Lots of buzz today about my my friend Todd Purdum's story on Sarah Palin in the new issue of Vanity Fair. The story's a good reminder of the still enduring role of the monthly magazine in the age of blogs and Twitter. By going over ground that was not exactly unfamiliar--the contempt that McCain staffers felt toward their charge, the governor of Alaska--Purdum was able to find the new in the well-trod, the headline amidst what seemed to be an old story. The level of vitriol and consternation expressed toward Palin is remarkable and so is the extent to which the senior officials of the McCain campaign were continually amazed by her lack of knowledge and her audacity. She tried to make her own concession speech on election night, something that veep candidates never do, and after refusing to take no for an answer from top McCain aides, had to be told no by the Arizona Senator himself.
Will all of this matter as the presidential campaign of 2012 begins to
move forward? It will if Palin continues to annoy any number of fellow
Republicans. But you also have to wonder if there isn't a huge capacity
for forgiveness in the Republican Party for candidates who get facts
wrong but embrace what are seen as simple truths. Ronald Reagan got
bashed as a simpleton with a messy family life--grandchildren he didn't
know, kids who didn't speak to him, etc.--but his basic adherence to
conservative principle was enough to guide him to the presidency and to
reelection. Palin lacks Reagan's decades long dedication to the
conservative principles or his exceptional skills as a communicator.
But I wonder whether a piece like this will really hurt Palin in the
long run or, in some ways, strengthen her with those who matter most in
the GOP. The derision of elites is a calling card, even if it's the elites in one's own party. Of course, Reagan was loved by the party base and many of its elites, too, like William F. Buckley and the National Review. Palin seems on thinner ice, to use a bad Arctic metaphor. But I think as the national GOP continues to founder and other stars in the party like Mark Sanford either burn out or fade, like Bobby Jindal, Palin seems like a troubled but surprisingly enduring brand, one that I can't wait to see engage with Newt Gingrich, the party's self-styled intellectual. Gingrich is as in sync intellectually with the conservative base of the party as is Palin, but he's thrice married and that may prove less appealing to the party's remaining evangelical core. His recent conversion to Catholicism will provide an interesting contrast to Palin's fundamentalism.
A piece like Purdum's reminds us of Palin's obvious flaws, but is the Vanity Fair readership picking the next Republican nominee?
"Gingrich is as in sync intellectually with the conservative base of the party as is Palin..."
So is my kid's guinea pig. Talk about the soft bigotry of low expectations.
How many of the McCain aides, who are now bashing Palin off the record, started out on Romney's team? Am I being overly cynical to suspect they would stoop to sabotaging her potential 2012 campaign during the deathrows of McCain's doomed 2008 campaign?
I think the real problem with Palin is how much she's dived into the trivial and the petty. While I basically agree with the Palin counter-narrative that she's not and never will be ready to be President and can never win, and that certainly relieves me, some of Purdum's work in that article really failed to give her credit for real accomplishments even on subjects where he sought to point out her errors, such as regarding Hickel and the gas pipeline. But all that gets buried under her feud with David Letterman who isn't running against her for anything, her choice to engage gay marriage through the sideshow of Miss California while remaining silent about the Iowa Supreme Court decision, and speaking of the court decision her first public comment on anything afterward was the next day to slam Levi Johnston for going on the Tyra Banks show. And it goes on like this.
Of course I'm a liberal Democrat and I don't care about Palin's fate other than for my own entertainment......but that's her very problem, she's made herself someone whose headlines makes all of us reach for popcorn. She's reduced herself to someone who cannot be taken seriously. She still has time to reverse that, but why she's doing all this crap all these months post-election is head-scratching.
Well said, DCC. I'm also a liberal Dem, and I'll freely admit I may not see this right. But Palin's "triviality" seems to be everyone's big problem with her, and it's something she's only accentuated since the campaign. Say what you want about Reagan (And boy, could I say some things), but he kept his eye on the prize. He projected genuine respect for big ideas and bold policies, even if he couldn't quite project his own understanding of those ideas. Palin just doesn't seem to even notice such things.
Long time reader, first time commenter.
Despite my extreme fatigue to all things Palin, this article really got my goat. Palin's support base will simply not grow anymore from what has already been established as her support base. If anything, it will shrink, thanks to her own inability to remember who her friends were. There is just too much out there on her that will turn potential voters off, and it's not the kind of easily forgettable material like statistics, or complicated truths - it's the kind of material that you remember from middle-school: embarrassing moments, vendettas, two-faced gossipers, and popularity feuds. And nobody, ever, forgets those things, or who was involved. This is the shtick Palin has enacted in her political life. There is no coming back from that level of immaturity in a grown woman.
The biggest political asset, BAR NONE, that Palin has today is the liberal over-estimation of her political ability to overcome the fallout of her own character, and her popularity with the American voter. These articles, and so many liberal commentators, while painting an unflattering portrait, somehow miraculously still manage to see her as some kind of genuine force, worthy of an opponent's fear. She isn't. She is her own biggest enemy. All anybody else has to do is to keep their own mouth shut and watch the bluster come apart at the seams.
And, might I add, it is this very fear and head-scratching that she causes in Democrats and independents, that heightens those sectors of Republican opinion of her, that judge a candidate's viability based upon their ability to rouse such reaction from their opponent, rather than her actual substance. And there is a crowd out there like that as everyone well knows.
