Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

When we show up, we win.

Whatever happens next week, the fight doesn’t end.

Republicans don’t want a speaker to lead them; they want a hostage.

Every day Vance writes another chapter in the book called “Worst VP Pick Ever”.

This must be what justice looks like, not vengeful, just peaceful exuberance.

Fundamental belief of white supremacy: white people are presumed innocent, minorities are presumed guilty.

‘Museums aren’t America’s attic for its racist shit.’

Hi god, it’s us. Thanks a heap, you’re having a great week and it’s only Thursday!

I also would like a pony to improve my balloon juice experience.

I conferred with the team and they all agree – still not tired of winning!

This has so much WTF written all over it that it is hard to comprehend.

When someone says they “love freedom”, rest assured they don’t mean yours.

… pundit janitors mopping up after the gop

The worst democrat is better than the best republican.

I really should read my own blog.

A democracy can’t function when people can’t distinguish facts from lies.

Motto for the House: Flip 5 and lose none.

There is one struggling party in US right now, and it’s not the Democrats.

We won’t go back.

An unpunished coup is a training exercise.

Sadly, media malpractice has become standard practice.

Baby steps, because the Republican Party is full of angry babies.

Trump’s legal defense is going to be a dumpster fire inside a clown car on a derailing train.

Republicans: “Abortion is murder but you can take a bus to get one.” Easy peasy.

You are here: Home / What is Wrong With People?

What is Wrong With People?

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It goes without saying that this is outrageous and wrong:

Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin’s home church was badly damaged by arson, leading the governor to apologize Saturday if the fire was connected to “undeserved negative attention” from her campaign as the Republican vice presidential nominee.

Damage to the Wasilla Bible Church was estimated at $1 million, authorities said. No one was injured in the fire, which was set Friday night while a handful of people, including two children, were inside, according to James Steele, the Central Mat-Su fire chief.

What were these scumbags thinking?

Reader Interactions

73Comments

  3. 3.

    TR

    Whoever set this — inside job, outside job — needs to be thrown in jail forever. Jesus Christ, there were kids inside.

  5. 5.

    P. Noonan

    Would it be irresponsible to suggest a parallel with a Godwin’s Law invoking fire in Germany in the 1930’s?

  7. 7.

    Midwest Meg

    A lot of my fellow political junkies may immediately wonder about the possible political motives to the suspected arson at Pallin’s church. And indeed a whole lot of black churches in the south were absolutely burned down for political reasons.

    But in my experience, as a life-long church girl, most acts of arson at a church are due to:

    a) burglars looking for cash, computers, video or sound equipment who then set a fire to cover up the burglary. I know. Setting a fire to cover up a burglary is dumb, but it happens.

    b) teenage vandals who do it for kicks or a drunk who breaks in to sleep for the night, gets cold (because churches keep their buildings awfully cool at night) and starts a fire to get warm. Churches have multiple groups and members using the building and they don’t always lock up properly.

    c) church members who are pissed at the church. Or the pastor. Or the youth minister. Or the choir director. Hell hath no fury like a church member scorned. People often come to the church in crisis—this is especially true for Pentacostal churches like Pallin’s— because their marriage is breaking up, their finances are in disarray, they can’t stay sober, etc, etc. A lot of times these folks have a long history of mental problems. Sometimes they find "salvation." only to feel betrayed by the church. Then they light fires.

    My mother’s evangelical church once two acts of arson— they had cleaned up after the first fire and then six months, it happened again. Both fires were started in the choir room with gas thrown on choir robes. The damage was over a million dollars and in order to keep their insurance, the church had to put in an extremely vigilant alarm and security system, complete with sprinklers everywhere—-which was a pain because so many people used the building at all hours of the night–and which the church couldn’t afford because of all the previous damage. But they borrowed the money and installed the system. A year later, a third fire was set, but thanks to the system, it was caught early. The church never did figure out who caused the fires. The fire investigator said whoever was doing it probably moved on or moved out of the metro area.

    d) insurance money—but this is more rare than you’d think, mainly because there’s no one person who would personally profit from it.

  9. 9.

    LiberalTarian

    But, the fires are generating sympathy for Palin and the evangelicals, aren’t they? I agree with Midwest Meg though, the simplest explanation is a native of Wasilla and probably a member (of sorts) of the church.

    Or a demon. ;)

  10. 10.

    Midwest Meg

    Can I add that my own church was nearly destroyed by fire a few years back. The culprit: faulty wiring in the coffee machine in the parish kitchen. Big blaze, yes. But no big drama behind it.

