Sarah Palin, The Tonya Harding of Republican Politics
With the mean-girl snark of Tonya Harding and the smug swagger of Bill Clinton, Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska thrilled the conservative faithful last night in a vice-presidential nomination acceptance speech that was long on partisan swipes but quite short on accuracy.
Even the Bush-friendly AP admitted "In some cases, the reproach and the praise stretched the truth."
Like Tonya Harding's posse wacking rival Nancy Kerrigan, Palin gleefully kneecapped Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama again and again and again.
Palin was clearly energized as she wielded the powerful hockey stick of words, attempting to bloody her opponent to an uncompetitive pulp. Sarah Barracuda, indeed. A vicious pitbull with lipstick, absolutely.
But will Sarah Palin's over-the-top, sarcastic performance be effective in drawing new voters to the Republican ticket in November? And is Palin's angry, judgmental demeanor what Americans want in this already bitterly divisive time?
I can't, and won't try to, predict Palin's impact on voters two months from now on election day, except to say that Obama and Biden need to tiptoe carefully around this fire-breathing, high-heeled, ultra-conservative ideologue.
I'm intrigued, though, by the interesting comments left at Focus Group: Palin Was (Alarmingly) Strong , a blog post at The New Republic. Here are a few:
- From wgcreeley: "Didn't hear a word of policy, no focus on any issues, just Rush-ready attacks. She's a base pick, and this was a base speech. We'll see if it moves any dials. "
- From tomeg: "Her derisive, self-serving patter only makes me hungrier...this is gonna be a bloody campaign, and I can't wait."
- From fougasseu: "I do think they made one major, major mistake. Belittling and mocking Obama in a way that showed their utter contempt for him. If that doesn't (justifiably) enrage every black American, I don't know what will. They weren't laughing because she was funny, the laughter came from that who-does-he-think-he-is place, this uppity phony. She took it too far... "
- From timteeter: "I found her demeanour to be insufferably smug, and wondered what it was about her that so irritated me. Then I realized: she's W. in drag."
- From Eos: "Her speech was directed at an unarticulated and underrepresented mainstream current in the country. She was tough, charming, poised, confident, unbeholden and unbespoke, a maverick, a reformer and non-doctrinnaire.. McCain and Palin just became the ticket of change in this election. Obama and Biden now seem ordinary and over-familiar."
Read more comments at The New Republic.
(Photo taken on September 3, 2008: Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)
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Comments
Sarah Palin took a town with $0 debt in 1996 and left it $22 million in the hole in 2002, mostly from the hockey rink/sports complex she shoved down their throats which never became the money generator she promised it would. Another white elephant from another white elephant.
Even with the stable Clinton economy during most of her mayoral tenure and Jack Abramoff’s crony she hired to lobby Washington to help her now indicted buddy Ted Stevens ring up $27 million in federal pork for tiny Wasilla (pop. 5000 when she entered office) she still managed to leave the town swimming in debt. Three of her pork projects even made McCain’s own wasteful spending list.
The following organization is the offshoot of President Reagan’s Private Sector Survey on Cost Control started in 1984, also known as the Grace Commission. Definitely not a Dem friendly group. Check out that per capita pork. Alaska is America’s welfare queen state.
Citizens Against Government Waste
http://www.cagw.org/site/PageServer?pagename=homePage
As governor she is borrowing from Alaska’s future while she wants to blow today’s Alaskan windfall oil tax bonanza and the huge surpluses they’ve generated on bread and circuses tax giveaways.
Alaska gets 89% of it’s operating budget from taxing oil coming out of the ground just like Arab kingdoms and Hugo Chavez’s Venezuela. They have no state income or sales tax up there. Instead of using that windfall to pay for all the profligate spending her Republican legislature keeps sending her she’s issuing bonds to pay for it which Alaskans and US taxpayers will have to pay off in future years while she takes credit for tax “rebates” while she’s governor.
Her fiscal policy is a disaster in the making which won’t hit til she’s left the governor’s office. She’d be a disaster as Vice President especially to a President who despite his grevious wounds and type A personality is already past the age his father and grandfather died of sudden heart attacks.
She can put on all the lipstick she wants but her political record is for the dogs.
What a terrific analogy!
You are a bunch of Idiots.
You lost me at “Bush Friendly AP”. Your joking right??
Yes, Sarah Palin’s speech was harsh, but so was Joe Biden’s. This is politics, not some fairy tale. Mr. Obama never explains how he is going to do anything either. It is unfair to single out Palin for the exact same thing the Democrats are doing!
Girl power! Go palin! lol
Good grief, Ms. White! Palin may be Republican but she is *not* Tonya Harding.
Deborah’s comments reflect the desperation some liberals feel and the length they will go as they slowly watch their chances of election victory quickly slip away. It’s this irrational obsession and hatred of Gov. Sarah Palin that’s partly to blame for their undoing. The American public loves her and they can’t stand it. But the more they direct their loathing to the #2 in the ticket, the more irrational and childish they appear.
Good to see the Palin bounce has fallen flat. Qualification and intelligence matter in regards to high office. She is not auditioning for Fear Factor, she is up for Vice President. Honestly, all partisanship aside,can you really see her as presidential material? Really, is she the best we can come up with? Yeah, I thought so.