Karl Rove?
Is that you?
So those of us who admire and have supported Governor Sarah Palin are all illegal drug users? Are you sure you’re at the right website?
"Pedestal" is too strong a word. Try "respect." This whole business of diminishing Palin supporters by transforming our belief in her as a good candidate into some kind of mindless adoration is a form of straw man reasoning. Of course anyone who worships any candidate and sees no faults is unrealistic, and it doesn't require hallucinogens to get there.
But is that really us? It's not me, and it's not any supporter I ever hung out with during the former times of enthusiasm. In fact, as an admin of a pro-Palin FB page, I can tell you we dumped trolls who gave themselves away by overplaying the admiration gig into the extreme range. They, like you, really thought that's who we were, thought they could use that to “blend in,” when in reality it made them stick out like a sore thumb. They believed their own stereotype, and came to a false conclusion.
Bottom line, Palin would have been an excellent presidential candidate, and I am sorry she is not running. But I never saw here as perfect, and mischaracterizing her supporters as irrational, to me, never seemed to be anything but an obvious effort to weaken support for her by marginalizing and isolating her supporters on less than rational grounds. Given the high quality conservatism she represents, that kind of attack really only helps the bad guys in the end, and I don't know why FReepers engage in it, except that they don't understand what they are doing, or that they do and it is the desired effect.