    The other big cause in church fires used to be cigarette butts. But that’s gone down as nearly every church I know now bans smoking on the premises. It was hard on all the AA group in the church basements because AA often has a lot of hard-core smokers. But they got used to it.

  12. 12.

    Doctor Cleveland

    The truth is, none of us know who set this fire and why, and we shouldn’t begin spinning it.

    I hope the people involved are caught. I hope that they are punished, severely, including convictions for multiple counts of attempted murder.

    When those people are caught, I expect that they won’t be affiliated with my politics. I don’t expect people with my politics to do this kind of thing. If they did turn out to be lunatics from my own side of the political spectrum, I would be embarrassed and unhappy. Really that’s all that any of us can say.

    But I don’t know who did this, and can’t imagine a good motive for doing it. So I’m not going to opine on the inexplicably bad reasons of unknown wrongdoers.

  13. 13.

    dbrown

    Only palin the news whore would immediately try to link the fire at the church with her run for VP. Unbelievable considering how often these things do occur and how late in the game this fire occurred (well after all events.) The woman is a joke and a news hog who can only see all events through a prism of her own self created idea of importance.

  14. 14.

    The Grand Panjandrum

    @Doctor Cleveland: Thank you. I agree wholeheartedly with you.

    In the very next post above this one John eviscerates the establishment media for speculation and find shiny objects to entertain themselves.

    I think I will not speculate (and thank you Midwest Meg for some perspective) on what may or may not have happened other than what was reported.

    Whoever did this should be punished.

  15. 15.

    Xenos

    No one knows who did this, yet the wingnuts are already in a froth about the mean liberals. A church full of superstitious and vindictive assholes, and you think ‘liberals’, as a group, are likely to be responsible? Yeah, right.

    How many ‘liberals’ are in Wasilla, anyway? Are they suggesting an A-Team of Biology professors and abortionists were sent by central command to strike terror in the hearts of the Mat-Su citizenry?

  16. 16.

    LiberalTarian

    What about the bomb in Oregon that killed a bomb tech and police officer? It was left in the bushes outside the bank. The reason it didn’t hurt women/children/old people is that it was discovered. Who did that? Will the US media report on it more (since it seems to be getting little coverage, while some idiot Illinois governor sucks all the oxygen out of the room).

    Expect to see a lot more of this. That justice-for-thee-and-not-for-me only gets to much violence-free mileage. If everybody is fat and happy, stuff gets let go. People losing their homes, jobs and standard of living? They get vengeful. Domestic terrorism: not just for abortion clinics anymore?

  18. 18.

    r€nato

    The truth is, none of us know who set this fire and why, and we shouldn’t begin spinning it.

    Amen. (heh)

    but that won’t stop the Malkins and Charles Johnsons from demagoguing it for all its worth.

  19. 19.

    John Cole

    I don’t think I placed blame on anyone. I have no clue who did it, but they are scumbags regardless.

    And I am not blindly speculating that it was arson, as the report said it was suspected arson. I think I have acted responsibly with this.

  21. 21.

    Doctor Cleveland

    John, very obviously you weren’t placing blame on anyone. Your post is perfect.

    And I don’t view the arson thing as speculative, for exactly the reasons you say.

    I was responding, in a general way, to something that was creeping into the comments: an understandable impulse to raise our hands and shout, "I don’t know who did this but it wasn’t us! It wasn’t us!" I know why people want to say that; I felt that instinct, too. But I think it’s important to resist it.

    And yes, Palin’s rush to identify the arsonists as her personal political enemies is part of the same phenomenon. But what Palin does is beyond our control, and what we do is within ours.

  22. 22.

    James

    While I dislike the burning of any structure for any reason, I do not put it past Bible Barbie to hype herself alone as the target/victim of any such act, no matter how few facts exist. I’m waiting for her to stand astride the inauguration crowd in Washington like a Colossus and remind us all how popular she is. See? Using totally disparate events/facts to prove idiotic premises, regardless of relevance, is the Wingnut Way.

  23. 23.

    Cassidy the Racist White Man

    But of course, its Christians so it has to be for insurance. Right El Cid? Bet you wouldn’t be that crass if it was a mosque or some other religious temple.

  26. 26.

    El Cid

    @Cassidy the Racist White Man: Listen, idiot, it’s not crass. Read my f***ing comment, you dolt. Most church fires turn out to be schemes or dissatisfied employees. Maybe that applies to mosques too.

