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No, Emily, we should not judge Sarah Palin as a mother, no matter how beguilingly she and her impulsive soulmate invite us to do so. Remember when the Earth was young, 10 days ago, and we were still wondering about the Hillary Holdouts? If they haven't been scared straight by now, they aren't coming back. But one thing I hope we learned from them is that sexist attacks helped Hillary more than they hurt her, energizing her supporters and winning her some converts, too, among women who weren't totally sold until they saw her criticized in ways a man wouldn't be. Every sexist shot not only boomeranged, but was held against Barack Obama. Which is why everyone who wants him to win should mind Dahlia's advice to Joe Biden and avoid certain modes of attack altogether.
This is especially critical given the latest polling, which suggests that many women really are switching from Obama to McCain because he's chosen a female running mate: According to a Washington Post-ABC News poll, "white women shifted from an 8-point pre-convention edge for Obama to a 12-point McCain advantage now.''
Like Hillary Clinton and every Republican in my lifetime—with the exception of Sen. Soulmate, before he got religion and lost our phone number—Palin is running against the media. So our sins will be held against the Obama-Biden ticket, too. With time so short, she did not even wait to be attacked before throwing down the victim cards of gender, class, and media bias: "I've learned quickly, these past few days,'' she said in her convention speech, "that if you're not a member in good standing of the Washington elite, then some in the media consider a candidate unqualified for that reason alone.'' (Are these the same "some'' who want us to make nice with terrorists? Or the "they'' who hate us because we're free?) Sure, but then why bring the straw man to life by lunging for the bait? Mike Barnicle played right into her hands, worrying on MSNBC about who'd be minding little Trig if Mummy was off working in the Executive Office Building.
And the more Democrats rant about God, guns, babies, and Sarah P., the better for McCain, who must have been doing the happy dance after Harry Reid described her tone as shrill, and when Biden joked that one big diff between them was that she was better lookin'. I was in Toledo for that one; that is what he said, and Obama was just as casual with his words that day, repeatedly addressing older women in the audience as "young lady.'' :(
This past weekend, my 12-year-old son, who totally knows how to work me, suggested that we celebrate my return from the Sarah Palin Party Convention in St. Paul by watching The Contender in her honor. I'd forgotten, but it's one of those heavy-handed, here-comes-the-crowbar and there-goes-your-cranium liberal morality tales about a Sen. Laine Hanson, played by Joan Allen, who's tapped to become the vice president after the guy in office dies. Her top adviser is her husband, but that's about all Hanson and Palin have in common. Early in the movie, we see the Clinton-ish president, played by Jeff Bridges, wondering whether a woman who has served only a decade in the U.S. Senate will be seen as experienced enough to handle the job, especially on the foreign-policy front.
Only oops, he was so busy trying to stump the White House chef that, just like John McCain, he seems to have neglected to vet his pick, whose past is more exciting than he might have hoped. For one thing, though it has somehow previously escaped the nation's notice, she appropriated her best friend's husband while he was managing her first campaign. A story that she had sex with a bunch of guys at a drunken college party turns out not to be true. Hanson would rather withdraw her name than dignify her accusers with a denial, but Bubba convinces the country that we're better than that, too, and don't need to know. So yay, she's in, and sex scandals are out!
There is one scene relevant to life on this planet, however: When consultants advise Hanson's craven shell of a formerly good-guy rival to "gut the bitch,'' he winces but goes along, and is ruined in the end. Though part of me is looking for a reason to wag my finger and say, "Let that be a lesson to you, young man," it's not really Obama or jaw-flappin' Joe that I worry about getting carried away like that; it's the rest of us I'm not so sure of.
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Emily, I absolutely agree that the personal and professional have become hopelessly entangled in this election. In her 11th day in the spotlight, Palin has already been compared to movie stars, a TV chef, and an '80s pop star turned reality TV darling. Faster than you can say, "Bitch is the new black," it seems, a new celebrity comparison emerges.
