So, Sarah Palin said on Saturday that she'd totally consider running for president in 2012, and I yawned. I mean, I giggled a little, and then I yawned, which is the same reaction I've had every time someone involved in the World Wrestling Federation has declared for office. Then, for a day or two, as the Internet burbled with speculation and as David Broder warmed up his pen, I wondered if maybe I'd missed something, like all of the other eligible Republican candidates swearing they'd sit 2012 out. Since Tim Pawlenty was still standing, I felt confident this wasn't the case: but why was everyone interested in Palin '12? Couldn't they see what a hoax this was?
Today I got my answer.
The Internet is (finally? again?) throwing an Anti-Palin Party. First, there's this woo-hoo poll that says Sarah Palin isn't so beloved (and is certainly not trusted) by the American people, unless you define "American People" as "three crazies who like tea." The Washington Post not only published a David Broder love letter to Mrs. Palin today, it published some poll results:
Although Palin is a tea party favorite, her potential as a presidential hopeful takes a severe hit in the survey. Fifty-five percent of Americans have unfavorable views of her, while the percentage holding favorable views has dipped to 37, a new low in Post-ABC polling. There is a growing sense that the former Alaska governor is not qualified to serve as president, with more than seven in 10 Americans now saying she is unqualified, up from 60 percent in a November survey. Even among Republicans, a majority now say Palin lacks the qualifications necessary for the White House.As Ta-Nehisi Coates points out, that means Palin's running worse numbers than that divisive, devilish Hillary Clinton ever did:
To put this bluntly--Sarah Palin is more hated than Hillary Clinton at any point in Clinton's political career, and yet engenders very little of the love that made Clinton a political force.
Things can be put even more bluntly than that, for which we must turn to Joe Biden, Vice President of the United States and Gaffestan, who said this very clearly in that folksy way of his: "Governor Palin appeals to a group of people who are generally frustrated, feel disenfranchised, are very conservative... Tea Party people, but beyond that. She has appeal beyond that as well. But I don't know that it represents anything approaching a significant portion of the population.”
The difference, of course, between Joe Biden's folskiness and Sarah Palin's is that sometimes Joe Biden knows what he's talking about. God love 'im. Remember when everyone on the campaign thought it was going to be Joe Biden who was more prone to be an embarrassment to his ticket? Oh ho ho. I love a good proved-'em-wrong moment.
Better than all of these, though, someone went on Larry King's show (which was minus Larry King, so at least some things are staying normal) and tried to summon the Ghost and Spirit of Ronald Reagan by invoking his name in defense of the Great New Governor Maverick. Sadly, this failed, because sitting next to said summoner was Ronald Reagan's actual, living son, Ron Reagan Jr., who took the opportunity to call crazy where he saw it.
The entire exchange is worth reading, but a quick summary goes like this: Ron Reagan Jr. says his father would not have liked Sarah Palin "because she doesn't have a thought in her head." Pam Geller says this isn't true, that President Reagan would have loved her, and RR Jr. says maybe Pam sholdn't talk about a guy she never met. The satisfying point comes at the end:
Reagan: Is Pam still blathering about me and my father? Oh, you are. You still haven't met him, though, right? You still didn't know him, so you're just sort of making things up as you go along, right?
Geller: You never met him either. You know, you never met him either. Do you think you're making your father proud? Do you really think you're making your father proud?
Oh, yes. Now we have people -- let's call them Palinites -- who have moved beyond just questioning people's patriotism when they disagree. They now question family relationships. Yes, friends, what we've known all along is finally be played out on the bigger screen: to believe in Sarah Palin, you must reject facts and rewrite history.
Luckily, it looks like maybe only a small segment of the country is willing to do that. I'm getting around to making the very same point that TNC made in his post, which is this: Sarah Palin is not a major political force. She is the political equivalent to "I'm not a doctor, but I play one on TV." Which, by the way, she does now: she plays a political leader on TV, paid for by Fox. She is not now, nor does it seem she ever will be, a real political force in America.
TNC has said he's going to stop treating her as such; I feel it's time I do the same. I'm turning off The Sarah Show except as entertainment. If America doesn't take her seriously, why should I?
TIP:
Enter the amount, and click "Tip" to submit!
Catherine Forsythe
Writer to the Stars
Emily Holleman
Iron Skillet
Leslie Harpole
old new lefty
Salon.com
Comments
OE's comment is really what we need. Good job.
The mainstream media, the megaphone of the corporate plutocracy that owns this country, is beginning to create the myth of Sarah Palin, the political genius. Joe Klein and David Broder just wrote columns praising her.
If Palin were to win in 2012 -- she won't, she'd resign in 2013 after she discovers being President is even harder than being Governor of Alaska. If the media pressure was too intense for her delicate sensibilities in 2009, imagine what she would be subjected to as President.