    It’s the result of an FBI investigation of a series of attacks which made a lot of people think that racists were targeting black churches. And the result was that no, the majority of cases were not cases of racist attacks on black (Christian) churches, but, yeah, you wouldn’t know, ’cause you didn’t follow the link and you were only able to use one hand since you had to clutch your rifle tight to do your job defending your family from the War on Christmas.

    On the other hand, maybe you’re just some dolt who occupies his days weeping into your hankie about ‘OMG we Christians are soooooooo oppressed and the mean Libruls just make it worse!’

  27. 27.

    Comrade grumpy realist

    Doesn’t it also depend if the fire was set inside or outside?

    Meh, I’ll chalk this up to "drunk teenager thinking this would be funny" until further evidence emerges.

    Forget where I read it, but someone had a story of the time that he (as a teen) and a bunch of friends thought it would be funny to go into a convenience store late at night and yell: "All right, this is a robbery! Get down on the floor NOW!"

    Given the amount of heat that storeowners often keep behind the counter, I’m surprised that this guy wasn’t the instant winner of a Darwin Award.

  28. 28.

    LiberalTarian

    Well, if it was caused by faulty wiring, will Palin announce to the world that she is sorry she brought suspicion of her political enemies? Seems unlikely.

    Whatever. It is too bad there was a fire. Always a bad thing. I hope it wasn’t arson.

  33. 33.

    TheHatOnMyCat

    WASHINGTON (FEMA) — Everyday brings news of a serious national problem – arson. This year, Arson Awareness Week, May 5-12, focuses on juvenile firesetting because young people currently represent about 55 percent of arson arrests, according to the U.S. Fire Administration (USFA), a part of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA).
    "Arson is not a hidden crime. It’s murder by fire, a violent crime against property and people. Every year arson kills 700 people, destroys 100,000 buildings and costs more than $1.4 billion," U.S. Fire Administrator Carrye Brown said. "There are, however, effective ways citizens, along with law enforcement and the fire service, can ensure the culprits are brought to justice."
    Brown said that everyone should take steps to prevent arson in their communities. Arson exists in various forms — juvenile firesetting, vandalism, pyromania, a murder weapon, and concealment of a crime. "We must identify the faces of arson. In addition to kids setting fires, incidents of adult firesetting are increasing, " she said.

    Most arson appears to be kids, vandalism and pyromania.

    That said, there are apparently a multitude of motives and scenarios possible.

    Knowing what we do now .. which is basically, nothing …

    "We have no idea what caused it," the Rev. Larry Kroon of the Wasilla Bible Church said Saturday, adding that investigators were considering arson and other possible causes.

    …what good does it do to speculate and bloviate about it?

    "It’s hard to say at this point. Everything is just speculation," he said. "We have no information on intent or motive."
    Steele would not comment on the means used to set the fire.
    Pastor Larry Kroon declined to say whether the church had received any recent threats.
    "There are so many variables," he said. "I don’t want to comment in that direction."

    So, what we have here is a dog bites man story, with a touch of "what’s the matter with kids today?"

    Kids were setting fires when I was a kid. They will be setting fires when your grandkids have kids.

    For more, see Our Lady of Angels Chicago School Fire, 1958.

  34. 34.

    The Raven

    My intuition is that it’ll turn out to be a church member. The church has been selling violence in the Cause for some time, and that attracts violent people. More food for corvids. Krawk!

  36. 36.

    Cassidy the Racist White Man

    @El Cid: Get a grip you moran. I haven’t been a practicing Christian in years. Although, I do balk at that Festivus and Kwanza crap as they aren’t real holidays and only celebrated by dumbasses with nothing better to do than wear their "I’m not a Christian/ imperialist American" patch for all to see.

    I just think it’s funny that the knee jerk reaction is that Christians must be doing it for insurance or whatever reason to blame the victim, but if this story was about a mosque or temple, I’d be reading 100 screeds on racist right wingers and how oppressive we Americans are and other such stupid shit.

  37. 37.

    demimondian

    @El Cid: Fooey, dude. Right below you, someone who knows church fires in particular quoted extensively about their cause, and pointed out that the most common cause of business arson doesn’t apply to churches, as no one person will benefit financially. In this case, CtRWM is right — there are lots of reasons that this church might have been targeted, but arson for insurance isn’t one of the more likely, least of all the most likely of them.

  41. 41.

    Church Lady

    It was a while back, but a rash of fires were set at three or four black churches in Alabama and, I think, Mississippi. Cable news was all over it – were the battles of the civil rights era being refought, etc. Turned out to be a couple of dumb ass teenagers. They had accidentally set the first one, and then set the subsequent ones to try to cover up the first. Strange.

