Posted on 04/07/2010 1:32:58 PM PDT by rabscuttle385
Conflicting loyalties seem to have resulted in some surprising political decisions by Sarah Palin.
On Monday here at NewsReal Blog I argued that Govenor Sarah Palin’s active support of John McCain’s Senate reelection campaign makes no sense. Palin, after all, doesn’t owe McCain anything. Whatever debt she might have owed McCain she paid off during the 2008 presidential campaign.
In fact, if anything, it seems to me that McCain is indebted to Palin. This because his ‘08 campaign really did her a disservice, and also because McCain staffers have since betrayed the former Alaska governor with malicious and disparaging leaks to the media.
Many of the commenters to my post don’t disagree. However, they write, there is one laudable reason why Palin is actively supporting McCain: loyalty.
Fair enough. Loyalty is important. But it seems to me that Palin has competing loyalty obligations; and that she chose to be loyal to McCain when she just as easily could have chosen to be loyal to other people and other principles instead.
For example, Palin knows that some of her most steadfast supporters in the conservative and Tea Party movements have very profound and important differences with McCain.
These Palin supporters believe that on too many critical issues — including free speech (aka “campaign finance reform”), military modernization, and illegal immigration – McCain is a liberal wolf in a conservative sheep’s clothing.
What about loyalty to these people? What about loyalty to their issues and concerns? Why does loyalty to one man, one politician, outweigh loyalty to millions of dedicated conservative and Tea Party activists?
And why does personal loyalty to a man (McCain) outweigh loyalty to a set of conservative political principles?
No one’s saying that Palin had to actively oppose McCain. That might, indeed, have been awkward and ill-advised given that she was his vice presidential running mate.
But why did Palin have to go out of her way to actively support and campaign for McCain? Why couldn’t she have praised both McCain and his challenger, Rep. J.D. Hayworth, while remaining neutral in the Arizona Senate race?
I can think of two possible explanations offered up, respectively, by journalists Conor Friedersdorf and Matthew Continetti.
Friedersdorf says that Palin simply may not be the conservative her steadfast supporters think she is. She may, in fact, be a John McCain Republican. This would mean that she is liberal on some issues, moderate on others, and conservative about a few things.
Continetti notes that since being thrust into the national limelight, Palin has “become incredibly rich.” It may be — and this is me speaking, not Continetti — that because of her newfound riches, Palin feels an understandable debt, literally and figuratively, to Sen. McCain.
If true, that’s fine. Making money to support one’s family is honorable. But that’s a different type of loyalty, I think, than many of the governor’s defenders have in mind.
John R. Guardiano is a writer and analyst in Arlington, Virginia. You can follow him on Twitter: @Guardian0.
We’ll have to see.
Last poll I saw had JD only trailing by 6 or 7.
I guess its all a matter of perspective. I’m 50 and my husband is 53. My husband is basically wheelchair bound and on oxygen 24 hours a day with serious health issues. If i wasn’t able to make a living and take care of the day to day chores neither of us would have any quality of life.
Life isn’t always perfect.
Christians, at least, believe angels are sent from God to serve them by watching over them. And what is commonplace in a working class home today would have been envied by the royalty of old.
Many issues I disagree with McCain
Various side door issues are used re McCain to distract
people from the bottom line.
PauBots are anti war. McCain supports the war against the IslamOfascists and lead the fight for the serge in Iraq
This is the real reason the Neo Left PaulBots hate McCain.
I am sorry to read of your difficulties. Life isn’t perfect by any means. This does not mean that we change our mores and values.
One wonders whether Obama believed this in 2009 when he was famous for being off on vacation trips longer than he spent in the White House.
Lol, as opposed to McCain who comes across as a vile tempered, backstabbing weasel?
If you are pro amnesty for illegals, pro cap and trade, oppose tax cuts for economic stimulus, oppose enhanced interrogation of terrorist, want terrorists in US prisons, want Gitmo closed, and love someone who constantly undermines his own party, then Juan McCain is definitely your man.
Which was you favorite major legislation cosponsored by Juan: McCain/Feingold, McCain/Kennedy, or McCain/Lieberman?
Or maybe he’s going to save us all by constantly harping on that $20 - $30 billion in annual earmarks while proposing legislation that will add hundreds of billions to our budget over five to ten years?
273 posted on Wednesday, April 07, 2010 5:03:25 PM by Will88
Will nailed it....now how much was the aggregate of pork Hayworth voted for????
Agree.
I’ve never heard McCain remark that he knows better for me than I do for myself.
And even though Hayworth hasn’t come out and directly said it either, he implies it. It bothers me a lot.
Are you suggesting that Bush and Reagan didn’t work “on vacation”?
I haven’t changed my morals or values.
But you’ve seemed to label me a feminist. My husband of 20 years, most of which he’s been ill, disagrees.
A lot of pork.
Which is why he’s earned Flake’s endorsement.
HOW MUCH????
google it yourself i’m tired of proving myself to you it seems i have to in every thread in which we disagree
how long have you lived here?
“google it yourself i’m tired of proving myself to you it seems i have to in every thread in which we disagree”
Don’t bother. Whatever it was, the number is negligable compared to TARP, and cap n trade. Hayworth spent a few million...McCain is in the trillions.
Good night.
Your point about servants to watch the kids is short sighted. If, in fact, the mother is the only one who can adequately raise kids, then certainly the servants wouldn't do it right.........would they?
(Not much better than Daycare, IMO).
My point - Women with a lot of strength and energy and an involved husband can go out and work and raise great kids. It's not something you, from afar, can assess. And as far as I can see, Sarah and Todd Palin have exceptional kids (one sin doesn't change that)
Incidentally, I stayed home until my youngest was in school because I was egotistical enough to think that no one could raise them as well as I could. (I was right. ;)
But the bottom line is that, working as Sarah Palin has done, is not counter to being a social conservative.
And the very bottom line is that your argument against Sarah isn't valid.
Riiight. Slam it as leftist all you want. There are no perfect parents. And there are no perfect teens. You are setting yourself up for a huge disappointment, Dr. Laura. Um, I mean, whoever you are.
I see. So its all about the dollars, not the conservative conviction of spending less. Wow.
Considering she supported McCain for President in 2008, that McCain campaigned for her, and that the "RINO" Palin is today campaigning with her, it would seem that Michele must be "purged."
Seriously, "RINO" is the last adjective I'd attach to Bachmann (or Palin, for that matter.)
Guess so. (You won't get a response. Legitimate questions never do with rabs).
But truthfully, how can anyone support a crazy anti-war, 9-11 truther, and be anything but........... crazy? How is Paul any different than Michael Moore or Danny Glover in these areas? And how can supporting him in such a combative manner be anything but nuts?
There is a fundamental difference between disagreeing with certain policies of a patriotic leader who defends our lives, while supporting him overall (like Bush), and wholeheartedly supporting a candidate who isn't sane and doesn't care if we all die (like Paul).
Isn't there? ;)
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