Conservative Columnist Douthat on Sarah Palin
Jul 6th, 2009 | 10 responses
A reader commented on a recent post discussing Pulitzer Prize winner Leonard Pitts’ column on Governor Sanford’s “I made a mistake, so all is cool now” excuse as follows:
Pitts is a lightweight, predictable Dem columnist, simply less tiresome than worse hack Paul Krugman and more substantial than worse-than-worthless Maureen Dowd.
Feeling real bad about my poor columnist selection and trying to level the playing field, I will now highlight a column from a heavyweight, conservative columnist, who wrote a column on Sarah Palin in the New York Times this morning.
Conservative Ross Douthat’s article, “Palin and Her Enemies,” starts as follows:
She should have said no.
If Sarah Palin’s political career ended last Friday, 10 tumultuous months after she was introduced as the Republican Party’s vice-presidential nominee, those five words will be its epitaph.
And, he continues:
Had she refused John McCain, Palin would still be a popular female governor in a Republican Party starved for future stars. Her scandals would be the stuff of local politics, her daughter’s pregnancy a minor story in the Lower 48, her son Trig’s parentage a nonissue even for conspiracy theorists. There would still be plenty of time to ease into the national spotlight, to bone up on the issues, and to craft a persona more appealing than the Mrs. Spiro Agnew role the McCain campaign assigned to her.
On Palin’s political future, Douthat has mixed emotions:
And now, seemingly, it’s over. Oh, maybe not forever: she’s only 45, young enough (and, yes, talented enough) to have a second act. But last Friday’s bizarre, rambling resignation speech should take her off the political map for the duration of the Obama era.
Just as he does about her motives for stepping down:
One hopes that was intentional. A Sarah Palin who stepped down for the sake of her family and her media-swarmed state deserves sympathy even from the millions of Americans who despise her. A Sarah Palin who resigned in the delusional belief that it would give her a better shot at the presidency in 2012 warrants no such kindness.
But, Douthat staunchly defends Palin and blames her critics and detractors—the media, the elites, male commentators, female commentators, Democrats (and their “meritocratic ideal”), the political establishments, etc.—for past, present and future attacks on her, including the “professionals who pressed you into the service of a gimmicky, dreary, idea-free campaign will still be blaming you for their defeat.”
In her defense, Douthat mentions that in a recent Pew poll, a slightly higher percentage of Americans regarded Palin favorably than those who regarded her unfavorably, and that such higher number included 48 percent of Americans without a college education.
From this statistic Douthat concludes that “Palin’s popularity has as much to do with class as it does with ideology,” and that “Sarah Palin represents the democratic ideal — that anyone can grow up to be a great success story without graduating from Columbia and Harvard.”
While admitting that such ideal “has been been tarnished by Palin herself” with “…her missteps, scandals, dreadful interviews and self-pitying monologues,” Douthat does have some nice things to say about Sarah Palin:
Sarah Palin is beloved by millions because her rise suggested, however temporarily, that the old American aphorism about how anyone can grow up to be president might actually be true.
He concludes with the warning: “But her unhappy sojourn on the national stage has had a different moral: Don’t even think about it.”
It remains to be seen if Palin follows her conservative mentor’s advice.
Ross Gregory Douthat is a conservative author and blogger. He is the author of “Privilege: Harvard and the Education of the Ruling Class” , and co-author of “Grand New Party,” which David Brooks has called the “best single roadmap of where the [Republican] party should and is likely to head.” In April 2009, Douthat became an online and op-ed columnist for the New York Times, replacing Bill Kristol as a conservative voice on the Times editorial page.
10 Responses to “Conservative Columnist Douthat on Sarah Palin”
I think it's hard for people to think clearly about Palin, for some reason – and I'll include myself in that. I had never heard of her before McCain picked her from obscurity, but I quickly found her so distasteful that I simply couldn't bear to hear her speak.
But, from the start, she was attacked from the left for cultural differences. She could field dress a moose, she liked to hunt and fish, etc. Well, I have several cousins who could give her a run for her money in the outdoors stuff – and I'm pretty sure they could take her in a “rasslin'” match. That stuff doesn't matter when it comes to policy stuff, but neither does the fact that Obama lived in Hawaii and Indonesia. So…both sides are guilty of gilding the lilly and then peeing on the other side's gold.
