I’m starting to think that perhaps my first instinct about Sarah Palin was right. Fareed Zakaria agrees. My favorite part:
COURIC: Why isn’t it better, Governor Palin, to spend $700 billion helping middle-class families who are struggling with health care, housing, gas and groceries; allow them to spend more and put more money into the economy instead of helping these big financial institutions that played a role in creating this mess?
PALIN: That’s why I say I, like every American I’m speaking with, were ill about this position that we have been put in where it is the taxpayers looking to bail out. But ultimately, what the bailout does is help those who are concerned about the health-care reform that is needed to help shore up our economy, helping the—it’s got to be all about job creation, too, shoring up our economy and putting it back on the right track. So health-care reform and reducing taxes and reining in spending has got to accompany tax reductions and tax relief for Americans. And trade, we’ve got to see trade as opportunity, not as a competitive, scary thing. But one in five jobs being created in the trade sector today, we’ve got to look at that as more opportunity. All those things under the umbrella of job creation. This bailout is a part of that.
This is nonsense—a vapid emptying out of every catchphrase about economics that came into her head. Some commentators, like CNN’s Campbell Brown, have argued that it’s sexist to keep Sarah Palin under wraps, as if she were a delicate flower who might wilt under the bright lights of the modern media. But the more Palin talks, the more we see that it may not be sexism but common sense that’s causing the McCain campaign to treat her like a time bomb.
McCain’s dug himself into a hole now. His right-wing nutjob sideshow can’t even withstand a half hour of Katie Couric lobbing softballs at her. His surprise choice of her, along with recent highly publicized but seemingly meaningless attempts to suspend his campaign, makes him look more and more like an underdog throwing Hail Maries in need of a miracle. That’s a vicious cycle, because it makes people perceive him as inferior, which in turn deepens his need for one.
Swinging numbers in polls among women show that the more she talks, the more they realize her selection is an insult to their own intelligence. Plus, despite her pro-life, gun toting image, she still talks like a Canadian, gives her kids names like Track, and thinks hockey is a legitimate sport.
So to the very base she’s meant to energize, she still feels like a bit of an outsider, and they’re all about voting for insiders. They routinely vote for a party whose policies send their jobs to China, then take their former incomes and give it to the executives who exported their jobs while telling them that if things work out well, maybe some of it will trickle back down to them (presumably when said executives stop by McDonald’s, where they’re now working the drive through) all so that the government will make a legal distinction between the words "marriage" and "civil union", so it’s clear they have no intelligence to insult. But while they’d love to vote for someone who plays football and hunts deer, hockey and a moose just feels a little off. Not enough that they’ll vote for Obama, but enough that they just might not turn out in force in Virginia.
McCain’s taken much heat for irresponsibly choosing a sideshow for a post that could very easily lead to the Presidency, especially given the fact that he’s so old that nobody is 100% sure he’s even alive.
As conservative columnist and former Bush speechwriter David Frum said, “she has pretty thoroughly — and probably irretrievably — proven that she is not up to the job of being president of the United States.” Replacing her now would just admit that openly.
But McCain can never admit that. Dropping her for a reasonable VP choice would only further make him appear to be flailing blindly in search of a miracle. So, like the guy who got caught by his wife smelling like another woman’s perfume and with a keycard from a cheap motel in his pocket, he’s got no choice but to deny it and tell the religious right that it must have come from when he hugged his boss’s wife at the board meeting they had at the Holiday Inn Express. And yeah, they’re not really buying it, but getting divorced is a pain, and who wants to sell the house in this market? The kids will be out of the house in 4 or 5 more years, surely they can tough it out at least that long.
So they’ll stay with him, but they won’t like it and he won’t care. He’ll just figure on getting what he wants and then trading them in for his secretary, and they know it. Am I going too far with this metaphor?
Either way, I’m back to my original thought that her selection will one day be looked back upon as a costly blunder. His temptation to choose her is understandable. He was down a bit at the polls, and slipping, and while Obama appearances were filling arenas, he had a hard time filling the dairy aisle of a supermarket.
But really, he should have gone for a less drastic approach. He could have pandered to the party base by choosing Mike Huckabee. Nobody gets the far right’s votes like that guy. His performance in the primaries was impressive for someone so extreme. And, unlike, say, Pat Buchanan, his personality is nonabrasive. He doesn’t blame acts of terrorism on homosexuals. And the man’s clearly got executive branch credentials, meaning McCain could continue insulting Obama’s lack of experience.
So here’s the question. You’re McCain right now. You’re down in the polls, and as the economy falters, you appear to be slipping, and no matter how much you try to pin the lack of a solid bailout on Obama, that trend is going to continue. You can match your opponent in the debates, but you probably can’t beat him at all, and definitely not by much. You’re stuck with a VP choice who seems to embarrass herself every time she speaks. How do you win this election?
Other than hope that being a white man still counts for something, I’m drawing a blank.
