Never Bring a Lap Dog to a Grizzly Fight

BigJournalism
The ruling classes in both the US Democrat and US Republican parties want Sarah Palin to just go away -- disappear! The threadworn media and ruling punditry are pulling out all the stops to make Palin seem like a "has-been," yesterday's news. At least one thing is wrong with that approach -- It won't work.

The appeal of Palin is illuminated by many of the images/perceptions of both her and President Obama. Palin the badass hunts, fishes, climbs mountains, shoots caribou, rides in small planes often; the Democrats are represented by Obama, a man who flinches while watching a judo exhibition and wears a safety helmet for a leisurely bike ride. Fair or not, this perception exists. Palin is Theodore Roosevelt in a size 6 suit, American flag pin, and some kick ass black leather boots, Obama is an academic who looks uncomfortable in jeans, throws like a girl, and can’t name his alleged baseball heroes from childhood. _BigJournalism

She is...a highly accomplished woman, what in an earlier age would have been called a feminist pioneer: the first female governor of the malest state in the country, the first woman on the presidential ticket of the party on the male side of the "gender gap." Having left politics, whether temporarily or permanently, she has established herself as one of the most consequential voices in the political media.

They say she is uneducated. What they mean is that her education is not elite--not Harvard or Yale, or even Michigan or UCLA. They resent her because, in their view, she has risen above her station. _WallStreetJournal

But because she has risen above her station to confront far more powerful ruling interessts, she is becoming a hero to the common person. You know the common person -- the one who is never polled about his presidential preferences?

The popular hatred of a self-described elite culture toward Sarah Palin is almost inexplicable — whether expressed in Andrew Sullivan’s unhinged efforts to suggest Palin faked her fifth pregnancy, or David Letterman’s slur that she seemed a “slutty flight attendant” and her 14-year-old daughter “was knocked up by Alex Rodriguez,” or CNN guest host Kathy Griffin’s crudity that her next target was the teenaged Palin daughter: “But I think it’s Willow’s year to go down.” _VDH

The common people who live in flyover country observe how the ruling classes treat Sarah, whom they consider one of their own. They watch and they remember.

Said Palin: "It isn't about me personally, but it is about the message. I know that a lot on the left hate my message, and they will do all that they can to stop me because they don't like the message. They'll do what they can to destroy the message and the messenger."

[Palin] added: "I am not ready to make an announcement about what my political future is going to be. But I will tell you ... I am not going to sit down. I am not going to shut up." _PoliticalWire

I tend to believe her when she says things like that.

The ruling classes in the US have generated a convincing mirage of invincibility. It requires every hack journalist, quasi-writer, media producer, and pseudo-intellectual that your tax dollars can buy, under the direction of the puppetmasters of public opinion. But just how well can that mirage stand up against a true popular revolt? We may find out.

Re-published from abu al-fin

More 22Jan11: In a new development, the united federation of lap dogs is attempting to organise a news and commentary blackout on all things related to Palin. Shades of 1984-style revisionism. This might actually start getting interesting, as the lap dogs attempt to assert control over the public information sphere in the age of the new media.

Why Does Sarah Palin Drive Stupid People Crazy?

Evidently, there is something about Palin that drives her critics crazy. But if they can pause for breath, they might take a lesson from history as to the wisdom of mocking a political figure for a supposed lack of intelligence. The caricature of Eisenhower as Donald Duck did not stop him from twice defeating, in Electoral College landslides, the cerebral Adlai Stevenson, the darling of the intellectual crowd. The Georgetown set's view of Reagan as "an amiable dunce" did not keep voters from giving the Gipper landslide wins over Jimmy Carter, a nuclear engineer known for his propensity to micromanage, in 1980, and Walter Mondale in 1984. And Bush won re-election over John Kerry in 2004 despite being pilloried as Cheney's puppet. NationalJournal _

Although I virtually never think about Sarah Palin without being prompted, I cannot help but notice the high level of criticism that Palin continues to receive -- from all directions. Whenever I trouble myself to look deeply into the criticisms, there is one thing that stands out regardless of the ideological standpoint of the critic: lack of substance, sometimes referred to as stupidity. Palin's critics are virtually always missing the crux of their own arguments -- and getting it wrong. Some of these critics were born stupid and will always be stupid. But a lot of the brighter critics who go bonkers on Palin are clearly letting their emotions get in the way of their thinking. And others -- on both left and right -- who go insane at the mention of Sarah-cuda simply lack enough insight into their own reflexive bigotry to ever penetrate to the essence. Still others -- such as the matronly right-wing intellectuals who sputter and spit at the thought of the former Alaska governor, are simply jealous of the cold-weather huntress' ability to seemingly live a life full of challenges and pain -- and still focus on the simple pleasures of children, family, and a huge, beautiful outdoors.

Yep. Sarah drives them to the brink of stark, raving madness.

Sarah Palin irritates, agitates, angers and annoys some of the self-appointed finest minds of America to a point long past reason. She has been the target, since the night she walked on stage to speak at a Republican convention, of some of the most savage commentary that the great republic has seen since Richard Nixon.

The great difference, of course, is that Nixon earned some of his venom. He practised political hardball. He was a remorseless partisan with an appetite for political vengeance

And he received some he did not earn, by virtue of a personality -- secretive, bitter even in success, humourless, cold and anxious -- that made him, fairly or otherwise, a target for the cruellest and most unrelenting attacks. But in any event, he was the President. He had been in politics for a full generation. For those determined to hate him, there was a large field to till.

But Palin is not the president, nor has she been. She's been a presence in American national politics for only about two years. She is a cheerful human being, with a large family, an apparently easy-going and normal husband. She has a personality that would sell corn flakes -- if not grow them. What career she had in Alaska, she earned. She's at home indoors and out, radiates human warmth, seems to have some balance about herself, and has displayed over the last year or so a considerable fortitude under an avalanche of mockery and hatred. For the final stroke of this cameo I should note she is smart -- smarter than 90% of the people who make a point of how rock-stupid they know she is.

