about the glory of Old Glory [when] they voted three times .... against an amendment that would have protected the flag against abuse?

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