That's not to say, she won't run, nor is it to say she can't wrangle the Republican nomination, given the sorry state of the Geriatric Obstructionist Party, and the fact that rightwingnuts control its primaries. Failing that, she can always run third-party as a the candidate of Team Teabag or the New American Independent Party.
But if your prediction holds true, they will have to put armed guards a the Canadian and Mexican borders to stop the mass exodus of illegals entering those countries from this one. I would be among them, and they'd have to shoot me to stop me. As they used to say in The Sixies, better dead than red.
God bless Joe Biden and Ron Reagan Jr. Can you believe how preposterous Geller was? Do these people hear themselves?
I'll be joining Tom.
Hey, Tom, did you know that Vancouver isn't nearly as cold as the rest of the continent? yeah, they actually have a little rain forest there, a little ecosystem. I think I could survive there.
She will, like any other semi- simian simpleton of the Rwing, milk her status for as long as the cows keep buying.
Her top shelf life is limited, though, and watching the downward arc will provide equal opportunity for amusement.
Yoooooooo betcha!
Meet you in Vancouver
Palin remains incredibly attractive to those who think W wasn't ignorant or incompetent enough to represent them. I remind those who dismiss her out of hand that in the last election just short of 60 million people voted for a doddering old man and a half-wit. For details, go here:
How Can 59,934,814 People Be So Dumb?
In short, never misunderestimate the ignorance and incompetence of the American voter (for details, see 2004).
Whatever
This is great.
Fun piece, Saturn. Your blend of facts and sarcasm was a delight.
I am not a fan of Palin, but count her out, no one is counted out in this ever changing media circus until the last vote is cast. Two years is a long time to change your image.
And Don Rich "Palin wins in 2012"? I wish that you were a betting man and that I knew you.
If Ronnie could be convinced, how many others are far behind?
History shows it's hard to defeat an incumbent President. As a lifelong Democrat, I'd like to believe that if Palin gets the Republican nomination and runs against Obama in the fall of 2012, his reelection will be a cake walk!
However...
I was in high school when Ronald Reagan was cozying up to the Moral Majority, saying things like, "You may not endorse me (it's against church-state separation for a religious organization to endorse a political candidate), but I endorse you!"...and making all kinds of stupid gaffes, like saying trees cause more pollution than industry!
Anything can happen in the next couple of years. The Clinton people were on target in 1992, saying, "It's the economy, stupid!" People vote their pocketbooks in an election year. The state of the economy in 2012 is going to determine who wins the White House that November.
Jenn Kepka writes:
Sarah Palin is not a major political force. She is the political equivalent to "I'm not a doctor, but I play one on TV."
Back in the late '80s, during the Reagan administration, a net user on USENET parodied that same TV commercial with: "I'm not a president, but I play one on TV."
Someone once said politics is show business for ugly people...Sarah Palin is slightly younger than me, and in some photos, I must admit, she looks quite glamorous for a middle-aged grandparent. In other photos, she looks, as someone on AlterNet observed, "like a creepy Avon lady."
Bill Moyers did a special report on the CBS evening news in 1986 about the state of affairs in black America. Someone wrote in with a different view, saying, blacks were prospering--just look at the Cosby Show!
Bill Moyers responded to the letter with a slight smile, saying that if we start believing everything we see on TV is real, we'll end up with an actor as president.
I see that the the headline writers at OS are up to their usual ineptitude. You don't need a poll to conclude that Palin will not be president any time soon; a calendar will do.
I'm fairly confindent that by election time, Palin will run, and will have spent the intervening 3 years studying up. I'm hoping this eventuality will entice Hillary away from her apparent resolve to never again revisit the presidential race. Maybe Obama is man enough, and has enough substance of character, to resign after one term, making it that much easier for Hillary to run. A Hillary/Palin faceoff; now! that would be revolutionary.
Alaska will never be the same.ENTER:MURK_OWSKI,ggod name for the "Clean Air" issue gal whose dommino effect went straight for the Global,because one thing follows the other[s]No clean-air?Well,they both LOST,Parnell & Murky! Parnell wants his Trophy Hunters to to be permitted to kill all Polar Bears at 2.?mil while hiring an att'y to win,so his friends could "adorn" the carcuss's of these now living,struggling creatures] in their livingrooms?Imagine this insanity? Where is Obama in all this indulgence? Palin's Pee Party..can't hold it in..?Tea& NO sympathy for the millions she made,w/ a roughneck title,like her character,red neck!Another reintroduction,just when you thought it was safe to go back into the water...she says to herslf,"now,it's time to shock again,get ready for my close up,boys...6 schools in 6 yrs? why?also,the arrogance to think she'll not face retrobution?Karma,baby,Karma!