She, by rights, should be queen of the feminists. All that self-reliance, her takeover of Alaska politics, the rocket ride to a Vice-Presidential ticket, a public career she blends with her family life-- these seem gold-standard credentials for a real feminist. But official feminism derides herewith an unspeakable intensity. Her early critics were not beyond the inane claim that she was somehow not really a woman. _NationalPost

I am very unlikely to ever vote for Sarah Palin as a presidential candidate -- unless she is running against an incompetent clown such as Barack Obama. I am certain to never contribute funds to a Palin campaign. As I said, I do not think about Palin unless someone else brings her up in a particularly cloddish manner. Then, it is the critic that appears the moron, not Palin.

Understanding The Sarah Palin Effect in National Post

Palin is no Puppet in National Journal

Knocking Out Sarah Palin: The Challenge

Everyone seems to want a piece of Sarah Palin.  Leftists and Obamists want her to lie down and die.  Tea Partyers want some of her sparkle and sex appeal.  Sedate and aging right wing women such as Peggy Noonan and Heather MacDonald want her to shut up and let them talk.  Some libertarians are jealous of all the attention Palin is getting.  But the news media just wants to knock her out and have her stay down on the mat.

Charlie Gibson and Katie Couric -- using creative editing and the best interview tricks they knew -- tried to knock out Palin during the 2008 campaign.  News agencies actually took reporters off sensitive terrorism cases and flew them to Wasilla, Alaska, to sift through dumpsters and dig up trash on Palin.  It was an all - out war against the little lady from the north, and it helped to elect Obama -- beyond a doubt.  But it failed to knock Palin out of the public eye, or to make her impotent on the national scene -- as the media clearly wished.

So we are back to the media war on Palin, albeit at a lower level of sniping and whining -- somewhat muted from the attempted nuclear attacks against her during the campaign.  Many in the media must be wondering what they have to do to knock out the plucky lady from Wasilla, one of whose nicknames is "Sarah-cuda".

Progressives traffic in the politics of name-calling and character assassination. They have forfeited any goodwill presumption of credibility when it comes to objectively criticizing anyone on the Right, let alone their most vilified American citizen target, Sarah Palin.

...Before the Progressive Left jumps all over that [AF: notes on her hand] as proof of some deficiency, they should consider the teleprompter-in-chief. He consumed almost a BILLION dollars to get elected. He’s been in office for just over a year. That comes to $2,617, 801 per day, or $109,075 per hour. That should be more than enough to get him to appear in a 6th grade classroom without the crutch of Teleprompter-One. _BigGovernment

The critical jabs at Palin fell short because the public does know about Obama's teleprompter dependency -- despite the media's attempts to cover it up. In fact, both Palin and an ever larger portion of the public are becoming immune to the strident but weak punches the media keeps attempting to throw Sarah's way. It is the media that is weakening as the rounds go on.

The polls even in the Republican Party do not correctly speak to the power that Palin brings to the campaign trail—a mix of feverish Reagan myth and pop Fox iconoclasm. She is Annie Oakley; she is Joan of Arc; she is that rare thing in politics, a one-name phenomenon, “Sarah,” like “Ike,” like “the Colonel.” _DailyBeast

While at the edge of Obama fandom, the zombies are beginning to shake their heads and wonder how they were so bamboozled by a fake messiah, fans of Sarah feel a greater affection for her as they read her book, watch her speeches, see their incomes diminish and obligations to government rise, even lose their jobs under the Obama - Pelosi regime, and wonder how an inexperienced clown like Obama who hates the US managed to reach a position of such power to do harm.

As keynote speaker at the [AF: Tea Party]convention, Palin has undoubtedly given the tea party movement a new level of legitimacy and stature. Moreover, her decision to go ahead with the speech even as others pulled out suggested to many that she may be positioning herself as the de facto leader of the tea party movement.

Bolstering that view is Palin’s decision to turn down an invitation to speak at the Conservative Political Action Conference later this month. The conference is widely considered a must-attend event for conservatives and Republicans lining up a run for office. _CSM

All of this is not to say that Sarah Palin should become the leader of any particular movement, or that she should run for any particular office. The news media and the pseudo-intelligentsia of academia will always oppose her with the viciousness of a rabid poodle. Jealousies from right-wing women whose better days are behind them, and from libertarians who could not assemble a crowd larger than thirty persons if they offered to jump from a high building, will add to the drama of the anti-Sarah melee and free-for-all.

Most people when faced with such vitriol and hatred would have shrunk from the public scene, never to be sighted again in the public eye. For some reason, it is not so easy to knock Sarah Palin out of the fight. She has something beyond looks, beyond winks, beyond luck, and beyond the political hucksterism of Washington DC and the Chicago Way, or the phony glitz of Hollywood and the NYC establishment. She has grit and confidence in herself, and is daily adding a wealth of information about using her unique set of assets to achieve what she wants to achieve.

For Palin to win, she simply needs to survive, grow, and learn how things are done on the larger stage. For Palin's opponents to deny her the chance of winning, they have to score a knockout punch. So far, they have not even come close.

Truly Tough People Temper in the Fire

The reaction of the intellectual elite to Sarah Palin was far more provincial than Palin herself ever has been, and those who reacted so viscerally against her evinced little or no appreciation for an essential premise of democracy: that practical wisdom matters at least as much as formal education, and that leadership can emerge from utterly unexpected places. The presumption that the only road to power passes through the Ivy League and its tributaries is neither democratic nor sensible, and is, moreover, a sharp and wrongheaded break from the American tradition of citizen governance. _Commentary

America's effete elite got exactly who they wanted in the White House. Someone who talks and thinks like themselves. Someone as equally untouched and untempered by real life, but with the proper degrees, friends, and attitude toward centralised control from "the top".

Meanwhile, America's schools and culture continues growing a large crop of perpetual adolescent incompetents, who take their cues from the effete elite via the entertainment and news media. The zombies of Obamby-land. Quite useful one day every two years, and particularly useful one day every four years. Otherwise, brain-dead zombies to be "managed."

If you learned the hard lessons of self-reliance, personal competencies, and working within the rules of society, you may not know how to talk the talk and walk the walk of the effete elite. If so, too bad for you if you want to break into national politics.

The reaction to Palin revealed a deep and intense cultural paranoia on the Left: an inclination to see retrograde reaction around every corner, and to respond to it with vile anger. A confident, happy, and politically effective woman who was also a social conservative was evidently too much to bear. The response of liberal feminists was in this respect particularly telling, and especially unpleasant.

