A refrain I keep hearing about why Sarah Palin is so popular is that she is somehow ordinary and normal, in stark contrast to the “freaks” who constantly attack her. I’ve already noted the glorification of the cultural baggage that surrounds her: the beauty queen, eloping with her husband, hockey mother, husband as a fisherman, “Lake Wobegon accent”, small towns, guns, hunting, snowboards and snowmobiles, more guns… This is supposed to represent some “down home appeal” against people like Barack Obama and his supporters who are clearly not “authentic” enough.
As this narrative expanded, some of the usual suspects began to concoct a victim mentality out of it to explain the strenuous opposition to Palin from certain quarters. For in opposing Palin, for mocking her rudimentary and exaggerated readiness for high national office, they are somehow opposed to normal and ordinary Americans. For since she represents “ordinary people with an ordinary love of family and the normal human love of children”, any opposition must surely imply ”the bizarre hatred of the Ordinary American” or the “insatiable hatred of normalcy and of America.” Or, as George Bush might have put it: “they hate us for our babies.”
Here is my question to these denizens of division: who are they to define what constitutes ordinary and normal? What Palin represents is a certain kind of rural white American culture, dominant across the south, but reaching also into the Alaskan frontier. There is a connection. As noted by the New York Times, the area where Palin grew up experienced a major influx of Oklahomans and Texans over the past three decades to work in the oil fields and fill the evangelical churches, and these very groups form the backbone of Palin’s support. But this is merely one particular culture, white American rural culture, a culture that has adopted a siege mentality not only against the prominence of secular liberalism that is happy to deride “rednecks” while remaining ultra-sensitive to slights against other groups, but also as a defensive bulwark against the rapid demographic shifts that will shortly doom this culture to permanent minority status.
What bothers me, and what propels me to write this post, is that I am sick and tired of the spokesmen for one particular culture abrogating the terms “normal” and “ordinary”, not-so-subtly implying that those of us for which this culture is entirely alien are somehow abnormal. Today, I’m going to get a bit personal. I beg your indulgence.
When I think of ordinary and normal people who love family, I think of the couple who immigrated to the United States from Guatemala and who work incredibly long hours cleaning people’s houses, and whose greatest joy in life was seeing their son accepted into a premier US college.
I think of the African-American women who run my local dry cleaner in DC, swelling with pride at the thought that one of their own could possibly be elected president of the United States.
I think of my friends from graduate school, a married couple who both work full time and devote every waking moment to their two young children and who are willing to pay whatever it takes and to make whatever sacrifices needs to be made to get them the best possible education. And I recall the woman in this couple telling me just last week that she burst into tears in her drive home, so upset that her fellow Americans could be leaning towards McCain and Palin after eight disastrous years of Bush and Cheney.
I think of my very good friend from church, an African-American man who grew up in a single-parent family in inner-city Chicago, only to overcome great obstacles and become the devout and devoted husband and family man that I can only aspire to. A proud member of both Opus Dei and the Democratic party, he is a reminder of the utter vacuousness of culture war stereotypes.
And lastly, I think of my in-laws who escaped from Vietnam with four young children on one of the last transport planes out of Saigon before the communists bombed the airport in 1975. After leaving Camp Pendleton, sponsored by a Catholic church, they built a new life in an utterly foreign land. My father-in-law started out as a janitor, and at one stage worked three jobs to provide for his family. Family was everything to them. And they raised four amazing children, all of whom enjoyed great academic success. Yes, they went to ”elitist institutions” while their parents were proud Democrats and union workers who proudly walked many picket lines during the coldest days of winter.
These people are all ordinary, normal Americans. Black, white, asian, hispanic– representatives of many different cultures and backgrounds, part of the great diverse tapestry that is this country’s strongest asset. They are all decent people, dedicated to family and children. They might have nothing in common with the kind of white rural culture that is somehow being held up as the embodiment of sublime virtue, but do not dare tell me that they are not “normal” simply because of some latent insecurity on your part. Do not dare.
Your smearing of those – like myself – who like and identify with Palin (“spokesmen for one particular culture abrogating the terms “normal” and “ordinary”, not-so-subtly implying that those of us for which this culture is entirely alien are somehow abnormal”) is, ironically, exactly what you accuse. To suggest that these people would not like in the abstract or be willing to become friends with those in your life described here is a wholesale fantasy.
