Posted on 07/10/2009 12:37:29 PM PDT by dr_who
Sarah Palin's announcement of her resignation as governor of Alaska may be the end of her political career or, as some speculate, the real beginning. What seems clear is that Palin is not conservatism's new hope but its dead end. In recent days, this has been amply confirmed by the arguments of Palin defenders, focused less on her presumed merits than on her presumed injuries at her enemies' hands.
Thus, Ross Douthat, the new conservative voice at the New York Times, hails Palin as Everywoman—living proof you can aspire to the White House without an Ivy League degree—and deplores her abuse by the political and media elites based on her "gender and social class." The message to other non-elite women with political ambitions, Douthat sums up, is: "Your children will go through the tabloid wringer. Your religion will be mocked and misrepresented. Your political record will be distorted, to better parody your family and your faith."
Yet Douthat admits that Palin's "missteps, scandals, dreadful interviews and self-pitying monologues" tarnished her role as a spunky common woman challenging the elites. But in that case, how much of the harsh treatment was due to prejudice and how much to Palin's own failings?
Yes, Palin has been the target of extremely vicious attacks (though the notion that no other politician has endured comparable nastiness would amuse Bill and Hillary Clinton). Her left-wing feminist foes have been especially rabid, mocking her in startlingly misogynistic language—"Republican blow-up doll" was one of the milder epithets—and denouncing "her pretense that she is a woman." The bizarre theory that Palin's youngest child, Trig, is really her grandson is still afloat in the gutters of the Internet.
And yes, this hostility has an element of snobbery. Former New Republic editor in chief Andrew Sullivan, currently a blogger with a bad case of Palin Derangement Syndrome, recently posted a catalogue of Palin's sins that included "white trash concupiscence."
Yet, such revolting extremes aside, some of the unpleasantness has been self-inflicted. Palin agreed to be John McCain's running mate knowing her teenage daughter was pregnant and single. (Of course, if Chelsea Clinton had been the expecting unwed mom, not one unkind word would have crossed the lips of Rush Limbaugh or Ann Coulter.) Nor was she particularly eager to shield Bristol Palin from the spotlight.
And then there's the matter of Palin's fitness for the second-highest office in the land. I say this as someone who initially hoped she would be an inspiring standard-bearer for conservative/libertarian feminism, a model of a woman who had it all and was a winner, not a victim.
It's not just the "liberal elites" that found Palin clueless; so did many in her own camp. Indeed, Douthat concedes she has to "bone up on the issues" if she is to have a political future. Those who believe Palin held her own debating Joe Biden forget that the McCain camp had requested a less-challenging format for that debate, with follow-up questions limited.
Palin critics on the right—George Will, Peggy Noonan, David Frum—have been slammed by the Palinistas as "haters," elitists threatened by a political star without proper intellectual credentials. Yet these same conservatives have been devout admirers of Ronald Reagan, hardly a product of the Ivy League.
Some of Palin's followers see her as the second coming of Reagan. But Reagan, despised as a "dunce" by his liberal detractors, had extensively read, written, and talked about the key issues of his day. While not an intellectual, he was a man of ideas. Palin is not known to harbor those. Her appeal is described in terms of "speaking from the heart" and exemplifying the virtues of faith and family—which is ironic, given the usual conservative derision of emotion-based liberal politics. Shortly after Palin's nomination, former George W. Bush speechwriter Michael Gerson suggested that her choice to bear a child with Down's Syndrome rather than have an abortion was an adequate substitute for a political philosophy.
If Palin does have a philosophy, it is the flip side of the class-and-culture warfare of which she has been a target. In fact, it was Palin who fired many of the volleys in this war—extolling the moral superiority of small towns and rural areas and calling them "pro-American parts of the country," mocking people who had traveled abroad as spoiled kids with rich parents.
While eschewing "victim feminism," Palin has enthusiastically embraced "victim conservatism": the grievances of cultural traditionalists who feel trampled and disdained by the more educated and influential (and often, more affluent) segments of American society. Like the "oppressed groups" of the left, these traditionalists have some valid complaints but channel them into a destructive ideology of polarization and resentment.
Such a zeal can energize the base—but also fatally split it and alienate the unconverted.
Most likely, Palin will be back. But if conservatives expect her to be their warrior princess in shining armor, they are courting defeat.
Cathy Young is a Reason contributing editor and a columnist at RealClearPolitics. She blogs at cathyyoung.wordpress.com. This article originally appeared at RealClearPolitics.
Yep. I backed you up with the exact quote that the Reagan smearer was trying to misrepresent.
I didn’t spread that crap.
Michael Reagan did.
And he dishonored his father’s legacy by doing it.
