What do you think of Sarah Palin?

WONDERFUL speech! (I watched the first 5 minutes and then just read the rest. I really appreciate your linking, because I would have ignored otherwise like I do all other non-Ron-Paul current politics!)

I’m at least 50% likely to put this sticker on my car now: http://candid.livejournal.com/766252.html

I thought the speech was very well done. She was comfortable and confident. She’s funny, down-homey, and personable; it’s hard not to like her. She’s brought an energy and vitality to the ticket.

The GOP certainly has fallen in love with her and I think she’ll help the grassroots with getting the GOP vote out.

She attacked Obama/Biden directly but without bitterness or mean-spiritedness. I think she’ll be able to continue to criticize and attack Obama in a way that McCain and others couldn’t for PC-type reasons.

Here’s what I posted on my blog:

Devastating – brilliant – beautiful

Sarah Palin. What a speech. What a woman. Stirring rhetoric. Great zingers. Poised – confident – sexy! This is the Republican Party! The stodgy old GOP. And before Palin, we had Rudy Guiliani making deep jabs about the sexism of the Left. Both Palin and Guiliani tapped into blue collar workers – union workers. What kind of upside down world am I in? I love it!

I honestly don’t know what to think. I think she delivered a good speech — that she succeeded in her goals that night.

Interestingly, she didn’t seem as effective the week before when they had her speak before crowds when she was first named the VP pick. I get the impression that she was holed up for days leading up to her convention speech, being coached, rehearsing, etc.

That gets to the larger issue. It’s impossible for me to know if any of this is real — if her stated convictions or even her tone and attitude are actually hers and will drive her actions as VP. Major party politics in the modern age is a game of manufacturing, spin, and cynical manipulation. I’m not confident in my ability to read people — your mileage may vary.

It’s important to linger on the fact that her words weren’t hers. McCain’s words probably weren’t his either. It’s amazing that we take people seriously when we know that someone else wrote the speech, but it’s just one aspect of Fundamental Attribution Error, a hallmark finding in social psychology. She might have contributed something or tweaked it, but she had speechwriters. Most of them do.

Back to the speech. I was bothered by all the militarism and jingoism — the mindless, content-free talk of America this and America that. The audience chants of USA! USA! USA! I had no reason to suspect that these people meant anything more in their chants than Russians shouting about Mother Russia or Mexicans shouting Viva Mexico. It seemed like a dark and unexamined process of tribalism — I didn’t get the sense that these people had any sort of principled grasp of or commitment to the ideals of individual liberty that defined this country’s founding. They just happened to be born here, and so they chant.

The capstone was Palin bragging about her son going to Iraq on Sep 11. She’s sending her son to die in a far off land for nothing, and this is supposed to be a good thing. Pure, unadulterated Christian altruism. Ick. Protect life. (I know it can be argued that the Iraq mission will make America safer, but it’s a complicated argument and the magnitude of the security gain doesn’t seem demonstrably or prospectively large.)

The “protect America” meme was strong and confusing — and all tied up with the aforementioned tribalism and groupthink. I kept wondering what these people were afraid of, and what they know about the world. America is massively strong, and militarily unassailable. No one’s going to invade us. Why would the citizens of a massively strong nation bordered by Mexico, Canada, and two vast oceans be so obsessed with security? Something is not right there — security hypochondria. The only threat we face is a crippled al Qaeda and assorted other Islamist wannabes. They could never hurt us much so long as we have our shit together.

Palin is shockingly religious, although it wasn’t in her speech. On Iraq: “Pray our military men and women who are striving to do what’s right for this country — that our national leaders are sending them out on a task that is from God,” Palin said. “That’s what we have to make sure that we’re praying for, that there is a plan and that plan is God’s plan.”

On a pipeline in Alaska: “I think God’s will has to be done in unifying people and companies to get that gas line built, so pray for that.”

WTF?

That spooks me. Otherwise, I liked her spunk, and I’m fascinated by her and her husband’s background as a regular, non-political people. This makes her something Hillary could never be — real.

I gobbled up some excellent commentary on this today:

1) Will Wilkinson has some fascinating things to say about Palin and culture here: http://www.willwilkinson.net/flybottle/2008/09/04/sex-culture-and-sarah-palin/ I think you’ll be interested.