“Her greatest hypocrisy is her pretense that she is a woman,” wrote Wendy Doniger, a professor at the University of Chicago. “Having someone who looks like you and behaves like them,” said Gloria Steinem, “who looks like a friend but behaves like an adversary, is worse than having no one.”

...In the end, Palin had a modest impact on the race. About 60 percent of those interviewed in the exit polls said McCain’s choice of Palin had been a factor in their vote. Of these, 56 percent voted for McCain while only 43 percent voted for Obama. In other words, she appears to have helped McCain more than she hurt him, but not by much, which is as it should be; we were voting for a President, after all. In the face of unprecedented attack, Palin succeeded where almost no vice-presidential candidate ever has before in winning sustained support for the ticket. _Commentary

Palin had real problems as a candidate. The news and entertainment media locked onto those weaknesses, and magnified them out of all reason and proportion. With Obama, they took exactly the opposite tack, and ignored any hint of weakness or deficiency.

They got what they wanted. And they continue to cover-up and obfuscate the huge problems of their Messiah. Zombies walk the land, oblivious. But real people, tough people, are tempered in the fire of real life. They keep living, keep growing, and keep getting tougher, because they face life full-on.

A society that grows top-heavy with a scummy faux elite, such as current American society, will eventually undergo significant changes. These changes will leave the unprepared, largely incompetent elite at a loss. The generations of zombies, psychological neotenates, are already lost -- beyond everything except technological revolutions that can remake their minds into those of real people. It's possible.

Palin to Critics: Thanks Loads, Chumps!!!

Sarah Palin's self-appointed enemies in the media and the blogosphere have kept the Alaska Governor's name alive in print, on the air, and over the internet. Some bloggers have practically herniated themselves in their blue-faced effort to portray Palin as being less intelligent than Albert Einstein. How is all of this "bad publicity" affecting Palin's popularity? Well, for one thing, there is no such thing as "bad publicity."

Palin has been the subject of intense online fascination since her introduction as the Republican nominee on Aug. 29. In September, the Anchorage Daily News reported a 928 percent spike in traffic, according to Nielsen Online. Her mid-October “Saturday Night Live” appearance drove the show’s highest rating in 14 years, and her Oct. 2 debate with Joe Biden was the most watched vice presidential debate ever — drawing more viewers than any of the three presidential debates between McCain and Obama.

...A recent YouTube clip that featured her being interviewed while, unbeknownst to her, a turkey was slaughtered in the background was the site's most-viewed clip over the last week. Two of the top 10 video moments of 2008, according to Truveo, an online video search engine, also involve Palin — a “Saturday Night Live” skit that mocks her and the governor’s ill-fated interview with Katie Couric of CBS.

..Palin's continuous presence in the news has played a role in the unabated levels of search activity. First she was buffeted by anonymous criticism from the McCain camp after the ticket's defeat, then she cut a high profile at the Republican Governors Association meeting one week later. In between, she sat for an interview with Greta Van Susteren of Fox News and delivered the show's largest audience of the year.

According to the Project for Excellence in Journalism, Palin was the second-leading newsmaker for the week of Nov. 10-16, trailing only Obama and ranking ahead of President Bush, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton and McCain in the number of stories about her.

“As long as she’s still in the mainstream media, it will continue to fuel her presence online. She’s sort of fanning the flames just by showing up,” said Phil Noble, president of PoliticsOnline and a pioneering consultant in online politics. “The other issue is that at some point people become permanent celebrities. She may have just reached that status.” _ Source

Governor Palin is certainly more intelligent and accomplished than most of her detractors. More importantly, Palin has authentic competence and character that her critics could only dream of--if they had any idea what competence and character were in the first place.

All the PhDs, MBAs, JDs, and Nobel Laureates of the World Cannot Make Capital Markets Work, but Sarah Palin Can: Reprise

Note from Alice Finkel: Al Fin has directed me to place this blog in suspension for the time being. He has been inside the "belly of the beast", the MNTD of the Obama campaign. If Obama wins the US election, Al Fin expects to have his hands full doing damage control for several weeks. He has kindly deposited my salary for the rest of the year plus a Christmas bonus, so I suspect he is quite serious. Mr. Fin directed me to re-publish the following article:

Sarah Palin is quite special, and quite ordinary--for America--at the same time. The true story of Palin contains the reason for America's ability to absorb multiple blows that would have ended most other governments and economies. It is the resilience of Americans like Palin, the sheer energy, optimism in the face of difficulties, and perseverance that allows America to bounce back in the face of multiple overwhelming problems and threats.

Provincial America depends on the initiative of ordinary people to get through the day..... Americans pay for most of their school costs out of local taxes, and levy those taxes on themselves. In small towns, many public agencies, including fire protection and emergency medical assistance, depend almost entirely on volunteers. People who tax themselves, and give their own time and money for services on which communities depend, are not easily cowed by the federal government or by large corporations.

Palin's career may look like a poor imitation of a Preston Sturges script, but films such as Hail the Conquering Hero (1944) struck a chord with Americans precisely because the character type of the ordinary man or woman who takes on entrenched interests is instantly recognizable in America.

Palin really did take on the American oil companies and turn the scoundrels out of office. Her predecessor, Frank Murkowski, appointed her to the state oil and gas commission in the apparent belief that a small-town mayor and former beauty queen would rubber-stamp corrupt deals between the state and the Big Oil companies.

Shades of Jimmy Stewart in Mr Smith Goes to Washington, Palin ran against Murkowski and took his job. That does not qualify her to be president, to be sure, but it does show cunning and strength of character. Palin is qualified for high office by temperament if not by education, and is preferable to candidates whose education has made no improvement on their characters.

....One doesn't see demonstrations by wronged peasants in the small towns of America. There never were peasants - American farmers always were entrepreneurs - and the locals avenge injury by taking over their local governments, which have sufficient authority to make a difference. At the capillary level, school boards, the Parent Teachers' Association, self-administered religious organizations and volunteer organizations incubate a political class entirely different from anything to be found in Asia. There are tens of thousands of Sarah Palins lurking in the minor leagues of American politics, and they are the guarantors of market probity.