Honestly, the mind reels. A partial list of purported alter egos:
Rachael Ray: The New York Times' David Carr portrayed Palin's relationship to the media as that of "Rachael Ray with a 4x4, who can not only make a meal in under 30 minutes but hunt and kill the main course."
Tina Fey: Apparently, "every American with access to 30 Rock and a blog" sees a resemblance between the VP nominee and NBC's brightest comedian. Seriously?
Audrey Hepburn: Drawn in by Palin's bangs and updo, Ann Althouse compared the self-described "pit bull with lipstick" to the 20th-century icon of elegance personified. A stretch.
Paula Abdul: The New York Post saw Althouse's movie star and raised her an American Idol judge, saying, "Palin won style points for updating from an Audrey Hepburn to a Paula Abdul look" by wearing her hair half-up to give her acceptance speech.
Margaret Thatcher: The one relevant, if not exactly accurate, analogy in the mix. The British press have jumped on the comparison. But isn't it a bit early to see the gravitas of a woman who ran a country for 11 years in the face of a novice candidate? Besides, Hillary Clinton garnered her fair share of comparisons to the "Iron Lady," and drawing a line between Clinton and Palin by way of Thatcher seems to test the laws of geometry.
The other nods to celebrity, though not entirely unflattering, are a distraction with less than two months to go until the election. Margaret Thatcher aside, should we really be thinking of Palin in terms of her inspired tresses or domestic prowess? I don't think so.
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Michelle Cottle has a great essay in the New Republic bemoaning the campaign season as one long setback for feminism, beginning with Hillary Clinton's decision to play the grievance card right on through to her still enraged supporters, as well as John McCain's pick of Sarah Palin, because she's underqualified. Cottle is careful to say, as is Dahlia here, that Palin has smarts and strengths, and could be a perfectly able and qualified vice presidential choice. Someday. The point is that she's not there yet, and would never have gotten the nod if she weren't a woman.
Right. And that should help guide us in sorting through the Republicans' charges that the press and anyone else who raises questions about Palin is subjecting her to sexist treatment. If the question is about her experience and record, and whether and how it merits the vice presidency, then it's all fair game. To suggest otherwise, as the Republicans are loudly doing, is to cry wolf. And doesn't it seem like this will, or at least should, come back to bite them, the next time they mock the Democrats on this score?
But if the questions about Palin focus on whether she can be the vice president and a good mother to her five kids, then they seem suspect pretty quickly. No one is asking John McCain how his seven kids are handling his busy schedule. The problem, of course, is that the motherhood part of the Palin picture is endlessly colorful, and that she herself is invoking it as a reason for voters to like and trust her. In the cult-of-personality universe in which we assess presidential candidates, there's no way to separate the personal from the professional. Tricky. Thoughts?
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My office is all abuzz about Good Morning America's spot this morning, "Palin's Pals," in which GMA interviews four of her closest friends. My response was: Is this The View-ification of the country? Am I really supposed to care what her friends say about her? Please! What does that have to do with voting record and politics? Would any news show dare such a dumbed-down tactic about a male politician? I suppose the media does do such a thing, when they interview male politicians' wives. I always recoil from those speeches, in which females are the ones designated as the bearers of emotional truth.
Fortunately, three of Palin's laconic crew (is it an Alaskan thing? These women are very, very laid back) refuse to say who they will vote for. (Three of them, interestingly, declare that they are pro-choice.) They have the great sense to say that their friendships don't depend on shared politics. My mom the small-town politician - a Democrat in the heavily Republican Greene County, Ohio - also has an array of friends with whom she does not discuss politics, because it leads to nothing good.
But my female coworkers found the "Pals" lack of enthusiasm for Palin quite shocking. My co-workers' view is this: If the Pals weren't going to rave about Sarah, they shouldn't have gone on television. They concluded that this reticence said something damning about Palin and declared those friendships dead.
Every now and then I wonder whether I am Spock's long-lost Vulcan sister. Am I unusual in not caring a whit about what her nonpolitical friends think? How does this relate to the price of gas?