The problem, I think, stems from the fact that Sarah Palin is, I think, a basically good person. The left kind of shrugged that off as immaterial while the right seemed to make it a panacea for all her ills. She was hopelessly unprepared to be on the national stage – she wouldn't have even spoken at the NRC if she hadn't been the running mate – and either no one tried to prepare her or she was singularly untrainable. Which one it is really doesn't matter. It amounts to the same – she wasn't ready.
What are our options now? Well, on the one hand, we can believe that Palin was driven out of public life by people who were someone on a scale that ran from vindictive to simply trying to sell more product (magazines, newspapers, whatever). If that is what happened, then there is a very sad lesson for basically good people who want to have a public life. On the other hand, we can believe that she has made a calculated political move. If that is what happened, then I am wrong and every political analyst on both sides of the divide are simply being duped by Sarah Palin. The truth is probably somewhere between the two. She may have rough-hewn political skills, but she is still a politician and her decision was made with one eye on her future political career.
I think for Sarah Palin to have any sort of political future, she'll have to get up to speed on policy – but she will also have to learn to not be such a good person. She'll have to get a thicker skin and she'll have to no longer care what people say about her or her family. I worry for any system where success is predicated on a person not being “such a good person.”
I found it interesting that FOX News' Liz Trotta commented that much of the “liberal media” had at least some foundation for the criticisms of Palin. She just did a lot of unprofessional and laughable things, not to mention being inarticulate. I know that many politicians do things worth being criticized and they should be, so Palin can't escape the media either, especially after criticizing Hilary for not taking what the media dished out. This video shows both sides of the story but most think Palin stepped down just because of media pressure:
http://www.newsy.com/videos/palin_s_questionabl…
Thurmanhart:
Thank you for a very reasoned and objective commentary.
About the only thing I would dispute a little bit is your comment:
“but she will also have to learn to not be such a good person. She'll have to get a thicker skin and she'll have to no longer care what people say about her or her family.”
I think she is morally a good person, but she wasn't very “good” when she vilified and smeared Obama during the campaign—and Democrats. By questioning and attacking Obama's patriotism and his loyalties, his national origin, etc., and by accusing him of “palin' around with terrorists,” etc.,she invited and deserved every personal attack she got—except for the ones on her kids.
Thanks
Dorian
ThurmanHart – probably as good of a treatise on Palin as I've ever read.
Poor Russ is now vacationing riverside in Egypt
Thank you HermesFire. That is a very enlightening reference.
Especially the 2008 video showing Palin saying the following about the criticism heaped on Hillary Clinton during the presidential campaign:
“Well, you know, I think, fair or unfair, I do think it’s a more concentrated criticism Hillary gets on many fronts I think that’s unfortunate, but fair or unfair I think she does herself a disservice to even mention it really. You have to plow through that. You have to know what you’re getting into….when I hear a statement like that coming from a woman candidate with any sort of perceived whine about that excess criticism…I think man that doesn’t do us any good.” Sarah Palin
Wow!!
Dorian
Thank you HermesFire. That is a very enlightening reference.
Especially the 2008 video showing Palin saying the following about the criticism heaped on Hillary Clinton during the presidential campaign:
“Well, you know, I think, fair or unfair, I do think it’s a more concentrated criticism Hillary gets on many fronts I think that’s unfortunate, but fair or unfair I think she does herself a disservice to even mention it really. You have to plow through that. You have to know what you’re getting into….when I hear a statement like that coming from a woman candidate with any sort of perceived whine about that excess criticism…I think man that doesn’t do us any good.” Sarah Palin
Wow!!
Dorian
Is there any hope now that the number of Palin-related posts at TMV will drop below an average of 20 per week within say the next 30 days?
And in related news:
Former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin Still Not Being Investigated by FBI
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087…
As I said elsewhere, the following by Nolan Finley here in Detroit metro is a suitable critique of Palin and of the GOP currently.
http://www.detnews.com/article/20090705/OPINION…