...Twenty-eight percent of China's population falls in the age cohort of 39-64 years, when individuals must put away most of their retirement savings. By 2025, the proportion will rise to 35%. (By contrast, America has 32% of its population in the 39-64 cohort today, but it will fall to 30% by 2025). _AsiaTimes

Sarah Palin has an impressive record of achievement which promises to grow stronger every year, whether or not she is elected Vice President next month. Unlike entitlist Barak Obama--whose followers hint that they may riot if their messianic leader is not elected--Palin inspires people to want to work for and earn what they achieve. That spirit of setting goals and working hard to achieve them is what caused America to rise to the top of the economic world in the late 19th century, and to the top of the political and military world after the end of WWII. Most Americans--like Sarah Palin--do not whine and quit just because things are not going well.

The entitlement mentality that controls most of the polities of the world--and is knocking at the door on Wall street and Pennsylvania Avenue--has not yet completely taken over Main Street America. The likelihood of Barak the Entitlist winning the presidency, has had a depressing effect on markets recently.

Because if America goes over entirely to entitlement thinking, the thing that once made America special and has continued to keep America on top, will be smothered and in danger of dying. Understanding that an American cold gives the world pneumonia, one might begin to apprehend what would happen to the rest of the world should America's situation suddenly become much worse than a mere cold.

300 million Barak Obama's in one country would be an epic disaster of narcissistic top-heaviness and absence of competence. 300 million Sarah Palin's, on the other hand, would carry on much as America has carried on for centuries. Working, planning, innovating, reforming, worshiping, raising families, fulfilling their contracts, keeping their word, and living within their means.

BO might be a good president of Zimbabwe or Venezuela--he might represent an improvement over their current leaders. As president of the US, BO is simply a suicidal gesture thrown in the face of ordinary Americans by wastrels who never in their best efforts could make capital markets work.

More: Why European banks are likely in much more trouble than American banks

"Sarah Palin Is Very Smart" Says Former Editor of Ms. Magazine, Democrat Journo

People who have never met Sarah Palin are falling over each other to call her the vilest and most contemptible names. They do not know her, know nothing about her. But they publish insults and dismissals of her as if they had known her all their life. Here is the viewpoint of a Democratic Party voter, journalist, and former editor of Ms. Magazine, who has actually met and spent time with Sarah Palin:

Now by “smart,” I don't refer to a person who is wily or calculating or nimble in the way of certain talented athletes who we admire but suspect don't really have serious brains in their skulls. I mean, instead, a mind that is thoughtful, curious, with a discernable pattern of associative thinking and insight. Palin asks questions, and probes linkages and logic that bring to mind a quirky law professor I once had. Palin is more than a “quick study”; I'd heard rumors around the campaign of her photographic memory and, frankly, I watched it in action. She sees. She processes. She questions, and only then, she acts. What is often called her “confidence” is actually a rarity in national politics: I saw a woman who knows exactly who she is. _Daily Beast_via_TomNelson

This is what Al Fin has been saying, although he has never met Governor Palin. Palin has been ambushed by every media dirty trick they could devise, and still smiles and continues working long hours from coast to coast, giving the media more time than Obama and Biden put together. In fact, the redistributionist duo has made itself very scarce on the media scene lately--concerned about several potentially embarassing questions that may come up.

Palin is real, she is authentic, she learns and grows and speaks her mind. Obama is a narcissist full of resentment and fear of being understood. If Obama ever speaks his mind, it is in a moment of carelessness--as when Obama confronted "Joe the Plumber" in the plumber's front yard.

If America chooses a phantom for president, and mocks and derides a genuine and authentic leader, that says more about what America is becoming than about the candidates themselves. Of course, the media bears much responsibility. Meanwhile, Oynklent Green looks on from the shadows.

All the PhDs, JDs, and MBAs In the World Can't Make Capital Markets Work, But Sarah Palin Can

Sarah Palin is quite special, and quite ordinary--for America--at the same time. The true story of Palin contains the reason for America's ability to absorb multiple blows that would have ended most other governments and economies. It is the resilience of Americans like Palin, the sheer energy, optimism in the face of difficulties, and perseverance that allows America to bounce back in the face of multiple overwhelming problems and threats.

Provincial America depends on the initiative of ordinary people to get through the day..... Americans pay for most of their school costs out of local taxes, and levy those taxes on themselves. In small towns, many public agencies, including fire protection and emergency medical assistance, depend almost entirely on volunteers. People who tax themselves, and give their own time and money for services on which communities depend, are not easily cowed by the federal government or by large corporations.

Palin's career may look like a poor imitation of a Preston Sturges script, but films such as Hail the Conquering Hero (1944) struck a chord with Americans precisely because the character type of the ordinary man or woman who takes on entrenched interests is instantly recognizable in America.

Palin really did take on the American oil companies and turn the scoundrels out of office. Her predecessor, Frank Murkowski, appointed her to the state oil and gas commission in the apparent belief that a small-town mayor and former beauty queen would rubber-stamp corrupt deals between the state and the Big Oil companies.

Shades of Jimmy Stewart in Mr Smith Goes to Washington, Palin ran against Murkowski and took his job. That does not qualify her to be president, to be sure, but it does show cunning and strength of character. Palin is qualified for high office by temperament if not by education, and is preferable to candidates whose education has made no improvement on their characters.

....One doesn't see demonstrations by wronged peasants in the small towns of America. There never were peasants - American farmers always were entrepreneurs - and the locals avenge injury by taking over their local governments, which have sufficient authority to make a difference. At the capillary level, school boards, the Parent Teachers' Association, self-administered religious organizations and volunteer organizations incubate a political class entirely different from anything to be found in Asia. There are tens of thousands of Sarah Palins lurking in the minor leagues of American politics, and they are the guarantors of market probity.

...Twenty-eight percent of China's population falls in the age cohort of 39-64 years, when individuals must put away most of their retirement savings. By 2025, the proportion will rise to 35%. (By contrast, America has 32% of its population in the 39-64 cohort today, but it will fall to 30% by 2025). _AsiaTimes

Europe's problem is similar to China's. Europe--and Russia--was populated by peasants at one time. The peasant mentality still persists in European and Asian countries--the lack of independent thinking which imagines that it can actually make a difference.

Sarah Palin has an impressive record of achievement which promises to grow stronger every year, whether or not she is elected Vice President next month. Unlike entitlist Barak Obama--whose followers hint that they may riot if their messianic leader is not elected--Palin inspires people to want to work for and earn what they achieve. That spirit of setting goals and working hard to achieve them is what caused America to rise to the top of the economic world in the late 19th century, and to the top of the political and military world after the end of WWII. Most Americans--like Sarah Palin--do not whine and quit just because things are not going well.

