Posted on 11/14/2008 3:46:26 PM PST by lewisglad
Attacks on Gov. Sarah Palin by McCain campaign staff at first appear to be a case of making her a convenient scapegoat, but the attacks have a more devious motive. This post-election barrage is the first volley of the campaign to choose the Republican nominee in 2012. The Washington, D.C. based establishment that rules the GOP wants her career over now. She threatens them.
Firefighting 101 teaches it is easier to stomp out a wildfire when it is small. Don’t allow the fire to grow, spread and become an inferno. Sarah Palin was the spark of McCain’s reform campaign. She ignited the campaign and gave the reform message legitimacy.
Those knifing Palin are the old-guard Republicans who don’t want to see her as the nominee in 2012. The old-guard GOP candidates are likely Gov. Haley Barbour or former Gov. Mitt Romney.
Sarah Palin brought a vibrant, fresh face to the Republican Party. The GOP elitists saw how she easily connected with voters. Palin drew huge crowds of up to 70,000 people anxious to see and hear her. The crowds flocking to see Gov. Palin bond with her culturally. She has the potential to garner Obama- or Reagan-like devotion.
The Republican Party needs this grassroots energy and her reform agenda after a decade of broken promises and the disappointing Bush presidency.
Looking back at history, you see resemblances of Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan in Palin. Both Thatcher and Reagan were dismissed and insulted by their own party stalwarts. “Useful idiot” was a term once leveled at President Reagan.
Palin hails from Wasilla, Alaska; Margaret Thatcher grew up in the apartment over her family’s grocery store in a small town in England. Thatcher’s father taught her never to do things because other people were doing them. He said, “Do what you think is right and then persuade others to follow you.” Like Thatcher, Palin’s political philosophy and economic policies emphasize reduced government intervention, free markets and entrepreneurialism.
Margaret Thatcher was willing to take a hard line and earned the nickname “Iron Lady” for her tough-talking rhetoric defiantly opposing the Soviet Union. Likewise, Palin is tough enough to stand up to present-day threats. While Thatcher earned the moniker of ‘Attila the Hen,” Palin calls herself a “Pit-bull with Lipstick” and others dub her “Sarah Barracuda.”
Human, likeable, personable and witty like Reagan, with loads of common sense and confidence, Sarah Palin lives what she believes. And the camera loves her as it loved Ronald Reagan.
Grass-roots efforts are sure to encourage Palin to run in for president in 2012. Meanwhile, she trusts a higher power, saying she is, “Putting my life in my creator’s hands—that is what I always do.” She also said, “I’m like, God, if there is an open door for me somewhere, this is what I always pray, …don’t let me miss the open door…And if there is an open door in ’12 or four years later, and if it is something that is going to be good for my family, for my state, for my nation, an opportunity for me, then I’ll plow through that door.”
This rising star is now too bright to be extinguished by attempts at sabotage. She has addressed the criticism, setting the record straight concerning the purchase of clothes for herself and her family by the Republican National Committee, saying, “Those are the RNC’s clothes, they are not my clothes. I never forced anybody to buy anything. I never asked for anything more than maybe a Diet Dr Pepper every once in a while.” And then there’s the ridiculous rumors regarding the debate prep about NAFTA and Africa. Palin summed it up well, calling it “cruel, it’s mean-spirited, it’s immature, and it’s unprofessional,” and said, “Those guys are jerks if they came away with it taking thing out of context, then tried to spread something on national news.”
Yet Palin realizes criticism is to be expected in politics. “Your life is an open book and you open yourself up to criticism and you’d better be ready to take that criticism,” she said. “In other words, don’t run for office if you can’t handle it.”
Those staffers guilty of anonymous attacks are cowards. Their agenda to control the GOP needs to be seen for what it is — an attempt to kill the career of Sarah Palin because it threatens them. Americans can see through the falsehoods and love the real Sarah Palin. Nearly 400 letters arrive daily addressed to Gov. Palin and are now piled high in big bags waiting for her.
She is a great speaker. One of the best on the stump I have ever seen. and she is genuine.
Like I said it is okay to disagree with the Governor on issues. But to make fun of the way she talks and degrade her like you just did.
I really believe the Palin Haters on Free Republic need to find another web site and another party.