There quite a bit that going around lately. And, your not the only one that it troubles.
I know Cathy personally, and she usually has good insights. But this time, she’s way off. BTW, the warrior princess reference is purposeful- she’s a HUGE Xena fan.
Liar. Michael Reagan said noting about "rising from the grave" or "lipstick." Those were your inventions.
Believe it?
I voted YES on Proposition 8.
Have you ever put your vote where your mouth is?
Any more sorry attempts at ‘gotcha’ questions for me?
You either missed the point or I did not make it clear enough. Sarah did work hard. It's that she did not pull herself up the SES ranks in the TRADITIONAL manner (i.e., education). You don't have to like it, and you can fairly call it elitism. However, if you want to help Sarah you need to understand that phenomenon.
Sarah is the true outsider that we need, sure she has some growing to do, it’s summer 2009 for God’s sake, she’ll be fine. I hope she runs.
Palin 2012.
I summed up his sentiment.
But fine, he said his father was ‘bearing children’ not ‘wearing lipstick’.
Is that better? Does that honor Ronald Reagan for you now?
You lied like a cheap rug.
Palin won’t be an outsider by 2012.
She’s packing up the kids and the Dude and is moving to Washington DC or NYC to seek out fame and fortune in the lower 48.
But I suppose you still think Mike Huckabee is an ‘outsider’ too?
Bullshit.
She's resigning because it's what's best for the state.
And it frees her to start campaigning 18 months before everybody else, and get paid for it.
But keep up your sniveling whining. It's what you're good at.
The GOP used to symbolize indiviual freedom for me...
Busted flat in Baton Rouge, waitin' fer a train
When I was feeling nearly faded as my jeans.
Jonny thumbed a diesel down, just before it rained
And rode us all the way to New Orleans.
I pulled my harpoon out of my dirty red bandana.
I was playing soft while Jonny sung the blues, n-yeah
Windshield wipers slapping time I was, holding Johnny GOP's hand in mine
We sang every song that driver knew.
Freedom's just another word for nothing left to loose
Nothing, I mean nothing honey if it ain't free, no no
Yeah feeling good was easy Lord when he sang the blues
You know feeling good was good enough for me.
Good enough for me and my John GOP.
From Kentucky coal mine to the California sun
Yeah John GOP shared the secrets of my soul.
Through all kinds of weather, through everything we done Yeah Johnny baby kept me from the cold world.
One day a near Selina Lord, he slipped away.
He's lookin' for a socialist home, and I hope he finds it.
But I'd trade all of my tomorrows for one single yesterday To be holdin' the old GOP next to me...
Freedom's just another word for nothing left to loose
Nothing, and that's all the GOP left me, yeah.
But feeling good was easy Lord when he sang the blues
Hey feeling good was good enough for me, hmm-mm.
Good enough for me and the old GOP.
None of whom are running for national office, or stand a snowball's chance of getting a nomination. Of those, Rush is the only one who might draw a sizable crowd. Also other than Rush, none of these men, and none of the other prominent Republican male politicians has, can, or would go toe to toe against the liberal, communist, homosexual, race-baiting ideologies and agenda.
The few very vocal anti-Palin spokesnothings are generally east coast faggots and dykes. None of their criticisms have any merit, other than Palin isn't part of their cocktail circles. You and several others here have completely fallen for it.
So you are actually defending Michael Reagan’s exploitation of his late father for political expediency in an electioneering shill piece for John McCain and his Alaskan protege?
Young background appears to be that of a family of Jewish refuseniks booted by the Soviets for political dissidence. She has repeatedly written about the fatuity of Ogabe’s appeasement of Russia. I think a lot of conservatives are reading into Palin’s persona what independents and squishy Republicans are reading into Ogabe’s persona. To me, Palin’s more or less a blank slate. She’s got a charisma that appeals to a good chunk of conservatives, and she’s taken an unfair bashing at the hands of the liberal media, and a bunch of Republican snobs. But that’s it. If she’s a unifying figure for conservatives and Republicans, I’ll be thrilled. But whether Palin wins the nomination or not, I’ll vote for the Republican candidate in 2012.
I hope she’s not waiting for Eczema the warrior lesbo to run for president.
Well, we can see that the same posters who are slamming Palin are smearing Ronald Reagan too, painting him as a “libertarian” who is “rising from the grave” and “wearing lipstick.”
Completely predictable.
Newt Gingrich and Rick Perry both might run for the GOP nomination. And hopefully, Mike Pence will be Speaker of the House by then.
Sarah Palin is not running for national office any more than any of the the people I named.
So far, there are no declared candidates, least of all Sarah Palin.
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