  42. 42.

    Eric U.

    I went to my mom’s house for the first time in a few years, and the church across the street looked a little different. Turned out that it had burned to the ground. They were too big for the church, parked all over the neighborhood, made a lot of noise every night of the week. They had planned on building another building elsewhere, but no such luck. Turns out the only thing standing after the fire was a cross on top of a pillar of brick that was 10 feet away from everything that was on fire. So of course that was a sign from god to rebuild the church as it had been.

    Who knows in Wasilla, maybe it was a witch. I hear they are fighting witches in that church, do they expect the witches not to fight back?

  43. 43.

    differnt church-lady

    Bezus, Sarah, it is NOT ALL ABOUT YOU!

    Nobody wants to hear about a church burning, but crikes, are you all missing yet another spectacular display of narcissism from the hockey mom?

    Nobody presents any evidence that it’s related to Palin, but she feels compelled to apologize because it obviously gotta be because people hate her? Could your right wing persecution complex get any more bizarre, Sarah?

    Or is this just another clever (or pathalogical) flip: something bad happens, let’s try to leverage it into sympathy for me and hatred for my enemies.

  44. 44.

    timb

    I like how Sarah immediately uses it to her advantage. Jesus, she’s Nixon wrapped up with Reagan with an homage to Lee Atwater. Everything enables her to attack "enemies," and the best enemies, in Nixonland tradition, are the ones the reader/viewer imagines.

    She is one dangerous politician.

  45. 45.

    jrg

    Was it wrong? Yes, obviously… but not surprising.

    It does not seem like an insurance scam, because there were people inside of the building. This was probably malace, IMO. Wasilla is a small place – I’ll bet that if they don’t find someone within 48 hours, it was likely someone from Wasilla.

    It’s also possible that Bristol Palin’s baby daddy did it, in an effort to delay the wedding. Just my theory. But then again, when you call the majority of Americans unamerican, anything is bound to happen.

  46. 46.

    Hedley Lamarr

    I would not count out God Himself. After all, He torches and tornadoizes lot of southern churches each year.

  47. 47.

    kommrade reproductive vigor

    “undeserved negative attention” from her campaign as the Republican vice presidential nominee.

    At first I thought she was actually apologizing for having the gall to run for the vice presidency. Then I realized she was just using Malkin’s Theorem: When something bad happens, it must be all about ME!

    For her next act she’ll form a militia to hunt down the DFHs who caused the blaze.

  48. 48.

    Xecklothxayyquou Gilchrist

    @jrg: It’s also possible that Bristol Palin’s baby daddy did it, in an effort to delay the wedding.

    Is that thing still going to happen? I thought it was like Bush’s Crawford "ranch" and would be discarded as soon as its value as political theatre went away. I guess it’s a 2012 thing now.

  51. 51.

    LanceThruster

    A false-flag incident is always a possibility. Who benefits?

    Whoever did this is vile, but it seems every attack of late is meant to put the focus on the "usual suspects."

  52. 52.

    gil mann

    I do balk at that Festivus and Kwanza crap as they aren’t real holidays

    Sort of the whole point of Festivus. You do know it’s from Seinfeld, right? People don’t actually worship a Flying Spaghetti Monster either.

    I’m inclined to agree with you about Kwanzaa, but since I live in a black neighborhood yet have never met a single black person who celebrates (or even gives a shit about) it, I’m gonna go ahead and assume that there’s no need to pile on.

  53. 53.

    Mentis Fugit

    The fact people were inside the building at the time rather reduces the likelihood of arson. An arsonist is more likely to target an unoccupied building, even if only to reduce the chance of detection in the act.

    Conversely, people in the building will do things like operate electrical appliances that do not belong to them. And isn’t it rather chilly in Alaska around this time of year?

    Any fire without a clear cause is "suspicious" to the fire services, and has to be investigated as such, but I believe the most probable cause is accidental.

  54. 54.

    Apsaras

    Isn’t this also Barack Obama’s fault? I have evidence that, a few years ago, Barack Obama was out dancing with friends and not only stated that the roof was on fire, but in direct disobedience of municipal fire codes, that they should let that motherfucker burn.

  55. 55.

    AnneLaurie

    Levin said that his study of hundreds of hate crimes found that boredom in teenagers that was fueled by anger and alcohol accounted for 65 percent of the incidents that he has termed, "recreational racism." Levin said, "Lots of young people feel powerless and there’s a sense of dominance in burning down a church. Not all of excessive need for power gets expressed in racism. That’s why you have burnings of white churches."

