Meritocracy to Mediocrity

Lately it occurs to me,
What a long, strange trip it's been
--Truckin', Grateful Dead

Over men and horses hoops and garters
Lastly through a hogshead of real fire!
In this way Mr. K. will challenge the world!
--Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite,
The Beatles

Instead of trying to build newer and bigger
weapons of destruction,
we should be thinking about getting more use
out of the ones we already have
--Deep Thoughts, Jack Handey
____________________

Sarah Palin, poster child for a new America, was recently given a forum in which to express her scatter-gun anti-Iran thoughts in that paean to journalistic mediocrity, USA Today ("Palin: It's Time to Get Tough on Iran.")

Her lede falls flat precisely because of its hypocrisy:

"Iran continues to defy the international community in its drive to acquire nuclear weapons. Arab leaders in the region rightly fear a nuclear-armed Iran. We suspected this before, but now we know for sure because of leaked diplomatic cables."

So, La Palin brands Wikileaks founder Julian Assange a traitor and a terrorist for his document leakage, but has no qualms about using data acquired by the same dirty deed. Apparently, irony is a lost art among those who hail from the Great White North. Or maybe it is just that expediency trumps consistency.

How do you say, "hypocrite"?