The entitlement mentality that controls most of the polities of the world--and is knocking at the door on Wall street and Pennsylvania Avenue--has not yet completely taken over main street America. Just the fact of opinion polls suggesting a high likelihood of the entitlist winning the presidency, is having a depressing effect on markets recently.

Because if America goes over entirely to entitlement thinking, the thing that once made America special and has continued to keep America on top, will be smothered and in danger of dying. Understanding that an American cold gives the world pneumonia, one might begin to apprehend what would happen to the rest of the world should America's situation suddenly become much worse than a mere cold.

300 million Barak Obama's in one country would be an epic disaster of narcissistic top-heaviness and absence of competence. 300 million Sarah Palin's, on the other hand, would carry on much as America has carried on for centuries. Working, planning, innovating, reforming, worshiping, raising families, fulfilling their contracts, keeping their word, and living within their means.

BO might be a good president of Zimbabwe or Venezuela--he might represent an improvement over their current leaders. As president of the US, BO is simply a suicidal gesture thrown in the face of ordinary Americans by wastrels who never in their best efforts could make capital markets work.

More: Why European banks are likely in much more trouble than American banks

Palin Express Picking Up Steam Across Heartland

As a frontier woman who fought corruption and won, she's the embodiment of independent womanhood. As the hunting and fishing beauty queen who got her man and went on to have five children, she's a potent symbol of the apple-pie American mother-figure. Her story is both epic and small time, heroic and ordinary, astonishing and familiar. _DailyMail

From rally to rally across the American heartland, Sarah Palin is drawing record crowds, and helping to fill the campaign coffers of running mate John McCain. Palin charms and intrigues most Americans on multiple levels--particularly American women.

[McCain's] pick of Idaho native Sarah Palin for vice president means McCain has a good chance to win Montana, Nevada, New Mexico and maybe even Colorado, which were all leaning toward Barack Obama. _SLCTrib

Palin is winning over men and women from both political parties--even libertarians. Her "frontier woman" story of hunting, fishing, surviving in harsh surroundings, and taking on large corrupt government and corporate interests, sounds like something straight out of a John Wayne movie, and for good reason.

When Sarah Palin appeared on the national stage, she was stepping into an archetype that already existed. In personality, looks, and behavior she resembled nothing less than our cultural image of the frontier woman. She was something out of history -- something that we already knew, were quite familiar with, and strongly approve of. But at the same time it's true that few people living (and those very aged) have ever met a frontier woman of the original breed.

...The importance of the frontier woman cannot be overrated, because it was the women, in the end, who broke the frontier. Mountain men and related types had been traversing the wilderness for decades before the Westward Migration got rolling, without leaving behind as much as a scratch on the landscape. It was the women -- and their families -- who made the land bend, who brought with them a sense of permanency, who civilized the frontier. Where men went, they created forts and outposts. When women followed, they established settlements and towns. _AmericanThinker

Frontier women civilised the frontier, after they helped tame it alongside the men. While Washington DC may not seem like a frontier to be tamed, in reality that is exactly what it has become--the frontier of corruption. That sad fact has been recently highlighted by the mega-billion dollar bailout for a problem that Congress itself created back in the Jimmy Carter administration, and amplified during the Bill Clinton administration. Expect a huge part of this $700 billion bailout to go to corrupt payoffs of friends of Barney Frank.

Big government is the problem. Obama wants to double the size of government. Where can Americans look for someone with a more objective viewpoint, and the toughness to do what has to be done? Somewhere far away from Washington DC. Somewhere where boys and girls are allowed to grow up to become men and women--strong men and women. Somewhere like Alaska, the last wild American frontier.

Palin draws rock-concert sized crowd of 60,000 in Florida

Why the news and entertainment media feels it absolutely must destroy Sarah Palin

Palin Obtains Coveted Heinlein Endorsement

In "Time Enough for Love", the master of SF wrote:

"A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects." _via_BCP

Heinlein wrote for the multiply competent, and multiply competent wannabes. Palin no doubt possesses a greater number of skills than the above, but it is a start. Search the Al Fin sidebar under the "Alternative Curricula" section for the John David Garcia curriculum. That is the starting point for an Al Fin school for competent future adults. But Palin grew up in small town Alaska, where girls and boys are traditionally expected to learn basic skills for survival in an unkind environment. She learned lessons that Heinlein would approve of.

Of course the psycho-neotenates in and around the Obama candidacy would never have even half a clue about why real-life people who understand the importance of basic competencies would be attracted to a fellow traveler. That is why Obama's attack dogs are frightened and confused by this inexplicable phenomenon. Obama's media force at the NYT has been shooting blanks, as have Obama's deputies in the broadcast media.

The endorsement was bestowed by the Chicago Boyz, and heartily endorsed by Al Fin--one of the few bloggers posting on this topic who has actually heard Heinlein speak at a space conference.

As for what Heinlein would think of Obama, don't ask. Heinlein never even gave the time of day to phonies. And spotting Obama as a phony takes less than a second, even for Al Fin, who looks for the best in all people.

Sarah Palin Offers US Women Hope and Change That the US Media Is Trying to Destroy

Sarah Palin keeps collecting admirers. Her interview with ABC News Charles Gibson has added another legion, and that number is growing as the recognition spreads that the editing done to the interview was deeply deceptive of its overall impression --even stronger than what came through on the broadcast version--and that Gibson unfairly mangled a quote of hers. Media elites are clucking that Palin didn't instantly define the "Bush Doctrine" to the level of detail demanded by (their) judges, but another vast audience watched another attempt to diminish her and has responded with an even greater enthusiasm for the Alaska governor.

The ABC News editors who left critical parts of Sarah Palin's interview responses on the clipping room floor knew exactly what they were doing. And now that the American public knows exactly what they are doing large parts of them are becoming hopping mad--especially the women.

Manhattan-Beltway media elites are very slow to recognize anything completely new. This is why prior to 9/11 they were in the dark about Islamist extremism. It is why prior to $4 a gallon gas, they had never anticipated a huge majority of Americans would demand offshore drilling.