See:
http://notionscapital.wordpress.com/2010/02/09/tennessee-tea-party-sarahs-sassy-speech/
voicegal: Do these people hear themselves?
Do they ever hear anybody else? They only listen to each other, so "crazy" sounds normal and sensible to them.
Saturn, I've been writing about Teh Cuda as entertainment every Friday for months until she became so much of a parody of herself that she was making Tina Fey's impression look sane and straight. How can you satirize a satire? I asked. Well, the comments were almost all about how Sarahcuda was precisely the kind of nimrod the American people of the 21st century seem to like to elect.
There's obviously a great fear of her appeal to crazies and little belief in the common sense of the LCD electorate. I dunno. Maybe they're right. Maybe it's a mistake not to take her seriously, but I personally find it very difficult to do that.
It is inconceivable to me that the media continues to nurture her fame and notoriety when it is repeatedly made absolutely clear that she knows nothing and fails to educate herself. Speeches that are trash talk against her perceived opponents are easy to come by if one has no poise, no class, no sense of propriety, and if one simply wants to feed off anger and to inflame and to seek press coverage. Interviews that never answer questions but are pure gobbly gook have gotten her very far.
And yet, when Hillary Clinton was campaigning in the primaries, she was maligned and criticized as having the sole credential of being the wife of a former President, after an adulthood of contributions to advocacy for children and others; after clearly being able to open her mouth and speak sanely to issues.
I hope you and all the rest will stop this Palin Show, as you said you would, at least. She is an embarrassment to this country and to herself, though her narcissism and other personality defects will never clue her on that, either.
Her main contribution has been to give some import to people like the woman in the interview with Ron Reagan, to Babe Buchanan, to Tea Partiers, to people who want to be seen as important, credible, and who need a voice, even though they cannot articulate a rational thought. For those in this group who have genuine issues and concerns, they are being exploited and the rest of us cannot hear them because their chosen Leader is a huge distraction and embarrassment.
Splendid. I am impressed by your post and, equally important, I am impressed by the acuity of most of the comments. You have an elegant readership (myself included).
I was also impressed by the obtuseness of those readers who defended Sarah. I would like to see some psychological testing of the Palin supporters. It might help me understand their point of view.
Ozmoses' cautionary note is well taken. The booboisee are still among us. However, I think that Juliet Waters' comment ("...the Old Boys Club of the GOP dislike Sarah Palin even more than the liberals do.") is the most prescient.
I purposely use words like obtuseness and prescient to confound the tea partiers.
You very clearly know nothing about American REAL men.
REAL American men do not see airheaded dimbulbs such as this palin female as hot.
A REAL hot woman is intelligent.
palin very clearly is not.
If you are THAT certain that Ms. Brittney Spears AKA Sarah is going to become president, please personal message me. I will be more than happy to take your money.
Saturn is 100% correct!
Incidentally, my blog could paraphrase your blog name: I'm an old old lefty.
When the people who stand to gain have enough money to give loud, substantial voice to the fringe craziness, watch the fuck out.
Yes - that's exactly the situation. And it's a sign of a Really Bad Habit the American people have: that of seeking out saviors when their "government on duty" comes up short in some way.
Recommended: instead of this revolving door approval / disapproval rating stuff, why not try actually telling our presidents and lawmakers what we WANT and demand in the way of proper results and proper efforts.
It is well known that those in Congress get lobbyist feedback at about four times the rate of voter feedback. THEN voters complain about their government having been bought by lobbyists!
Voters of America: Put your email and phone calls where your mouth and (belated) votes are.
As for Weather Girl, Professor, Governor, Candidate for President Sarah Palin: Chances are that her publicity campaign (big as it is) will expose more than her cute-but-stupid wink. In the end, I suspect that she will go down in American political history as proof of the saying: You really can't fix Stupid.
As if she were so compassionate re: "any life",it's as if she wants all women to suffer,by not having the right to abortion,si if a woman is "raped",should she have the DNA of a madman,if she lived through it,which means the charges would include rape,but the dead woman[or surviving woman] would have indeed "been" raped!,doesn't this mean,she should not have the extra torment of carrying a child,after such emotional trauma[s]? For,Palin,she say's no,miss "abstinence" remember, who got caught in a lust filled display of "irresponsibility",having sex without tsking her own advice..at 40+ she ran the risk,perhaps her same GOD punished her,like she said "the Jews are being punished for not believing in Jesus.."Jesus& "Sarah?" not in same sentence,or breath! This was written by a Rabbi...re: the jews..remark!
Just remember that same American Public, voted in Dubya for a second term!
President Palin? Hey wait for me Tom, I'm outta here!
From the GripeVine.... & Donah..//
Neck lift