2) Megan McArdle pulls that and more into her post at the Atlantic here: http://meganmcardle.theatlantic.com/archives/2008/09/rural_identity_politics.php

3) Peggy Noonan is just a pleasure to read. Her Declarations column over at the WSJ had an incisive piece on Palin and politics a few days ago, before her speech. Now, the same link seems to yield a new column, written after the speech. I haven’t figured out yet how to retrieve what she wrote before, but her new musings are still just great examples of someone who is a much better writer than I am: http://online.wsj.com/public/article/declarations.html

Joe,

Thanks for the links. I had seen Wilkinson’s and McArdle’s pieces, but not yet the new Noonan. Noonan is one of my favorite commentators.

Wilkinson’s piece never really got off the ground for me, but I’ve enjoyed McArdle’s friendly criticism of Palin, if only because it seems so much less mean-spirited than the attacks coming from the left.

Knowing as I do your opposition to the war in Iraq, I can understand why Palin’s pride in her son’s service would leave you cold.

For those of us who support the war on principled grounds — and even for many who do not — it is an unmistakable mark of integrity when parents like McCain and Palin have their own children on the front lines.

Regarding her religious beliefs… that would have rattled me when I was a teen; but as an adult surrounded by people with religious beliefs, I’ve grown comfortable with the fact that many of the best people I’ve ever known have been not just religious, but religious to their core.

What I see in Palin, so unmistakeably, is the “realness” that you noted. Pretty much the opposite of John Kerry.

On the morning of her nomination, I was in Los Angeles and Kathy called me to say, it’s her, the one we watched on video.

We both knew from the first time we saw Palin that she had the potential to be another Ronald Reagan. Not just because of her looks and charisma, but also her articulateness, her seemingly strong principles, and her fundamental normalness, in contrast to so many career politicians.

Reagan had his flaws, but in our age, I do believe the standard he set is about the best we could realistically hope for among any who would rise to national prominence.

McCain’s gift to America, is elevating Palin to a level where she could become the Republican standard-bearer within a few short years. And given the skull-cracking she administered in Alaska, that raises at least the possibility of some real change.

I just hope she proves to have a good understanding of and appreciation for free markets. That’s the biggest unknown for me.

Joshua

PS. Regarding the whole “she didn’t write all her own words” thing … isn’t that just a sign of our times and the nature of politics?

I scratch my head a bit when I hear pundits pointing that out, as though they never realized that politicians usually don’t write their own stuff — and that certainly includes Obama, who often seems lost without a teleprompter.

Reportedly Palin does have a history of speaking extemporaneously, which would put her well above average in her abilities as a communicator.

I enjoyed Palin’s speech both in style and content. Sure, she is a mixed bag like almost all Republicans but I still feel she and McCain are vastly preferable to Obama-Biden. I know we cringe when we hear Republicans like Giuliani and McCain make negative comments about self-interest. But I think we make the mistake of assuming that they have the same concept in mind as we do. We need to ask whether McCain and the others have ever read Rand and, if they have, do they really understand what she is saying? (The same question can be asked about some of her admirers.) I am just starting to read McCain’s Worth Fighting For to get a better feel. In the opening pages he makes a brief reference to individualism versus egotism without explaining the distinction he is making. Furthermore, if McCain and his colleagues were completely dead set again self-interest why do they appeal to ours?

We ultimately will have a choice between McCain who believes we should serve our country in order to protect and improve it versus Obama who wants us to sacrifice ourselves to everyone else, both foreign and domestic. On the surface it appears there is no fundamental difference between the two. McCain asks us to serve our country while Obama wants us to serve others in general. I think buried in this is a key distinction. McCain is not denying that we have a right to be happy or to pursue happiness. (At least I haven’t found any quotes to that affect.) I think he believes we need to put the interests of the U.S. first because protecting this framework will ensure our freedom and our ability to pursue our values. I’ll admit that maybe this is wishful thinking and might be too generous but I think his voting record supports what I’m saying.

On the other hand I’m confident that deep down Obama does indeed want to change us … into another more consistent welfare-state with a heavily government regulated market that is more in line with the “enlightened” European-model where we can’t drive our SUVs, have to turn down our thermostats and can’t eat as much. (This is paraphrasing a quote from him.) Kind of intrusive, isn’t it? I think he is ultimately uncomfortable with and ashamed of the self-interest that drives us. It doesn’t take much digging to find the collectivist intellectual influences in Obama’s life that would explain his antipathy to self-interest.

I find it interesting how some Objectivist bloggers recommend either not voting or voting only for the Democrats. My theory is that these Objectivists, influenced by their own rationalism/intrincism, react to the religious rationalism/intrincism of the right and prefer, oddly enough, the post-modern subjectivism of the left.