And it is why they still don't understand the Palin Breakout....Since the day John McCain selected Palin as his running mate, I have spoken with only women callers to my radio show. For the past week I have limited callers to those who are calling a radio show for the very first time. All the lines have been filled every hour of every day. Caller after caller wants to discuss their affection for Sarah, their willingness to work for her and contribute to the RNC and to share stories of like-minded women in their families and among their friends.

Each new attack on Palin brings increased enthusiasm for her. _HH

As noted here previously, roughly 90% of the US mainstream media is out to shoot Sarah Palin down like a mad dog in the street. They consider it their job to destroy a competent female executive of an American state, in order to make sure that their preferred candidate is elected. The American public has seen this type of dishonesty before (fake but accurate), and is growing increasingly cynical and angry toward the media as a result. The problem of corrupt media manipulation of the news is getting worse, and will lead to a very unhappy end for that same corrupt media.

Whatever the media hopes to gain by skewing news coverage, in the case of Sarah Palin, they are only helping to grow Sarah's army of female supporters.

More on biased news coverage here and here.

Obama Backers Becoming Uncomfortable With the Messiah's Reflexive Phoniness

I have become increasingly uneasy about Obama's efforts to sound folksy and approachable by reflexively using inner-city African-American tones and locutions, which as a native of Hawaii he acquired relatively late in his development...

Instead, the Obama-messiah's backers want him to be phony in a way that is more convincing to his target audience. Some even suggest that Obama just "be himself", as if the Obama-onion when peeled away layer by layer, actually has an actual self. Sorry, folks. There's no there, there.

Which may be why Obama's poll numbers are abit shaky right now, and why an inexperienced "former mayor" from Alaska has the messiah shaking in his boots.

...Palin represented an explosion of a brand new style of muscular American feminism. At her startling debut on that day, she was combining male and female qualities in ways that I have never seen before. And she was somehow able to seem simultaneously reassuringly traditional and gung-ho futurist. In terms of redefining the persona for female authority and leadership, Palin has made the biggest step forward in feminism since Madonna channeled the dominatrix persona of high-glam Marlene Dietrich and rammed pro-sex, pro-beauty feminism down the throats of the prissy, victim-mongering, philistine feminist establishment.

... I have immensely enjoyed Palin's boffo performances at her debut and at the Republican convention, where she astonishingly dealt with multiple technical malfunctions without missing a beat. A feminism that cannot admire the bravura under high pressure of the first woman governor of a frontier state isn't worth a warm bucket of spit.

Perhaps Palin seemed perfectly normal to me because she resembles so many women I grew up around in the snow belt of upstate New York. For example, there were the robust and hearty farm women of Oxford, a charming village where my father taught high school when I was a child. We first lived in an apartment on the top floor of a farmhouse on a working dairy farm. Our landlady, who was as physically imposing as her husband, was an all-American version of the Italian immigrant women of my grandmother's generation -- agrarian powerhouses who could do anything and whose trumpetlike voices could pierce stone walls.

Here's one episode. My father and his visiting brother, a dapper barber by trade, were standing outside having a smoke when a great noise came from the nearby barn. A calf had escaped. Our landlady yelled, "Stop her!" as the calf came careening at full speed toward my father and uncle, who both instinctively stepped back as the calf galloped through the mud between them. Irate, our landlady trudged past them to the upper pasture, cornered the calf, and carried that massive animal back to the barn in her arms. As she walked by my father and uncle, she exclaimed in amused disgust, "Men!"

Now that's the Sarah Palin brand of can-do, no-excuses, moose-hunting feminism -- a world away from the whining, sniping, wearily ironic mode of the establishment feminism represented by Gloria Steinem...

...Sarah Palin, if her reputation survives the punishing next two months, may be breaking down those barriers. Feminism, which should be about equal rights and equal opportunity, should not be a closed club requiring an ideological litmus test for membership. _Sal-on

Yes, if Sarah Palin's reputation survives the surreal and absurdist attacks being heaped indiscriminately on her and her family by "plausibly deniable" Democratic Party attack dogs, and a national media largely subservient to the DNC.

This is full contact politics, and as in any no-holds-barred full contact event, blowback can be a bitch [media take note]. Hold on, it only gets more intense when the Democratic attack dogs of war are let slipped.

Democratic Dirty Tricksters Hate This Woman

They hate the woman, her family, her baby, and everything else connected with hurricane Sarah. That's why the dirtiest legions of dirty tricksters from the abyss of the US Democratic Party have descended on the pristine state of Alaska--to do whatever it takes to rip up and destroy her chances for victory in November. The US national media and leftist websites have gone berserk trying to find a Palin scandal--any Palin scandal!!!!!--that will hold up to scrutiny. So far, no dice. But we remember the fake National Guard memoes that Democratic dirty tricksters dug up and tried to feed the public via "Courage!" Dan Rather. Fake but accurate is the motto for Dan and the Dem Dirties.

Democrats have airdropped a mini-army of 30 lawyers, investigators and opposition researchers into Anchorage, the state capital Juneau and Mrs. Palin's hometown of Wasilla to dig into her record and background. My sources report the first wave arrived in Anchorage less than 24 hours after John McCain selected her on August 29.

The main area of interest to the Democratic SWAT team is Mrs. Palin's dismissal in July of her public safety commissioner. Mrs. Palin says he was fired for cause. Her critics claim he was fired because he wouldn't bend to pressure to get rid of a state trooper, Mike Wooten, who had been involved in a bitter divorce battle with Mrs. Palin's sister. Mr. Wooten is certainly a colorful character. He served a five-day suspension after the Palin family filed a complaint against him alleging he had threatened Mrs. Palin's father. They also accused him of using a Taser on his 10-year-old stepson, drinking in his patrol car and illegally shooting a moose. _WSJ

So far, everything the enraged dem-entors have attempted has backfired--either on them or on their media/blogger proxies. The same is likely to happen in connection with loser Wooten.

But you can't blame power-hungry dirty trickster operatives for trying. Especially when they see the numbers swinging Mr McCain's way, big time, among women with IQs above 90, and among independent voters of all IQ levels.

You still see the morons at Kos and Huffpo bleeding out of all orifices in a desperate attempt to sink the Alaska fisherwoman and her crew. But looking at the American voting population realistically, at this point they'd have to find something much bigger than Obama's close relationship with terrorists and America hating race baiters to knock this lady out of the race. Because from my vantage point she looks tougher than all three of the men in this contest put together.

