Posted on 07/11/2010 6:15:01 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
If she does run for president, her path will be more complicated than her true believers realize.
Andrew Sullivan has a good roundup of some of the recent punditry about Sarah Palin and the 2012 Republican presidential nomination. I've given my position before: Anyone who thinks she has it locked up is nuts, and anyone who thinks that there's zero possibility of her winning is also nuts. But that does raise the question: What can we know now? What should we ignore? And by the way, how does the nomination process work, anyhow?
First: We can't know what's in any candidate's head. Anyone who tells you that they're certain that Palin is "really" just in it for the money, or is "really" power-crazed and only cares about getting elected, is actually just guessing. My advice: Anyone who tells you they're sure about stuff like this is someone to usually skip.
Second: We don't know what she really wants, but we can say that she's doing the things now that a presidential candidate in her position would do. I'm comfortable with saying that she's currently running for president (along with Romney, Pawlenty and others). Or, as Josh Putnam would but it, she's running for 2012, whether or not she'll be running in 2012. That description would have fit Hillary Clinton and John Edwards -- and Al Gore and John Kerry -- in 2005-2006.
Third: Presidential nominations are ... I need a word not quite as strong as "controlled," but much stronger than "influenced" ... .by political party leaders. See below, for an explanation. What that means is that it's very unlikely that a candidate disliked by party leaders could actually get herself nominated. If party leaders don't want Palin -- and I think they'd be nuts to want her, but that doesn't mean they won't -- then they'll have little trouble keeping the nomination from her. The best recent example of this was the fate of Mike Huckabee in 2008, but another reasonable example is Dan Quayle's failed bid for the 2000 nomination, when various conservative opinion leaders who had been quick to defend Quayle up to that point did not take his candidacy seriously, and it quickly ended. If Republican leaders don't want Palin, you'll start hearing negative stories about her on Fox News, and from leading conservative talk shows and blogs, and enthusiastic conservatives will turn elsewhere.
Fourth: A useful reminder: Many conservatives are enthusiastic about Sarah Palin in the context of Palin vs. Obama. But in 2011 and 2012, if she's actively campaigning, she won't be running against Obama; she'll be running against Romney, Pawlenty and other conservatives. Yes, some of those other candidates aren't exactly household names, or able to elicit the kind of enthusiasm among conservatives that Palin has now, but give them some positive buzz from Rush and Hannity and the rest, and that can be created real fast.
(By the way -- that doesn' t just happen on the right, and Hillary Clinton found out the hard way.)
Fifth and last: I recommend moving anyone who predicts that the Sage of Wasilla will repeat as V.P. nominee to the bottom of your reading list. Really, she might be president, she might be the next Oprah, she might be the first woman on the moon, but there's just no way that anyone is going to select her as their running mate after the way she treated the McCain campaign.
Now, bonus content: Presidential Nomination Process 101. I said that nominations are controlled by "party leaders." That does not mean that a handful of people sit down in a room in Washington and dictate the nomination. What it means is that quite a few people, including the leaders of party-aligned interest groups, local and state party leaders, big donors, opinion leaders, major politicians at the state and national levels, and ordinary activists, collectively try to come to a decision. The role of the voters over the last couple of decades has been three things. First, and most basically, voters ratify the decisions of party leaders. Second, in cases in which party leaders split, voters may determine the outcome. And, third, it appears that party leaders sometimes use voters in the early primaries and caucuses to test how a candidate they are considering supporting will play with the electorate. So Howard Dean failed that test in Iowa in 2004, while Barack Obama passed it in 2008. Those insiders narrow down the field during the "invisible primary" -- hey, wait, that's happening right now! That's why, for example, by the time the voters started choosing in 2008 such reasonable-on-paper candidates as Joe Biden, Chris Dodd and Bill Richardson were reduced to asterisks; they had already been winnowed out before anyone even voted.