    Is Wasilla still the meth capital of Alaska?

    Srlsy, props to Midwest Meg and Mentis… I’ll bet a cookie this will turn out to be either a frayed wire on the coffeemaker or somebody getting careless disposing of the cigarette they weren’t allowed to bring into the choir loft.

    And Bible Spice retains her title as America’s Biggest Female Tool.

  56. 56.

    Minima

    Isn’t this also Barack Obama’s fault? I have evidence that, a few years ago, Barack Obama was out dancing with friends and not only stated that the roof was on fire, but in direct disobedience of municipal fire codes, that they should let that motherfucker burn.

    Hahahaha!!!! And we have a winner!

  57. 57.

    [delurk]...[/delurk]

    I realize Caribou Barbie has never read a book in her life, but obviously she heard about the Reichstag Fire somewhere….

  58. 58.

    J sub D

    I’ve no idea of the cause of this fire.

    Some above should ask themselves, if this were the Rev. Wright’s Chicago church that had a fire and arson was suspected, would your comments be similar?

  60. 60.

    Xenos

    @J sub D Yes.

    I admit it would strike me a bit more personally, but if tons of people went about accusing a group of arson without the slightest damn idea about who did it, I would tell them that they are being assholes and ought to shut up pronto.

    Check out the comments on the Washington Post article… 95% of the comments are condemning liberals, gays, and CNN for this clear act of political and religious persecution and terrorism. This is assholery, pure and simple.

  62. 62.

    demimondian

    @J sub D: No, and there’s a good reason for that: the American Right has frequently descended to political violence in the last thirty years, much of it with implicit, if not explicit, support from the religious hierarchs. The left has policed its fringes much better — there’s a reason that Ayers went into hiding with his family, not with political supporters, when the Olympic Park bomber was hidden and supported by political fellow travelers.

    The Left doesn’t have clean hands, but we’ve repudiated political violence. Not so the Right. Pretending otherwise is yet another false equivalence.

  63. 63.

    gil mann

    if this were the Rev. Wright’s Chicago church that had a fire and arson was suspected, would your comments be similar?

    A lot of us would jump to conclusions, yes. Others would take the high road while, it should be said, harboring the same suspicions. Some might even say wildly irresponsible shit in the heat of anger. After all, people are, as Depeche Mode put it, people. I don’t blame anybody for their assumptions, just for their eagerness to make hay.

    Especially Palin. She’s breathtakingly horrid. And the worst part is, I totally admire her talent for demagoguery. She just walked right up to a microphone and said "that was meant for me." That is some Bob Roberts shit right there.

  68. 68.

    HRA

    Before we moved into our new home some years ago, it was set on fire twice and at the same place as well. While reading the comments above, I noticed no one cited volunteer firemen who set fires and are on the scene first. As it happened, the volunteer fireman who set our fires lived next door. We only found out about him through a friend who was also a volunteer fireman. His punishment was visiting a psychiatrist for treatment. Until he moved, it was very unsettling to have him next door.

    Note I am not saying this church fire was arson.

  69. 69.

    Andrew J. Lazarus

    That’s Kwanzaa. Kwanza is the Angolan unit of currency.

    What makes Kwanzaa more made up than Christmas and Easter?

  70. 70.

    John Evans

    There is now a shadow of the Palin’s political career. Can she prove she was not involved in setting this fire? She should immediately come forward and disclose any contacts she may have had with the arsonists. If she doesn’t, then federal investigations should be launched to find out what she’s hiding.

    Why isn’t Sarah Palin telling the truth to the American people about her involvement in his heinous crime?

  73. 73.

    Cassidy the Racist White Man

    @Andrew J. Lazarus: Christmas and Easter actually have roots in an ancient religion, much like Hanukkah and Ramadan. Kwanzaa is some made up BS with roots in a frickin’ classroom..circa 86? if I remember right.

    Here’s the thing. If you don’t want to celebrate the religious aspects of said holiday, that’s cool with me. I don’t have a baby Jesus on my lawn; I’ve got some light up deer. Hell, if you don’t want to celebrate Christmas so you can show everyone your not a Christian, then fine, although I’d say you were an idiot as modern Christmas is no more Christian than Boss’s Day. But, don’t try to sell me on some made up crap, like Kwanzaa or Festivus, that is an ignorant mish mash, attempting to emulate multiple belief systems. It’s drivel for the ignorant and for those who want to show wear their uniqueness on their sleeve, a la Life of Brian.

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