Have you always hated white people, or is this something you learned in your adult life? There are plenty of non-whites who own guns, live in small towns, and do all of the activities you so clearly deplore, yet you haven’t mentioned them at all. Why?
As I await approval for my previous comment (still uncertain why I’m in moderation), here’s a big reason why people are responding so strongly to Palin:
http://www.amconmag.com/article/2008/sep/22/00014/
“Human beings can’t help feeling strongly about making babies. Look at the celebrity gossip columns……An obsession in politics with breeding is both very old (hereditary monarchy) and very contemporary…..Frontier fecundity is hardly a new concept. In 1751, Ben Franklin pointed out that America’s low population density meant higher wages and lower land prices, which in turn allowed earlier marriages and more children.”
Affordable family formation seems to have very good explanatory power. I look forward to testing 2008 by 2004 and 2000. I think we will see very similiar patterns.
Old Zipster and his cyber-buddies must have a very fragile sense of their own self-identity and inner composure, holding on so fiercely to these narrow and prejudiced conceptions of ‘real’ America.
This resentment of the Other is obviously a splitting device of the most entrenched sort.
Poor fellows.
By “normal” I think what people really mean is “average.” And I think blaming it on rural white America is a red herring. My family was suburban upper-middle class to a T (“elitist” universities, McMansion, etc. etc) but against my own better judgment I am finding that I feel the same way the Palin-ites do.
On the one hand there’s this guy with an awesome resume and an Ivy League degree. On the other hand we have a lady who attended five different colleges in six years before finally snagging a degree from the University of Idaho. Guess who seems to me to be more “normal” (in other words, average)?
The reality is that as members of the ruling class ALL the candidates are elitists. But that’s not how it comes off looking at their biographies. Everyone knows what a PTA mom is. Half of my classmates had PTA moms. I think there are about 15 people scattered around the country who actually know what a community organizer does and I have never met a community organizer in my life.
I have no evidence to prove this, but I think practically any American would be more likely to defend somebody who was denigrated for being from a small town than they would be to defend someone who was denigrated for being from a big city. I probably would myself, and I have lived in Manhattan all my adult life.
We romanticize small towns, and we have accepted the idea that people in big cities are self-absorbed, rude participants in a soulless rat race. It’s a kind of prejudice or bigotry that is working in Sarah Palin’s favor. Why anyone should regard her as more “authentic” or more representative of American womanhood than all the women I work with here in Manhattan is beyond me. But for the moment it looks like it’s happening.
Way to knock down that strawman, MM.
Well done.
Palin is ordinary & normal in almost exactly the same way your examples are… her family is middle-class, and she hasn’t spent the entirety of her adult life pining for Pennsylvania Avenue. She knows (and in many ways continues to know) what it’s like to live a typical middle-class life.
Like it or not, good or bad, that’s what many Americans want in a politician… someone who understands their struggles because they’ve lived a similar life *as an adult* and not just when they were growing up.
-but do not dare tell me that they are not “normal” simply because of some latent insecurity on your part. Do not dare.-
Has someone told you that they are not normal?
When I first heard of the Palin pick, I thought it was a desperate gimmick. However, after I started watching and learning about her (no matter what you think of her politics) I came to the conclusion that it was a brilliant move, if nothing else from a PR or marketing angle.
America is a big country, and there is a great cultural divide between New York-Los Angeles-Chicago-San Franciso-etc. and the rest of the country. Nothing against Obama, but if I wanted to sell a product to “America”, and had a checklist of requirements (that would appeal to most people), she would hit nearly all of them.
that’s what many Americans want in a politician… someone who understands their struggles because they’ve lived a similar life *as an adult* and not just when they were growing up.
That’s not what I want in a leader: I want somebody who understands diplomatic and economic conundrums that I wouldn’t even dream of understanding; I want somebody who can speak to power in its own highly complex and esoteric speech; I want somebody who can, perhaps, understand more than one language (as the high-ranking clerics of the Roman Church do); I want somebody who understands high finance (as I don’t); I want somebody leading my country who’s sufficiently well-cultured so as to be able to avoid serious gaffes when he negotiates with other world leaders; I want somebody who understands enough history to be able to know what Sunnis and Shiahs are, and why there’s such enmity between them.
