politics and the media 1:39 pm
Variously, discussing the recent news concerning Bristol Palin has been described as cynical, an invasion of privacy, or otherwise something that should be avoided. While there are definitely snarky, cynical posts out there, I feel that it’s a legitimate conversation–and yes, even the snarkiness of Gawker is not going to kill anyone. (more…)
politics 10:08 am
The more reports I read from the campaign’s postmortem, the less convinced I am that John McCain really had control over his message at the end. Once he had picked Sarah Palin as his running mate and took a hard tack to the right, the campaign had entered into its final stages, with attack ads that took a turn for the nasty and a running mate who seemed to represent everything I have ever disliked about the conservative base. At that point he seemed less interested in acting like the moderate he has developed a reputation for being. It had become a campaign of gimmicks, of erratic and seemingly desperate stabs at the presidency.
Had they recognized they had lost before that point? Did they think their only chance was to hope the conservative base outnumbered Obama’s legion of supporters? Were they counting on the youth vote to be as unreliable as previously? The strategies after the conventions seemed risky. Sarah Palin seemed at once a cynical attempt to attract Hillary’s supporters, a grab to energize the Republican base, and a desperate stab at weakening Obama’s message of change by bringing someone else who can lay claim to being an agent of change.
I am not convinced that balancing act would have been possible even for a political mastermind, and I certainly don’t think Sarah Palin fits the bill. I grant her bloody, luxurious, avaricious, false, deceitful, sudden, malicious, smacking of every sin that has a name; she may even be intelligent and clever. But she is not cunning. She is a creature of gimmicks. She was also almost entirely unknown, apparently even to the McCain campaign. The convention bounce came, held for a while, then faded into an Obama lead once the public got an idea of who she was–and was less than impressed.
But I’m not really here to talk about why the campaign failed. He was taking some risks and failed. I think they got away from him at some point. He lost balance, things happened too fast, and the only choice was to run with it and hope. I can’t say it was a civil campaign at the end. But I think it is important to remember at least this much: John McCain is not a monster. His supporters are not all hateful fearmongers. Perhaps it’s time to make the attempt to make some unity happen?
conservatives and politics 10:34 am
Probably you’ve heard by now that Sarah Palin, in the event McCain/Palin loses this election cycle, wants to remain a prominent figure in national politics. I’ve been quietly making this speculation for some time now, but at first I thought she might be more likely to run for one of the state’s Senate seats. I think I was wrong about this one. Sarah Palin wants to be president of the United States in the year 2012, and she is going to use the same narrative she’s been running on.
She kicked out the incumbent Republican governor, if you recall. She fought the existing Republican establishment. She is a diehard Republican, but she still bucked the establishment. And now she has a flotilla of intellectual Republicans who don’t like her and think she is dangerously unqualified and a bit of a lunatic. She will be fighting against these elites who think that knowing what you’re doing is important in a candidate. She has a narrative already. She will drag the word “maverick” kicking and screaming back into politlcal discourse.
You see, many observers think the Republican party is tearing itself apart. You are seeing the intellectual conservatives and the conservative base, and they are not happy with each other. John McCain has ultimately decided he would rather appeal to the base. And he has set up Sarah Palin to become their new champion. It’s politics without high-minded discourse, just gimmicks and obvious ploys to make the common man feel included. Joe the Plumber? Really?
Are the gimmicks working? Can Sarah Palin come back from this election and lead the Republican Party to victory? Can this Republican Party win elections anymore? Do they need someone whose gimmick is being a reformer to shake up the party? Or is it perhaps that what they really need is someone who is intelligent and thoughtful and has the right temperament to lead, to redefine the party so that it is no longer associated with angry shouts of “socialist!” and “terrorist!” and “muslim!” and “kill him!” at rallies. A thoughtful party with traditional values, rather than a hateful party afraid the gays are going to steal their jobs.
Watch Sarah Palin carefully. What happens to her could be a sign of the future of the Republican Party.
liberals and politics and Uncategorized 1:09 am
MSNBC has an article about how Barack Obama misrepresented some of Sarah Palin’s comments about negative campaigning. The very first comment: “You people are ridiculous with your headlines. Palin clearly criticized the robo-calls.” The poster’s name is “MSM is biased.” This confuses me. I’m used to accusations of bias, of course–Fox is conservative, MSNBC is liberal, and as some people would have it, everyone that isn’t Fox is liberal–but I’m not sure I ever expected to see someone accuse MSNBC of conservative bias.
Perhaps this is just a case of the hostile media effect. But that is most prominent in a controlled study–and by and large the media is pretty friendly with Obama. What I think this is about, really, is the danger of getting your news from Daily Kos or Huffington Post (or, on the other hand, WorldNetDaily or all those other fun Republican places). Research your news, please.