What is Palin thinking?

As those who have followed my musings on Sarah Palin, I have been a (generally) enthusiastic supporter of her political moves. Before John McCain picked her to be his running mate, I wrote that she was my first choice (with Bobby Jindal second), though I doubted that McCain would want to pick her. To my delight, he did, the best move he made in the whole campaign and one that, for a brief moment, made fortune smile upon him in the polls.

Unlike some of her more smitten supporters, I understood that she, no more than any politician and probably any human at all, was without flaws. Some of her fans view her with almost the degree of rapture and attribution of infallibility the media and many Americans reserve for The One. But she offered the best and most authentic voice for that broad swath of Middle America to which Richard Nixon once referred as the “Silent Majority.”

Certainly she was not the voice of those who saw themselves primarily as members of various identity groups thrown together into a confederation of victimized racial, ethnic, or sex-denominated tribes. Nor was she the voice of elitist snobbery that, while centered in the academy, the professions, the entertainment industry, and the media, nevertheless knows no clear socio-economic bounds. Nor was she the voice of the inexperienced-in-life, who might take time off from their trust-funded education and their Wii-games to work for a political Pied Piper who dazzled them with “cool.” Nor was she the voice of those for whom real religion and a true Messiah did not slake the thirst for a connection with something greater than themselves, and who sought refuge instead in the secular preachings of someone who promised that with him, the oceans would finally begin to recede. For all of those, there was Barack Obama.

She struck a deep chord, however, with those humbler folk who work, produce, take care of their families, and cherish without guile or embarrassment the connection to the older traditions, religious and secular, that define our shared culture. Mr. McCain’s flacks, such as the execrable Steve Schmidt, mishandled her press appearances and smothered her personality in a way that proved as satisfying a product as dressing a fashion supermodel in a burqa.

Towards the end of the campaign, as the cause became increasingly desperate, she cast off the bonds of the elitist insiders, and struck out on her own. “Let Sarah be Sarah” was the demand from her supporters, and she drew enthusiastic and large crowds in a way that the top of the ticket was unable to do. There is no doubt that this was one of those rare, if not unique, campaigns where many people voted for the ticket because of the vice-presidential nominee.

Meanwhile, she and her family were vetted for the most picayune and hypothetical transgressions and infractions (all eventually shot down) by a now-frenzied press who had been asleep at the switch or had tried to delay or deflect stories about Obama’s long associations with corrupt politicians (Blagojevich), shady business operators (Rezko), racist hate-spewing pastors (Wright, to name one), and former (and still unrepentant) terrorists and Chavez-worshippers (Ayers and Dohrn).

Worse, she and her family were subjected to the vilest slurs, accusations, and slanders in living memory. An indulgent press treated rumors hatched in the scabrous minds of certain leftie bloggers as demonstrated facts of which she and her family stood convicted until she could prove the contrary. Not the wildest of these was the allegation that Palin’s daughter Bristol was the mother of the baby Trig, not Palin herself. The corporate media picked up on this, and soon, led by Andrew Sullivan of The Atlantic on his blog, demands were made that the Palins produce complete medical and hospital records on a matter of utter irrelevance to Palin’s health. Mere physical impossibility resulting from Bristol’s own almost contemporaneous pregnancy was not enough to dispel this idiotic rumor in the eyes of the press. This from the same media that made no demands that Obama release his medical records and that, when he released a single summary page, uttered no protest. Certainly no investigation into physiological remnants of his self-admitted prolific drug use in earlier years was demanded.

Since then, Palin has remained in the public’s eye, drawing cheering crowds and collecting political chits. The opposition perceives the danger she presents. They resent her resilience and her giving a voice to those the elites expect to be followers. The attacks on her have resumed. Those range from numerous expensive and time-consuming “ethics violations” filed against her for making speeches outside Alaska, wearing a visible label on her clothing, and similar eye roll-producing minutiae. All 15 of them have been dismissed. But since they are being filed by the same bloggers and “citizens,” with ties to the Democratic Party organization, one can expect them to continue. While those complaints cost nothing, to investigate them costs the state, and to defend herself costs Palin, so far to the tune of $500,000.

The personal vendetta has been ramped up, as well. David Letterman’s sex jokes (not joke—there were two separate ones) about Palin’s minor-aged daughter Willow were one example, though Dave tried to excuse them by saying he thought he was talking about Palin’s 18-year old daughter, Bristol. Well, all right then, Dave. No similar Letterman jokes about Obama’s minor-aged daughters have been noted, nor about Biden’s adult children. Nor about Clinton’s. Nor Edwards’s. Then came further disgusting attacks on baby Trig, courtesy of the Huffington Post and other liberal bloggers that eventually entered the news cycle. Interesting how the liberals who loudly proclaim their own compassion in contrast to the bigotry and hatred they ascribe to conservatives attack a helpless baby for his handicap, something that this presumably (in the definition of liberals) insensitive and bigoted hate-mongering right winger would find beyond the pale. What has become clear is that these attacks reflect the state of panic the elites (mainly, but not exclusively, the liberal portion) feel at the star quality of Sarah Palin. Again, I have certain reservations about some of her speeches, themes, and approaches. She is, after all, a politician, and one should never invest too much of oneself in a person with whom one has not reached an advanced state of emotional intimacy and personal convergence. But the scope and intensity of the attacks on her are directly proportional to the fear she instills in her (mostly) liberal enemies and in the Democratic Party apparatchiks. One doesn’t, after all, see such vitriol directed at Mitt Romney—yet. 

In my next post, I will have some thoughts about her resignation as governor.