Huckabee is unelectable on a national stage simply because of his name and looks...sorry, we're living in the age of image over substance. Palin was probably not allowed to go off-script too much about anything, economics included. Not all presidents are economists, especially “professors” of economics as you are. Do you think Obama’s ideas were great? I would much rather have someone who didn't have as much of a cerebral nature as they did an instinct for basic budgeting and common sense. I am afraid good conservatives will never see the light of day to the avg American as the media will no longer allow it. Let's hope the death of the MSM( the liberal democrat media) is at hand!
Palin was raised in a house of teachers and I doubt very much she is not curious as you say. Don't you as a teacher try to teach your own children about EVERYthing and encourage them to read widely and be well-rounded? My mom and dad both had teacher parents and were always reading and looking deeper into things, as I would expect Sarah does. There will be plenty of time now for her to focus more of her attention on national, and international issues.
I remember, speaking of being “curious” that Colin Powell called Obama intellectually curious. I would say he was curious pretty much exclusively to the Marxist left & I see no evidence of his curiosity anywhere else.
Too bad Newt couldn't make it past the MSM death squads!
It will be interesting to see how those issues are developed when Palin isn't constrained by John McCain. When she was his running mate, she had an obligation to avoid showing him up. She is now freed from that.
What's important from a knowledge standpoint isn't so much 'book learning' as a combination of common sense and the humility to recognize the limits thereof. It's been said that every problem has a solution that's simple, obvious, and wrong. Thus, one should not always insist that the apparent 'common sense' solution to every problem is the right one. On the other hand, if a proposed solution would seem to defy common sense, one should look closely to ensure that it really is a solution.
Even more important than those things, however, is an ability to identify good and bad people. Common sense plays a big role in that, but the political world is infested with communist moles. Any Republican who knowingly or unknowingly gives power to such moles will seriously undermine himself and his party.
It is relevant for those of us who are against amnesty for illegals. Weren’t you a Duncan Hunter supporter? How can you possibly claim this is irrelevant? She is acting like Huckabee 2.0.
Here are two other sources of her stated belief
As governor, how do you deal with them? Do you think they all should be deported?
There is no way that in the US we would roundup every illegal immigrant -there are about 12 million of the illegal immigrants- not only economically is that just an impossibility but that’s not a humane way anyway to deal with the issue that we face with illegal immigration.
http://hotair.com/archives/2008/10/22/palin-i-support-a-path-to-citizenship-for-illegals/
It’s a subject the Alaska governor has never mentioned before. But listening to what she said didn’t clarify much. Her answers were very cautious and were designed, like those of McCain, to take a middle road that leaves their specific immigration reform policy unclear.
Palin told Univision’s Jorge Ramos that it would be impossible to deport 12 million undocumented immigrants, saying that “not only economically is that just an impossibility but that’s not a humane way anyway to deal with the issue that we face with illegal immigration.”
Asked whether she would support an “amnesty,” she said, “Not total amnesty. You know, people have got to follow the rules. They’ve got to follow the bar, and we have got to make sure that there is equal opportunity and those who are here legally should be first in line for services being provided and those opportunities that this great country provides.”
In another part of the interview, however, Palin said that she supports a path to citizenship for the undocumented. “I understand why people would want to be in America. To seek the safety and prosperity, the opportunities, the health that is here. It is so important that yes, people follow the rules so that people can be treated equally and fairly in this country.”
“someone who can speak intelligently about economics”
Don’t think that exists.
That's because she's never been asked in-depth national security and policy questions, other than the interview with ABC's Gibson, which she handled quite well.
2) She can't speak intelligently about economic policy. She appears to know even less about economics than McCain.
You have no proof of that. During the VP debate, she did let people know that those who willingly signed onto sub-prime mortgages should take responsibility as well. There are reports that she opposed the original bailout.
3) She couldn't speak intelligently about the financial crisis, beyond parroting platitudes about "greed and corruption on Wall Street," which...
That's not really her job as the VP nominee. That's McCain's job to set the message. She works for him, remember?
4)Betrays a perverse tendency to succumb to economic populism, like Huckabee.
I didn't see it. The deal she got for Alaskans from the oil companies for example was negotiating with the oil companies to make sure the people received their dividends as they were supposed to under the state constitution. IMO she's a far better free marketeer than Huckster.
5) Favors amnesty for illegals.
Post a link specifically where Gov Palin supported amnesty. This is part of the reason why I'm glad McCain lost. If McCain would have went through with amnesty, it would have damaged her own bid to run in 2012. But for the most part, illegal immigration was a non-issue this election.