OK, that's what we do know. What we -- that is, what political scientists -- don't really know is which party leaders are the most influential in any one party at any one time. We're much better at figuring that sort of thing out after the fact. So there's plenty of scope for good reporting, especially over the next year or so when things are beginning to matter. Things such as the National Journal's insiders poll are helpful; campaign finance reports will start being helpful; endorsements are helpful. But it's also helpful to poke around aggressively to find out which interest group leaders are thought of as serious players and which are resting on their reputations; which state and local party people carry resources with their endorsements; which Washingtonians are really plugged in to conservative networks, and which are just repeating stale conventional wisdom. Good reporters can get to that kind of stuff as it's happening. So my advice is to pay attention to reporters and pundits who seem to know what they're talking about when it comes to the Republican Party network, and less attention to those who think they know what's in Sarah Palin's head.
:-)
So you helped Obama get elected?
- JP
One thing for sure is you're neither......
You've been here since 2008, and your name isn't on the FR donors list.
So, unless you feel the need to drive FReeper donors away in the middle of a FReepathon...
and take raybbr with you.
It's an unspoken rule that posters must ping people when they talk about them.
You might take that troll on the other thread too, he just signed up today.
What troll? Are you badmouthing donna?
Zactly.
Yet I voted for the most conservative candidate available to me on the general election ballot.
Isn't that the course of action all you "pragmatists" (i.e., Republican Party operatives) advocate?
You truly *are* dense, aren't you? Let me explain to you: Not all Republicans are conservatives, (DUH)
BUT, EVERY CONSERVATIVE HOLDING NATIONAL PUBLIC OFFICE *IS* holding it as a REPUBLICAN!
Understand now, third party troll?
He can't understand, he isn't really a conservative.........he just plays one so he can be noticed.
Bwahahahahahahahahahaha
*Gasping for breath
Bwahahahahahahahahahahahahaha.
How can someone vote for a person who thinks US black ops were responsible for the Haitian earthquake?
Short answer: You'd have to be a loon.
You’re out of line. Bad form.
Free Republic is the premier online gathering place for independent, grass-roots conservatism on the web. We're working to roll back decades of governmental largesse, to root out political fraud and corruption, and to champion causes which further conservatism in America. And we always have fun doing it. Hoo-yah!
If you have ever been around politicians you know how insanely ambitious they are. The insanity, however, does not come out until they have a chance to win an important office. Nr does it manifest itself in obvious ways. Looking at someone like the governor of Minnesota, for instance, you would neve know that he probably would sell his oldest son/daughter in order to win the Presidency, or at least seriously consider an offer. ;-)
Plain seems to be one of those intuitive politicians. Like Lincoln, although her style is totally different. Lincoln learned by doing, and she seems to be the same. He was a writer and she seems not to be one. He was a legislator; she has never done that. He was a cautious man, always looking for an opening. She is maybe bolder. I know a lot more about Lincoln than I do Palin, or at least I know a lot of what men have wriitten about Lincoln, and little about Palin. But she seems to be able quickly to size up a situation, and so far has been remarkably sure-footed.
LOL, I have only one thing to say on this subject:
You Talkin' To Me?
Jonathan Berns ... whatever ...; here's someone who has actually been on another planet for the past two years.
How could you vote for someone who joined with John Kerry to abandon and betray U.S. POWs and MIAs in Vietnam in order to curry favor with the Communist government of Vietnam?
I will vote for someone who is emotionally disturbed before I vote for someone who stabs my fellow countrymen in the back.
I will vote for Baldwin every time before I ever support that two-faced Rat bastard McCain!
You can take that all the way to the bank.
The way she treated the McCain Campaign? This is a glimpse into how these useful fools in the media will spin it with an extra helping of lies. They are taking that car for its last joyride before it hits the junkyard of history. As a former journalism major, I am sick at what our media has become.
I would appreciate it if you kept the dialog on the subject of Jonathan Bernstein’s opinion piece.
Your questions about those who I describe as suffering from Palin Derangement Syndrome, pierce through the deception I see really at play. I have many times asked them who do they want to win in 2012? The never have an answer. Never.
Why they never have an answer is because their game is entirely focused on seeing Republicans loose in 2012. All they do is throw out the same old attacks which sabotages the discussion of the issues being addressed with the post. With the issues not discussed, there is no longer any learning process and the marketing of our ideas to the rest of the Ethernet.
They could just as well be working for Zer0. By the way, if Zer0 does get reelected, they will be working for Zer0.
Do you agree with Jonathan Bernstein's statement? Do you think it is an accurate description of how the "party leaders" in the Republican Party will treat Sarah Palin?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.