Some thoughts on Sarah Palin

It was just two weeks ago that I was advising a fellow commentor at Fanatical Apathy thusly:

I think it would be as much a mistake to try to disregard Palin as a lightweight distraction of no importance as it was for Kerry to disregard the ironically-named “Swift Boat Veterans for Truth” back in 2004 until the damage had already been done.

Try to hark back to those long-ago days when Palinomania was just beginning, when the afterglow of Palin's speech was still shining brightly. There was still some question as to whether or not her bounce would amount to anything; but by the beginning of the next week, the news was All Palin, All The Time. You couldn't throw a dead cat without having it bounce off an image of Sarah Palin. The Republicans had found their Celebrity.

And that, I think, is where it started to go wrong.

I've criticized Obama for using what I call the "chase figure" strategy in his appearances. A "chase figure", as any Star Wars geek worth his or her blue milk would know, is an action figure that is intentionally shipped to retailers in limited numbers. If a case contains 20 Darth Vaders, 20 Luke Skywalkers, 20 Stormtroopers, 20 Sandpeople, and 20 Rebel Commandos, it might contain one Ralph McQuarrie Stormtrooper. And so that was the figure everyone wanted. By limiting access to the product, an artificial demand was created. So many Obama appearances have been limited-access events in small venues. And they always are packed houses.

Sarah Palin has been more accessible. Throngs have showed up everywhere she has gone to hear her repeat essentially the same speech, the same talking points, in appearance after appearance, even after many of these points were shown to be blatant misrepresentations of the facts - or even outright lies. She has been all over the TV, playing the media that she and her running mate officially hold in great contempt like a harp from hell. Maybe people didn't know a lot about the political philosophy of Sarah Palin, but they sure were becoming familiar with Sarah Palin the hockey mom and moose hunter.

And familiarity, as the saying goes, breeds contempt.

Things started to unravel by the end of that first week after the convention, as Sarah Palin showed Charlie Gibson and the world that while she was quite good at spitting out official party platitudes, she needed to go hit the books when it came to specifics. Then came the roadblocks to the long-standing bipartisan Alaskan investigation into the reasons behind Governor Palin's abrupt dismissal of a government employee. As always, the crime is less damning than the cover up, and we were all treated to a cover up in real time as the McCain-Palin campaign scrambled to interfere in an internal State matter - and succeeded. (What glimpses we received of Palin's method of governance during those parts of this process that actually got to happen suggest that the "Change" she represents is a change back to Nixon-era enemies lists and political intimidation and retaliation.)

Now Palin has been pushed back into the shadows as all the chickens spawned by the past seven years and eight months of Bush Administration mismanagement have started to come home to roost, all the postponed bills have come due, all the duct tape and bondo has started to fall off. McCain-Palin's post-convention bounce is gone. Palin's celebrity star has dimmed. And those on one side of the political divide are faced with a dilemma: do we keep silent and let her fade into obscurity, or do we continue to shine a light on her and her past and risk stirring interest in her once again?

I had planned to hold my tongue. But I don't think silence is the best strategy at any point in a political contest. Sarah Palin is still there. The reasons behind her selection are still there. And the long-term strategy behind that selection, whatever it may be, is still there. So I choose not to be silent.


Recommended reading: When Atheists Attack: A noted provocateur rips Sarah Palin—and defends elitism. Sam Harris, Newsweek, from the magazine issue dated Sep 29, 2008 (Hat tip to Tressa.)