Posted on 08/30/2008 5:38:54 AM PDT by cgk
The hostess with the moosest
Mark Steyn
Over in the Frumistan province of the NR caliphate, our pal David is not happy about the Palin pick. I am - for several reasons.
First, Governor Palin is not merely, as Jay describes her, "all-American", but hyper-American. What other country in the developed world produces beauty queens who hunt caribou and serve up a terrific moose stew? As an immigrant, I'm not saying I came to the United States purely to meet chicks like that, but it was certainly high on my list of priorities. And for the gun-totin' Miss Wasilla then to go on to become Governor while having five kids makes it an even more uniquely American story. Next to her resume, a guy who's done nothing but serve in the phony-baloney job of "community organizer" and write multiple autobiographies looks like just another creepily self-absorbed lifelong member of the full-time political class that infests every advanced democracy.
Second, it can't be in Senator Obama's interest for the punditocracy to spends its time arguing about whether the Republicans' vice-presidential pick is "even more" inexperienced than the Democrats' presidential one.
Third, real people don't define "experience" as appearing on unwatched Sunday-morning talk shows every week for 35 years and having been around long enough to have got both the War on Terror and the Cold War wrong. (On the first point, at the Gun Owners of New Hampshire dinner in the 2000 campaign, I remember Orrin Hatch telling me sadly that he was stunned to discover how few Granite State voters knew who he was.) Sarah Palin and Barack Obama are more or less the same age, but Governor Palin has run a state and a town and a commercial fishing operation, whereas (to reprise a famous line on the Rev Jackson) Senator Obama ain't run nothin' but his mouth. She's done the stuff he's merely a poseur about. Post-partisan? She took on her own party's corrupt political culture directly while Obama was sucking up to Wright and Ayers and being just another get-along Chicago machine pol (see his campaign's thuggish attempt to throttle Stanley Kurtz and Milt Rosenberg on WGN the other night).
Fourth, Governor Palin has what the British Labour Party politician Denis Healy likes to call a "hinterland" - a life beyond politics. Whenever Senator Obama attempts anything non-political (such as bowling), he comes over like a visiting dignitary to a foreign country getting shanghaied into some impenetrable local folk ritual. Sarah Palin isn't just on the right side of the issues intellectually. She won't need the usual stage-managed "hunting" trip to reassure gun owners: she's lived the Second Amendment all her life. Likewise, on abortion, we're often told it's easy to be against it in principle but what if you were a woman facing a difficult birth or a handicapped child? Been there, done that.
Fifth, she complicates all the laziest Democrat pieties. Energy? Unlike Biden and Obama, she's been to ANWR and, like most Alaskans, supports drilling there.
Sixth (see Kathleen's link to Craig Ferguson), I kinda like the whole naughty librarian vibe.
The images of her with the AR-15 appear to be a training simulator, not an actual firearm.
Excellent contrast!
And.... he “ain’t” bad either!
That is the best line of the month. The first paragraph pretty much sums up my thoughts.
Mark, come back! We miss you so much.
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus
The Bible admonishes us not to cast pearls before swine. That applies here.
McCain is one of the reasons I had lost most of my enthusiasm for politics, but he has done much to redeem himself with his first Executive decision. Well done, John!
Good point. I would also note that Gov. Palin has a son who will soon be in Iraq; Sen McCain has on there now. With kids on the line, I trust their judgement to make decisons to deploy our troops more than Obama. To be fair, I do believe I read that Sen. Biden has a son in or on his way to Iraq. But given his repeated gaffes, and liberal politics, I’m not a fan...
Craig Ferguson was Hilarious! Sarah the Naughty Librarian! - hey, a new way to win over the 20 year old guys who know nothing anyway!
Steyn’s Obama: “creepily self-absorbed lifelong member of the full-time political class”
CSALMFTPC for short. Damn Anagrams...never work when you need one.
Well I watched a video of her firing off a short burst in full auto. It has been posted around and looks like a video made by a military camera, like when she visited a base or maybe in Iraq.
Well I watched a video of her firing off a short burst in full auto. It has been posted around and looks like a video made by a military camera, like when she visited a base or maybe in Iraq.
I understand he's part Eskimo. I'm not too sure which part, but it's probably the part that would throw a harpoon up your butt.
Same here.
Thanks for the link.
That is one P.O.’d bunch of ex-democrat voters!
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Oh I understand now, thanks for the correction. They didn’t have those when I was in the USMC in the 60s.
I like her and we need someone different from the normal Rino for this country’s future.
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