6) Beyond a few small, token purely symbolic spending cuts, she hasn't governed as a fiscal conservative.
She has held the line on spending both as a Mayor and as a Governor. Her state isn't facing a deficit like 40 other states.
Beyond her being pro-life and pro-gun, there is very little to like about her.
You're kidding, right? Palin's story is classic Horatio Alger material. This woman pulled her ownself up by her bootstraps and made a name for herself. There was no Title IXX or no NOW speaking on her behalf.
What’s your point?
That Moderates are pure evil?
She couldn’t win with 1/3 of the Party against her.
If the Governor can’t bring her Republican opponents around
I’ve greatly misjudged her LOL!
In fact I think she can do even better than that- and has to.
There is no doubt that the Vichy Republicans want to end the Palin thing right now. Bury her and her ilk and move left trying to gain the support of blacks and hispanics.
These Vichy Republicans want to expand their own power with the help of minority groups who...won’t vote for republicans anyway. They are of the big tent theory which is an abysmal failure. The point being that these minority groups see what the leadership has done to the republican base, do they honestly think that given the chance, that they won’t do it to them.
These minority groups have been repeatedly double dealt by the democRATS, and they have come to expect it. Why would they leave the democRATS to get the same treatment from the Republicans?
They know full well that she whipped the GOP in Alaska and the changes she made when she won and they fear the same thing. I, too, pray for her safety and success.
“There is no way that in the US we would roundup every illegal immigrant -there are about 12 million of the illegal immigrants-”
I do not disagree with that....we can’t roundup ALL of them.
The poster I replied to said she wants AMNESTY. She said no such thing. We need to hear more from her on this subject for sure, but trying to make her sound like she’s saying something she’s not just puts us in Katie Couric’s league. No thanks.
Did Gov. Palin have criminal illegal aliens working on
her Alaska illegal alien sanctuary, as did Romney over two years
at his Belmont MA illegal alien sanctuary?
If you're referring to the National Review cruise, may I point out that that was advertised many, many months ago (how many I don't know -- I don't keep back copies as a rule) and would have been booked months in advance of the election. If my household budget AND vacation leave allowed it, I'd have been tempted to book the cruise myself.
One of these years I still might.
You admit that 1/3 of the GOP backstabbed the rest
during the Election2008, thereby throwing it to Obama.
Correct.
She said she wants illegals to have a path to citizenship.
That’s amnesty. Don’t deny it because you like her. I like her too, but that doesn’t mean she is qualified to be president.
There was a time when posters here could be honest. McCain and all the others got smoked out for this kind of talk but because Sarah has become the conservative version of Obama we are no longer allowed to investigate her positions. Anyone who does gets personally attacked and threatened by the cyber lynch mob. It is SHAMEFUL behavior and does a disservice to the conservative movement and FR.
As much as I dislike the depths to which the FR flamewars are descending these days (and someday I may leave in disgust), I think it's more important to have all sides heard here.
(If there were to be a purge, I'd purge those who go overboard -- as happens from time to time in the Religion forum, for all that we still have calm ecumenical discussions crossing "warring" factions there. But this is not my call.)
The vast majority of Palin haters on FR are not disagreeing with her on policy. They are making comments about her Religion, the way she talks, ect.
that is why i think they need branded as trolls.
Go easy on the Palin thing. Let things play out for a while. Let the Mitt-heads and the Hucksters prattle on about how Sarah is not qualified. She has done her best work out of the spotlight, so let her do her thing and in a year or two, after she’s gotten a better grasp on what the game that’s being played is, and what the rules are, she can come back on the stage and run rings around the rest of these Vichy Republican pretenders. She’s a quick study.
I do believe that she was unprepared for the national stage. Not that she isn’t capable, but simply she wasn’t looking beyond the job at hand (governor). Then McCain taps her for VP and she’s thrown in with the lions. She did pretty well considering, but she got scratched up pretty good too.
To see Republicans attacking her when she has more than a few enemies on the other side is disgusting. I am all for questioning her policy positions or whatever.
but the blatent hard core anti Palin attitude I see is not rational or based in reason.
She's a Christian, and some FReepers, who haven't been saved themselves or want the GOP to represent a strain of Godless libertarianism, is clearly uncomfortable with that. Hence the anger and outrage at Gov Palin.
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