How Obama Blew It by Democratic Commentator Kirsten Powers

White Women Flock to McCain/Palin

Independents moving to McCain/Palin: Gallup

Media Aims to Shoot Sarah Palin Like Rabid Dog

The news media has aligned itself with extreme leftist websites in the attempt to destroy Alaska Governor Sarah Palin, and her family if needs be. Three high-powered reporters on terrorism have been deflected from covering the nation's enemies, to digging up dirt on Sarah Palin.

Editors in the print media are shifting terrorism experts on their staffs towards investigations of political candidates. At least three such reporters at three major papers are now chasing Sarah Palin stories... _Counter-Terrorism

Even the "queen of American media", Oprah Winfrey, has taken a stand against Palin--refusing to bring Palin on her show. It seems she has already committed her resources and reputation to getting Barak Obama elected. Sorry, sister Sarah. You're just not "the one" in Opra's eye.

It is disingenuous to now pretend Oprah is not a big story this campaign season. Oprah has a perfect right to act in a partisan way, but please stop with the whining when that is pointed out. Oprah injected herself into the political campaign. And now she has to take her lumps for it, as would any other media figure who did what Oprah has done. _TalkLeft

Roughly 90% of American journalists and media personalities support the Democratic Party candidate, so one naturally expects their bias to shine through--as it so frequently does. But there is more than a little outright sexism and blatant double standard in how the media is looking at the second woman candidate for US Vice President. And this undeniable and outspoken bias by the media is just about ready to turn around and bite---the media itself!

Rasmussen has a new poll out that suggests that piling on Mrs. Palin may do more to harm the media's own image than hers.

According to Rasmussen, fully 68% of voters believe that "most reporters try to help the candidate they want to win." And -- no surprise -- 49% of those surveyed believe reporters are backing Barack Obama, while just 14% think the media is in the tank for Sen. McCain. _WSJ

Even feminists--long die-hard supporters of the party--are starting to notice that the Democratic Party / Media Industrial Complex has jumped the shark, into the tank for Obama--and against women.

The party has moved from taking the female vote for granted to outright contempt for women. That's why Palin represents the most serious conservative threat ever to the modern liberal claim on issues of cultural and social superiority. Why? Because men and women who never before would have considered voting for a Republican have either decided, or are seriously considering, doing so. _SFGate

Until now, there has always been at least a thin veil of deniability protecting the media from full-out exposure as partisan, biased mouthpieces for the DP, DNC, and George Soros. Now that veil has been dropped by both the news media and the popular media.

We are soon to see something the media never dreamed could happen--a full-fledged backlash against know-nothing partisan "journalists." Because now, there are millions of news outlets where before there were only 3 or 4 for broadcast and 2 or 3 of record, for print. Old media interests are beginning to lose advertising revenue and readers/viewers to the new media. This is a new age for media, and the blood-letting in the old media has just begun.

More on Sarah Palin and the media here and here and here

Update: Cyber-vermin are busy vandalising Palin's Wikipedia page

Leftist media "is disgusted" at little Piper Palin's loving care of her baby brother

The Washington Post uses propaganda tactics in an attempt to turn a non-story into a scandal about Palin

And even Steve Sailer--who early on took gratuitous potshots at Palin's fertility--has begun to notice the ultra left bias of media coverage of Palin

Is Palin a form of "locoweed" for the media--driving them viscerally insane? Or does the media still have time to recover from its quasi-suicidal anti-Palin insanity, and attempt to portray itself as objective again?

Take That Democrat Pussies!

Even funnier than O Hail the Messiah, Lord Obama!

H/T Ann Althouse via Instapundit.

Who Is Sarah Palin, and What is all the Fuss?

McCain's selection of Palin for the VP slot has thrown the US political world into a turmoil. People who should actually know better are making quasi-pompous pronouncements about the choice without having done their homework. Such leaping before looking betrays a lazy mental complacency that does not do them credit. Who is Sarah Palin? Here is one close up viewpoint:

A very good friend, who is a lifelong Alaskan and one of the smartest people I know, offers this word of caution to those (yes, like me) inclined to take Sarah Palin lightly:

At the end of 2005, a close friend called to say that he begun writing speeches and talking points for a certain gubernatorial candidate.

"Remind me," I asked. "Who is Sarah Palin?"

I was dismayed at my friend’s choice of political entree. Why was he wasting his time on a relative nobody, trying to beat an incumbent governor (and former three term senator) in the Republican primary? It was utter folly. "Wait until the big money starts coming in for Murkowski," I said. "Wait until the party machinery goes to work on Palin. They will eat her for lunch."

Murkowski, for his part, expressed a similar view. "If I decide to," he said, "I will run and I will win. It's that simple."

The folly, of course, turned out to be my own (and Murkowski's), as Palin slaughtered the incumbent in the primary--posting a 30 point margin of victory--and went on to win the general (over a former Democratic governor) without seeming to break a sweat. She then quickly fulfilled an implicit campaign promise by slapping down ExxonMobil, BP, and ConocoPhillips in negotiations over a proposed Alaska natural gas pipeline, even though they, too, by all accounts, were well prepared to dine on her tender little frame. Not bad for a lightweight.

Listening to the Democratic leadership respond to John McCain’s selection of Sarah Palin as his vice presidential running mate, one hears echoes of the Alaska Republican leadership from just a few years ago. Barack Obama’s spokesman, Bill Burton, put it this way: "Today, John McCain put the former mayor of a town of 9,000 with zero foreign policy experience a heartbeat away from the presidency." Former mayor? If you're going to skip over her job as governor and, before that, her job heading the commission that oversees production of the largest petroleum reserves in America, why not "former high school student"? Bah, what does it matter: She's just a small town mayor, just a hockey mom, just a beauty pageant queen. Palin has never shunned these belittling monikers, in part, I imagine, because the camouflage has served her so well. Soothed by the litany, her opponents tend to sleep too late, sneer too much, and forget who it is that hires them.