Sorry to be nitpicky, but please fix the typos in the post.
"...after refusing to take no for an answer form top McCain aides, had to be told no by the Arizona Senator himself."
"But I think as the national GOP continues to founder and other stars..."
Ironically, typos are also a good reminder of the still enduring role of the monthly magazine in the age of blogs and Twitter.
As far as I can tell, she is emerging as the tea-party candidate. Pajamas media, Fox news, a thousand angry republican blogs, all see in her the perfect example of a real american, in opposition to the eggheads that lost the election because they were not american enough. A cynic might say that this is because she sells copy, so that her candidacy is resting on her media-value, the freak-factor as it could be seen, but it goes deeper than that I think. A real anti-intelectual vein has been exposed inside the GOP, and that is the one she is tapping. She *is* what GWB played at being, someone who trusts in the lord with blind faith in larger questions while at the same time playing hardball on domestic issues. Of course, democrats are smart to deride her, because it A) strengthens her base and B) makes the GOP look like a flock of religious nutcases when they rally to defend her. Obama is propably donating money to her campaign discreetly, to put it like that...
DCC, that's an interesting angle. Related to this is the pattern that Republicans like electing two- or three-time election losers. Democrats would never do that. That’s why Bob Dole was an anomaly. He could have run again and won. Obama, if he had lost, couldn’t have.
Also, some editorial suggestions. Spell check will do wonders for your writing career. It's "William F. Buckley," not "WIlliam F. Buckley." Similiarly, try "after refusing to take no for an answer from top McCain aides," instead of "form top McCain aides."
"Similiarly"
Ah, memories - I screwed that up the same way in a spelling bee in 7th grade.
As for Palin - all she needed (needs?) to do, was to disappear to Alaska for a couple of years, become better informed, and develop better, non-deer-in-the-headlights, interview skills. Whether or not she is capable of that, I have no idea.
But if she could do that, then the vitriol against her in the past year just becomes an unhinged response from the left and from a tingly-legged media that did nothing to gain respect in the past cycle.
Basically, she has the opportunity to make the case (implicitly) that she wasn't ready in 2008, but is in 2012. Whether she can make the case or not is up to her.
Yes but in order to get to the GOP nomination in 2012 she has to survive the primaries first -- and when her fellow Republicans go after her, she will not be able to blame the "unhinged left". I have a very hard time seeing how she will survive a dozen debates without at least once making herself into an irredeemable national laughingstock.
Yes, the evangelical base needs somewhere to go -- what's wrong with Huckabee -- he is an appealing candidate who will not make a fool of himself.
I tend to think she'd survive the intra-party debates, because everyone will be trying to out-crazy the other candidates. But she'd never survive a debate with Obama, assuming he's the candidate. The winkin' and blinkin' routine would fall utterly flat.
And I think Huckabee would be a real challenge for Obama, simply because he seems relatively reasonable and genuine.
As long as we're correcting each other, it's 'death throes'.
Now all of you, go play outside. it's a beautiful day.
Shouldn't it be 'As long as we're correcting one another...?"
Sorry.
msully, I don't think she can disappear to Alaska for a couple of years, become better informed, and develop better, non-deer-in-the-headlights, interview skills.
She never seemed to able to get comfortable in unscripted interviews. You could see her kind of panic when challenged with a question she didn't know how to answer. Most public speakers have a supply of subroutines they can deploy on a number of topics. You know - "Well, let me just say this: (blah blah blah)". She doesn't seem to be able to do that. She just blanks and starts talking. A nervous tic, like.
I don't know if you can train natural spontaneity into someone a la Eliza Doolittle. On the evidence we saw last Fall, it doesn't seem so. Bottom line: I don't think she can hack it.
Sarah Palin is a polarizing figure. With beauty queen looks and significant smarts, she was enjoying a 90% approval rating as governor when McCain showed up in August of 2008 to tap her as his VP selection. Within weeks, McCain was taking public swipes at her and in the ensuing months leading up to the election she was brutalized in the media. McCain ended up the loser, and there are many who would like to be sure that Sarah Palin has gone down with him. While there is no question that she has stepped into the muck with both feet more than once, as indicated in Cooper’s piece, the reality is more complex, as she is still has the potential to be a powerful force in conservative Republican politics. Like it or not, there are a lot of Americans who identify with who she is and what she says, regardless of a few missteps.
Here is a nice piece on the current flap:
http://www.newsy.com/videos/vanity_fair_on_palin_what_s_it_all_mean
Carter (arguably the worst president off the 20th century) brought us Reagan. Obama will bring us Palin or someone Reagan like! I am anticipating a backlash to the socialist agenda being rammed down our throats by the Progressives. You cannot live beyond your means forever, as much as everyone wants to implement these social programs going bankrupt or raising taxes to economy stopping levels is not the answer. Socialism has failed everywhere it has been tried before and will not work in this country either. If you rob from Peter to pay Paul, Peter will be a Richard no one likes to be a Richard after all and will become Paul (or worse yet become a criminal and stop paying taxes by going underground if one is to intelligent or ambitious to be unproductive), then there will be no more Peters to take from and all will starve. I look forward to Sara's next move as her actions are what this country needs.