Winnipeg Free Press - PRINT EDITION
She's red, they're blue; U.S. politics fetid brew
Palin is an easy target for the leftist authors who contributed to Going Rouge.
Going Rouge
Sarah Palin: An American Nightmare
Edited by Richard Kim and Sally Reed
Thomas Allen, 320 pages, $20
Sarah Palin, who ran for U.S. vice-president on the McCain ticket in 2008, was not the sole cause of the Republican party's bitter loss.
Then-Senator Barack Obama's charisma, his chief opponent's pomposity and crankiness, and an incumbent with a poor record about to see his country plunged into a severe recession, all played a role in the worst GOP bashing for years.
Of course, she didn't help much. After the initial excitement, it became abundantly clear that she lacked the base to be an effective candidate.
Her interviews with CBS news anchor Katie Couric pretty much shattered any pretence she might have of policy expertise. And Tina Fey's mimicry of her on Saturday Night Live became a classic.
One might have thought that such a bracing kick in the pants would be enough to keep her out of politics for the rest of her life. But it looks, from the vantage point of late 2009, that she might try again.
However, in order to make life more difficult for her, a group of American leftists has produced this bizarre little book designed to totally discredit her.
With a title that puns off the title of Palin's new bestselling autobiography, it consists of a long list of chapters, and a few short pieces which are plays on the words palaeontology and palimpsest.
The best known authors in the collective are Gloria Steinem, Nancy Klein, Robert Reich and Sky Jones (yes, Sky Jones the artist).
The book is co-edited by a couple of people from The Nation magazine, which is the source of several of the articles.
The one thing all these great talents have conspicuously in common is a profound dislike of ex-governor Palin. They dislike her persona, her cultural values, her political values, the whole lot.
They are embarrassed that a candidate for the vice-presidency (and possibly higher) should have been a beauty queen in Idaho. Not cool; she should have chosen Maine.
She has a habit of winking at the camera during TV debates and has been caught showing a glimpse of stocking during photo sessions.
What America's best and brightest leftists most dislike about her, however, is her religious fundamentalism and her opposition to abortion. She is a gunshootin', moosehuntin', snowmobilin' redneck of the North.
She is a staunch supporter of capitalism, an advocate for the orderly but early development of Alaska's assets. She creaks with small-town values and is a suspected secessionist. And she is so anti-environmentalist that not a single polar bear will send her a Christmas card.
So what? Americans don't elect many intellectuals; they prefer the unsophisticated. And it unlikely a book such as this, so biased, so unfair will hurt Palin all that much.
One often hears of, and frequently witnesses the clash between red and blue in America, red representing the heartland, blue the urban northeast and liberal coasts.
This clash seems to be bursting out in earnest. And when all is said and done, there really isn't much to choose between them, is there?
Geoff Lambert is a political scientist at St. Paul's College at the University of Manitoba.
Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition January 2, 2010 H7
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