I do NOT want somebody who merely represents the hoi polloi of my country, or my own serious gaps in education or culture. I would NOT respect such a person, and would not expect the peoples of other cultures to have much respect for him or her, either–knowing, as I do, that what’s most revered by the people of other cultures, much older than America’s, is careful, judicious civility and great caution–combined with hospitality–in dealing with the stranger in their midst.
In short, I want somebody BETTER than me to rule my country. But I guess I’m just a deluded fancier of archaic and “aristocratic” systems of government. However, I will point out to you that your Church has taught for centuries that “democracy” is not necessarily the most just form of government, nor the one that best promotes virtue among its subjects.
I would prefer to be ruled by the intellectually refined and elegant Obama, as compared to the pandering vulgarians, Palin and McCain.
“I would prefer to be ruled by the intellectually refined and elegant Obama, as compared to the pandering vulgarians, Palin and McCain.”
Rule by community organizer. How delightful.
“Like it or not, good or bad, that’s what many Americans want in a politician… someone who understands their struggles because they’ve lived a similar life *as an adult* and not just when they were growing up.”
Yeah…like having a personal tanning bed installed in the governor’s mansion..
But it does nor matter, because myth is intentionally running against fact this year, on the grandest scale…
I want somebody BETTER than me to rule my country.
More “intellectually-refined and elegant” is not the same thing as better, digby. As you properly note, democracy has a profound leveling effect. I’m not sure *any* of the candidates are categorically “better” than the average American, unfortunately.
Since when is a quarter mil a year income middle class? Obama ain’t middle class either for that matter.
Mark, what about doing away with the chef, limo and plane?
MZ, the Palins didn’t make that before she held statewide office, correct?
This has long bothered me. The catholicism I grew up with was urban, immigrant and cosmopolitan. . .VERY different than the kind of small town, nativist, America-first christianity that is called normal.
Abortion seems to be the only significant overlap between the “norms” and we poor freaks.
Alas.
This talk of real America stuff is just a longing for those times in which the prejudicial Institutions and Traditions in America did not have to be challenged by the cumbersome notions of eqaul rights and real universal dignity.
There was that good ole’ time in America whenever venerable Tradition and Institution, for example, communicated to a white man down South that however wretched a man he was, his whiteness guaranteed his gentlemanliness in comparion to a black man.
And up North, white homeowners could feel guaranteed that foreigners could be kept of of their tightly-knit Community. Liberals just don’t understand the importance of these over-reaching ties and bonds then provided–now sadly absent
Mr. Burgwald,
Most likely. It has been a while since they were under $100,000. My own definition of middle class is $40,000-$80,000. YMMW.
The catholicism I grew up with was urban, immigrant and cosmopolitan. . .VERY different than the kind of small town, nativist, America-first christianity that is called normal.
Me, too, but that “Catholicism” has migrated, as I have, and been replaced by a religion that is, if anything, more culturally and temperamentally Protestant than Catholic.
This talk of real America stuff is just a longing for those times in which the prejudicial Institutions and Traditions in America did not have to be challenged by the cumbersome notions of eqaul rights and real universal dignity.
Mark, this is such a strawman. Are there racists still around? Of course. Is everyone who likes Palin a racist because she strikes them as “real”? Of course not.
Do you think that most conservatives think this way?
Most likely. It has been a while since they were under $100,000. My own definition of middle class is $40,000-$80,000. YMMW.
I’d tend to agree with you on the definition of middle-class, although it did occur to me that two $45k incomes in the same household isn’t uncommon these days.
Any recollection of where you saw the Palin income numbers? I presumed that suburban mayors did make a lot, but perhaps that was erroneous.
I still think my point stands, in that a good chunk of her adult life was in the middle-class, even if you scratch the mayoral period.
Mark, this is such a strawman. Are there racists still around? Of course. Is everyone who likes Palin a racist because she strikes them as “real”? Of course not.
This may or may not be a relevant question, but I wonder how America would react to Palin if she were black. Is a white woman with five children viewed differently than a black woman with five children? I kind of think a religious black woman with five children (particularly if poor) would be seen as having had too many children. But a poor, religious white woman with five children would be someone who unselfishly took on the burden of having many children. If true, and it is just a conjecture, I am not exactly sure I would call it racist, but then again, I am not sure it wouldn’t be.
