A Wonderful Anachronism
This was an odd speech by Sarah Palin. She had a few genuinely good lines: the hockey mom as pit bull with lipstick was genuinely charming. The mockery of the pillars was sharp.
But the mockery got a little overboard at times. Yes, it fires up the base. But Rudi Giuliani gave them all the mockery they need. She sounded petty as the speech went on and she delved more and more into culture war attacks. Does “community organizer” poll really poorly? She and Rudi hit Obama on it a lot.
Palin age
Her biographical bit was good, but it was deeply uncomfortable to see Levi in the room. It seemed to revive all the bizarre questions of the last few days. Perhaps Rudi stepping on the intro video made this seem so perfunctory. But it was fine, such as it was.
Where Sarah Palin failed the most was in her discussion of policy. She spoke of energy in fairly generic terms, listing off the forms of energy to use but without a whole lot confidence. On other subjects she sounded like she was running for Mayor of Wasilla again. If someone at home was wondering if this woman has the knowhow to step in on Day Two to be President of the United States, that person would be left scratching her head. I suppose that was a bit deliberate, but when she had to hit her substantive points it sounded forced.
It was a real throwback to 2004. I hear some people on TV saying they didn’t bring culture war stuff, but that’s wrong. They brought up bittergate and ran on anti-elitism like it was 1992 again.
The long term effect of the speech is hard to gauge. It WILL rally the base. But what about everybody else? It will definitely rally the Democratic base too. I suppose those undecided voters or weak leaners didn’t hear enough to go either way. Some might have been turned off by her sarcasm; others might have been impressed.
I would also suspect that by taking the gloves off, Palin invited Obama to start going after her hard. She openly lied AGAIN about the Bridge to Nowhere. This will invite a full frontal assault on her honesty. The recently released e-mails from Walt Monegan only underscore the challenge to her honesty.
How does it play then? I have no idea. I’m biased. I’m a partisan Democrat that supports Barack Obama. The speech made me like her far less than I did earlier in the night. I feel much less sympathy for her over the blogger and media attacks against her. That’s what I mean by firing up the DEMOCRATIC base.
As for Republicans and Independents, I’ll defer to others.
Related posts: Bush lifts offshore drilling ban in symbolic move
(Reuters)
, China time, Erin andrews cubs game, Board of studies, Cash mccall
