Posted on 10/06/2011 8:46:17 AM PDT by Qbert
- “I will continue driving the discussion for freedom and free markets…”
- From Sarah Palin’s statement announcing her decision not to run for president.
Um, probably not. Sarah Palin’s political voice had dwindled well before she announced her decision not to run. Now it will sink altogether into inaudibility. She will be no kind of force in future national discussions. She will have no sway over party debates. She will retain some starpower for a little while longer. She may for another cycle or two be able to help certain candidates for certain political offices raise some money. Even that will fade within two more years or four. Her political career was brief, bizarre, and sordid. But now at least it is definitively finished.
Palin will never become a party elder stateswoman. Over the past three years, it became apparent to all but a handful of cultists that her only interests were money and celebrity. She had no concept of public service, and no capacity to serve even if she had wished to do so. Soon even those last cultists will quietly abandon the argument. We talk often these days about makers and takers. Sarah Palin was the ultimate taker. She abandoned her post as governor of Alaska to cash in on lectures and TV. She squeezed her supporters for political donations and spent the money on herself. To adapt an old phrase, she seen her opportunities and she took ‘em.
In the end, she exploited, abused, or embarrassed almost everyone who had believed in her. Most embarrassing of all: she was never even a very good con artist. Everything that was false and petty and unqualified in her was visible within the first minutes of encountering her. The people she fooled were people who passionately wished to be fooled. To that extent, what was important in her story was not the faults and failings of Sarah Palin. There have always been grifters in politics. What was important in her story was the revelation of conservatism’s lack of antibodies against somebody with the faults and failings of Sarah Palin. That’s the story that should trouble us still.
Copying and pasting your stupid posts from yesterday I see.
Obviously the PDS a$$hats that contaminate FR have helped this lib whack-job write his slop.
Frum obviously hasn’t forgotten her since he’s writing another column about her. His disproves his own thesis....more PDS combined with wishful thinking.
The big frummy said, “There have always been grifters in politics”
Totally agree.
The biggest grifter is currently President of the US.
Mrs Palin was merely considering a run.
Oh, wait, did he mean Palin, and not Obama, was one of those grifters???
Boy! I sure can’t fool you. Hey, am I livin’ in your head 24/7 rent free?
Remember, all warfare is based on deception! Ahh so.
We lose.
If the political power she had in 2010 proves to be intact over the next few months, your post #13 is going to look silly.
You really want to try and argue Frum’s endorsement would mean more then Palin’s in the GOP Primary or the General Election?
Well, Frum is a complete idiot and of course Sarah will continue having some influence in the party. Her endorsements will matter in a lot of races and I saw that the remaining candidates are calling her already. Saying that, Palin teased this "will I or won't I run" campaign out way, way too long. Now that she has shocked her supporters and declined to run, I think many of them are going to be feel burned and used for a long time to come. Her approach to this whole thing was not very good, she should have made her intentions more clear to her followers a long time ago and avoided this whole nasty episode.
No. But I am disappointed and angry to have been dragged by all of her hype to this...decision.
Palin will do none of those things. She’s a GOP insider. She’s in it for the money and fame, and sidling up to the leading GOP candidate will keep her in the game.
Palin’s not the maverick many here think she is. Heck, remember she gladly accepted the VP slot for that self-proclaimed “maverick” John McCain, then happily endorsed him over the much-more conservative JD Hayworth (who probably would have lost).
She’s a GOP insider, wearing “outsider/maverick” clothes. And she’ll toe the party line and enthusiastically support whomever the GOP candidate is - even if it’s Romney - because she knows where her bread is buttered.
If her political power has been 'neutralized'; then why were GOP candidates calling her last night seeking her endorsement?
"I doubt if she’ll have a large influence, but I sure wouldn’t bet on being correct. Who’s to know?"
To paraphrase Reagan's famous plaque on his Oval Office desk:
"There is no limit to what a woman can do or where she can go if she does not mind who gets the credit."...
“She comes out and flatly states...”
It will not be because she flatly states something. It will be because she clearly gives her reasoning and it will be compelling.
Consider this one (of many) data points in her decision matrix.
Having a down syndrome child who every month falls farther behind the developmental curve. Hard to know what that learning trajectory was going to be a year or six months ago.
(I noticed that Mrs. Palin was none too pleased that Greta brought up Trig's marking on her ipad with a permanent marker).
I am sure that over the past several months the level of longer term care her youngest is going to require is coming more clearly into focus and she wasn't going to sacrifice her time with him for an office.
"Palin will do none of those things. She’s a GOP insider. She’s in it for the money and fame, and sidling up to the leading GOP candidate will keep her in the game..."
I think you should go back to the sidelines...
I truly believe she was planning on running. The purchase of the bus, the property in AZ, and a high-level meeting in August. Even the Iowa speech. But something happened this past month. Maybe the GOP establishment made some threats, regarding support. Maybe Trig’s health. Maybe the growing realization that the whole political-media complex was going to go to all-out war on her, utilizing and concocting any smear or lie imaginable, making a successful run all but insurmountable. Be disappointed (I am), but don’t be angry.
It’s possible. Still, her reasons are her business, not mine. I find it irritating that people make negative assumptions on Palin when she’s been through so much crap.
I’m disappointed too, but some people are outright bitter and that’s unreasonable.
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