Watching Palin operate over the past few years has been like witnessing a dramatic reading of All the King’s Men. In 2002, Murkowski had interviewed but passed over Palin in selecting a replacement for the senate seat he vacated to become governor. In a grand act of nepotism, he chose his own daughter instead. Palin was tossed a bone: She chaired the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission, which oversees the production of petroleum in Alaska. When she reported conflicts of interest and other ethical violations by another commissioner, she was ignored by Murkowski’s chief of staff and ultimately resigned in frustration. One can imagine how the quick double dose of corruption--insiders having their way with the polity and its resources--sickened the young Palin. It also fired a savage competitiveness that is not, perhaps, apparent at first glance.

What the Republicans missed about Sarah Palin then--and what the Democrats seem poised to miss now--is that she is a true political savant; a candidate with a knack for identifying the key gripes of the populace and packaging herself as the solution. That keen political nose has enabled her to routinely outperform her resume. Nearly two years into her administration, she still racks up approval ratings of 80 per cent or better. _Source

And much more at the link above. The sheer volume of uninformed pontification about Palin would fill the libraries of dozens of pseudo-intellectuals.

Pundits pontificate. They cannot help themselves. But investigators investigate before they opine. This would be a good time for investigation, for the wiser ones.

Does Sarah Palin have the "X" factor?

Why are leftists so afraid of Palin that they will violate their principles to attack her in the most sexist manner?

Can a mere facade like Obama close the sale?



"Lord Barry heal the bitter ones
Still clinging to their faith and guns
Hope for the change for the hope, of the change"
O Hail the Messiah, Lord Obama

American Feminism Out of Touch w/ Women & Men

As one Iraqi women's advocate, Haifa Abdul Rahman, told her, "We see feminism in America as dividing women from men, separating women from the family. This is bad for everyone." _Source

This is not the time to be attacking the family, or family-oriented women. But that is exactly what feminism and the left is doing, in an increasingly crude and frantic manner.

Today's feminist establishment in the United States is dominated by the radical wing of the egalitarian tradition. Not only do its members not cooperate with their conservative sisters, but they also often denigrate and vilify them; indeed they have all but eliminated them from the history of American feminism. Revisionist history is never a pretty sight. But feminist revisionists are destructive in special ways. They seek to obliterate not only feminist history but the femininity that made it a success.

Feminists do not speak for the majority of women. They speak for leftist radical women, who consider all other women as "fair game" to be exploited systematically in a way the patriarchy never considered doing.

The candidacy of Alaska governor Sarah Palin should present an interesting spectacle for the women of America. It also presents an increasingly difficult dilemma for the radical feminists who have pressed so hard for a Democratic Party majority in the US Congress. If radical feminists adopt their standard attack tactics against Palin, they risk revealing more about themselves than they care to do. But if they hold back, they risk allowing entire new generations of young women to be exposed a powerful new female role model that could reverse decades of feminist indoctrination.

Should the harpy hos of feminism ignore Palin, or should they loudly protest her as "anti woman?"

McCain's maverick choice has certainly stirred the pot.

Two Hurricanes, Two Governors

US Republican Party presidential candidate John McCain's selection of Alaska governor Sarah Palin as his VP running mate seems to have energized the US Republican Party base. If Barak Obama had named former Louisiana governor Kathleen Blanco as his VP running mate, would that have energized the Democratic Party base? Certainly, when Mr. Obama failed to select Hillary Clinton as his running mate, the letdown felt by many US women was palpable.

But about Ms. Blanco, former governor of Louisiana? Would her selection by Obama as VP candidate for the USDP energize the Democratic Party base? Why not? In one word, Katrina. The infamous hurricane Katrina of August 2005 devastated New Orleans and ruined Blanco's chances for political advancement. Although the press neglected to emphasize the point, Blanco was far more responsible for the failure of state and local relief agencies to perform in a timely manner to the disaster than anyone in the US federal government. Blanco's failure to prepare and respond to Katrina marked her for life.

Blanco was not very smart, but she was smart enough not to run again for governor. She had proven herself as totally incompetent in the face of crisis, and would not be given another chance. Louisiana elected a different governor, Bobby Jindal, giving Louisiana's famously corrupt Democratic Party political machine a huge loss.

In the face of hurricane Gustav, Jindal has mobilized state and local agencies, law enforcement, etc. well in advance, and has maintained clear communications with all levels of federal government. Jindal is prepared as far as possible. Jindal is a hands-on governor with a meritocratic system--as opposed to the incredibly nepotistic and corrupt Democratic Party machine that Blanco operated within.

Louisiana (except perhaps New Orleans?) has never been better prepared for a hurricane than now. The city of New Orleans is still under Mayor Nagin's control, although it is a much smaller city now. And the more intelligent people of New Orleans will never take Nagin seriously again. They will take responsibility for themselves. For Nagin is part of the famously corrupt Democratic Party political machine. Like Nancy Pelosi, Barbara Boxer, etc., Nagin is incompetent because the machine he is part of is incompetent.

Alaska's Sarah Palin is a hands-on governor like Bobby Jindal. She inspires confidence as Jindal does, and currently has an 80% approval rating in her state. There is no question as to the energizing effect her presence on the ticket has already had on the base of her national political party.

Governors matter. Their decisions matter. In routine operations and planning, and in crises. Governors are executives, they run things. Legislators such as senators can easily skate by for decades without needing to demonstrate real world competence. Governors have to have something going for them, or they are apt to be found out--like Blanco.

Gustav is building for impact with Cuba, then on to the Gulf of Mexico. Every hurricane, every natural disaster, every designed disaster is a test of the competence of government officials. In most countries (and previously in Louisiana) elected office was a corrupt sinecure, meant mainly as a base to distribute favours to campaign contributors, friends, and relatives. But in the Anglosphere, officials are expected to behave honorably and with distinction in the face of a crisis. Kathleen Blanco failed. She was replaced. She is now a political embarassment, and Obama certainly never considered her as his running mate.

Bobby Jindal was considered as a running mate for McCain, but Jindal was not ready to jump a crippled ship for higher office. Palin was asked, and she accepted. Both Palin and Jindal have demonstrated records of achievement and competence.

Senators are hard put to match the achievements of a governor. That is why US Senators are so rarely elected US President. Baby senators such as Obama, who has barely "served" half a term--spending most of the time running for president--would never have a chance without "magical" circumstances aiding them. But Obama chose another US Senator as his running mate--not someone with executive decision-making experience. That was a mistake.

Gustav, like time, global jihad, and the Russian Army, will not stop for incompetents.