Too much has already been written about the dramatic rise and fall of the inimitable Sarah Palin, and I have nothing substantive to add about the specifics. I will say that few politicians, or public figures of any profession for that matter, can lay claim to such a flawless record of pure entertainment. Watching her declare victory over her “assailants” by vacating her position of power because of their attacks was like watching a three year old try to blame gremlins for an empty cookie jar.
Double speak, annoying as it happens to be, is an art. It should not be taken lightly. You’ll notice that Bush’s inability to answer questions while cloaking his true motives drove him to speak in guttural platitudes. He never employed the subtle half-truths of his decomposing familiar, Dick Cheney. He just forcefully tossed out non sequitur, meaningless platitudes. The fact that Palin’s resignation remarks were not, despite their appearance, impromptu, but written ahead of time, only adds to her astonishing career statistics. She will be missed.
What strikes me about her resignation is that it is one of the few times in American public life (at least during my conscious awareness of it) that an ignorant, dumb person was called such and laughed off the stage based on those very failings. She and her apologists are complaining about unfair media treatment, but the harshest criticism was directed at legitimate issues: her inability to answer basic questions, her awful incitement of the base, her ethics issues, her abuse of campaign funds. There were plenty of absurd things like this, but if Levi Johnston is capable of bringing down a governor, perhaps we should choose leaders made of sterner stuff. And it goes without saying that even the most bizarre Palin rumors cannot approach the seriousness with which the right accused Hilary Clinton of murder.
No, she was chased away for being a fool. It is a testament to her absurdity and the continually vile character of her statements that she was dismissed so thoroughly while we put up with a second term of “W.”
The right perpetually emits a plaintiff wail, bemoaning too much “tolerance” in society (the most horrific voicing of this imaginary problem cam when Bush accused his opponents of being so tolerant that they wanted to give the terrorists therapy). Somehow letting people dress as they like, marry who they like, engage in the sex acts that they like (non-criminal), and generally express themselves aesthetically, has led to too much tolerance.
Well, I will agree both that we’ve become too tolerant of certain fashion trends, like fat people wearing tiny clothes, and are generally too tolerant. But our acceptance fails to the degree that we tolerate people like Palin on the public stage. Remember the pride with which Huckabee, Tancredo, and Brownback shot their hands towards their Lord when the GOP primary contestants were asked who didn’t “believe” in evolution? They should have mocked, ridiculed, and dismissed, yet their political and public careers continue.
Palin represents someone who wasn’t tolerated for legitimate reasons. Knowledge, ability, intelligence, decency, competency, and ethical behavior are all virtues, the lack of which should not be tolerated. Skin color, sexual preference, gender, and other aesthetic characteristics must be tolerated because they alone give no indication whether someone possesses any of the qualities listed in the first group.
I know it’s only a matter of time before a wet-mouthed Chris Matthews begins to drool over the well-sculpted Mitt, but for now I am pleased that someone was sent away for just being incompetent.
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I hate to raise the oft summoned specter of sexism into this discussion, but I am left wondering if Palin would have been as ill-received if she were Y-chromosome enabled.
ReplyDeleteAs you note, there are loads of ignorant, double-speaking Republicans who share her basic set of beliefs, principles and political viewpoints. None of these characters became the target of vitriolic scorn like Palin did, and most of them continue to spout their factually baseless, incoherent nonsense on a variety of cable news networks (see: Buchanan, Pat on MSNBC).
Was there anything Palin said that really outstrips some of the finest material of our last President? "Axis of evil," "human animal hybrids," "yellow-cake uranium."
Not only was Palin an obnoxious, self-important dullard, she had a vagina.
Hey cool, first off, thanks for the comment. You have the rare distinction of being this blogs first commenter.
ReplyDeleteAs for the sexism, it's a difficult question. If a male struggled through the Gibson-Couric interviews like Palin, would he have been so ridiculed?
My hope would be yes, but Joe the Plumber outlasted Palin, so my best guess would be no.
In some ways that tempers the claims of my post, but perhaps it was the media's sexism that allowed them to call dumb ideas dumb.
In any case, I'm not holding out hope that the trend continues.
And you are correct, "human animal hybrids" is the clubhouse leader for dumbest thing said by someone with nuclear codes.
"In some ways that tempers the claims of my post, but perhaps it was the media's sexism that allowed them to call dumb ideas dumb."
ReplyDeleteI think part of the problem is that our media does not necessarily have the capacity to differentiate between a dumb idea and a good one (or an absence of ideas given their coverage of the current health care debate).