Posted on 12/01/2009 8:45:49 AM PST by Bob J
Chapter Four
At last the chapter for which we have all been waiting: Sarah Palin is picked as McCain’s running mate. For those of us who were Palin fans before the announcement it is is interesting to read what was happening behind the news stories.
Palin was treated badly by the media. They sneered at her like she was a Window user at a Mac convention. She was hit harder than anyone I have ever seen . . . and the McCain camp was not ready. They mishandled the issue of her daughter’s pregnancy by not getting ahead of the story. Instead, they had a weird desire to probe her theistic evolutionist views (”creationism” in the most liberal sense of the term).
Palin comes across well in the opening of the chapter. She was hit by stuff nobody prepared her for and it is easy to forget that her first two encounters on the national stage were grand slams. I think her convention speech the best of either convention.
She was boffo.
Conservatives should never give up on a talent like Palin as long as she can lead and give speeches like that! She made my entire family cheer for John McCain, a task more difficult than most.
Oddly, this part of the book is the least revealing. We have heard most of it before, but I think the idea that she is “vengeful” is nonsense. She settles some scores and answers lies she thinks has been told about her.
She does not strike me as vengeful about it.
Her description of her speechwriter Matthew Scully reminded me of what could have been. She references my friend the Crunchy Con Rod Dreher . . . one of the first conservatives she later lost.
Palin would control the nomination process if she had more Scully in her. Can she do it? I don’t know.
Conservatives that think Palin critics are all RINOs are wrong. I thought (and still think) that Dreher abandoned Palin too quickly. . . though this book has forced me to the conclusion that he may have been right in his judgment. If you are hasty, but right, then you are still too hasty!
There are of course RINO’s out there, but when Palin lost Dreher and others disposed to like her there was a problem. The McCain campaign may have picked her before she was ready, or utterly and disastrously mishandled her, or both.
The weirdest thing about this chapter is that Palin constantly talks about Palin talking to people about policy, but the details given to the reader are all about clothes and campaign chat which she allegedly hated. Now I know geekery about Iraq might have sold fewer books, but did her publisher make her talk about what she claims to have not cared about and not write about what she did care about?
Did the rogue obey her publisher?
Or did she write about what actually excited her?
It is hard to take her policy wonkery seriously when the details are all elsewhere. When a man claims to love the Packers, he should not always be talking about the Vikings or his friends will begin to doubt his interests.
Palin was candid about how she hated being screened from the press. The campaign’s handling of this was a disaster! Why didn’t they let her warm up with Alaska press and friendly reporters from day one? Why did they hide her?
Obviously, their strategy took a huge public asset and tarnished it badly. It is hard to imagine any other idea going worse!
I thought her explanation of the Couric interview was excellent if the full tape of the interview backs her up. Why didn’t the campaign have someone making their own copy of the full interview? I am just a teacher and I know to do that!
Couric should release the whole tape if she has not done so already and let us make up our minds. Palin has charged her with abusive editing and now Ms. Couric should let the truth be known.
I doubt she dares.
The story of the campaign was not new to me, but it reminded me that Palin was the only good thing, at least for a brief moment, that happened to the McCain campaign. John McCain certainly did not lose because he picked Sarah Palin.
Palin should have been given more policy speeches, but Palin could be giving them now, could have written a book chock-a-block full of them, but she chose not to do so. She cannot blame the campaign for that.
If Palin is not running for office again, then I don’t blame her for telling her story, getting her handsome check, and doing something nice for her family. If she is running for office, she should have said more about policy and less about celebrities in this section.
There is no discussion of the economy or foreign policy in her description of the campaign. This is disappointing, because it plays to her critics.
As I have worked on this long, long, live commentary I have already started getting nasty email. This has caused me to reflect on whether I have been too hard on Sarah Palin.
I think not. The only way I know to admire a person is to take their work (and a book is serious work) seriously. Did Palin take it as seriously?
ping for later
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.