Chris,
It’s the same…but on a smaller scale.
Don’t you understand the importance of the “collective wisdom” passed own through the pre-reflective habits of American Tradition, amidst tightly-knit, small Community.
You start tinkering with this stuff and you have confused individuals and social chaos…or so it goes.
I believe the point of mocking normal is due to the fact there are extremist poking fun at aspects of Mrs. Palin’s life and family that are closely related to their life or people they know – and most people consider themselves normal whether they are or not. As MM points out his normal by people around him. Each person has a ‘normal’ based on their life experiences and those around them.
Having the campaign carry this non-sense on or even doing the wink-wink-nod-nod condemnations rings very hollow. You cannot have media outlets ask questions that use deliberately false mischaracterizations and expect the average viewer/reader not to see the shameless smear work underway. As a result of this haywire non-sense, no one will have a clear answer on policies other than the preconceived extremist views similar to MM and MZ. So the lamentation on the potential loss by Obama can only be laid at the feet of the extremely nasty actions on behalf of their candidate.
MM can’t overcome his Eurosnootery.
It has nothing to do with race, it’s just that a lot of us are sick of just the snooty attitude expressed by MM. Remember when he demanded respect for the ‘intellectual elite’ ? :P His is a constant protestation of not being liked & respected enough. “If only more people would share MY prejudices !!!”
If I understand correctly, MM is from Europe. Clearly, he must be a masochist to live in the simplistic, dualistic, Calvinist United States of Amerikkka. Pass the hat around to buy the poor bloke a flight back to the old country.
Mr. Burgwald,
Todd Palin has been employed for 18 years with BP. His earning for 2007 were $46,000 for fishing and $46,000 for BP work. Source.
I’m an extremist. Gotta love it.
“This may or may not be a relevant question, but I wonder how America would react to Palin if she were black. Is a white woman with five children viewed differently than a black woman with five children?”
And What if Obama had a pregnant seventeen year old daughter?
I think Bill O’Reilly and “real America, for one, would be complaining about the ” obvious lack of parental supervision”, as he did so much with Ms. Lohan, and giving the wink-wink about wild black rap culture…instead of remaining silent or even praising the young girl.
The what-ifs are interesting … but there is the reality of the current mess. Bill O’Reilly’s explaining away the double standard he has was poor at best. As for the rest of small town America, if there wasn’t a big deal of it made in the mainstream press it would have probably had little notice. If the mainstream press played it out in the same nasty sentiment as we have witnessed (taking unsubstantiated blogs as news sources) I would think there may have been a similar reaction. At least from this one small town American perspective.
Since when is a quarter mil a year income middle class
In America, virtually everyone is middle class, at. least according to self-description.
Anyone who claims to “support” Sarah Palin automatically discredits himself and places himself outside any possible rational discussion.
“A refrain I keep hearing about why Sarah Palin is so popular is that she is somehow ordinary and normal, in stark contrast to the “freaks” who constantly attack her”
Most people are responding to the over the top scare tactics. Yeah they are feaks in the sense they have little notion of the people in this country besides a cartoon version
“: who are they to define what constitutes ordinary and normal? What Palin represents is a certain kind of rural white American culture, dominant across the south, but reaching also into the Alaskan frontier”
”
MM to put the very unique Alaska cuture in terms of race shows me you don’t get it
the area where Palin grew up experienced a major influx of Oklahomans and Texans over the past three decades to work in the oil fields and fill the evangelical churches, and these very groups form the backbone of Palin’s support”
The not too subtle US verus Them. True not as bold to call Palintholic is postate but it is still there. Sorry the JOhn Paul II generation moved passed this long ago
“not only against the prominence of secular liberalism that is happy to deride “rednecks” while remaining ultra-sensitive to slights against other groups, but also as a defensive bulwark against the rapid demographic shifts that will shortly doom this culture to permanent minority status.”
I ma proud Catholic redneck. Believe it or not we are a tad more diverse than you might think
” think of my very good friend from church, an African-American man who grew up in a single-parent family in inner-city Chicago, only to overcome great obstacles and become the devout and devoted husband and family man that I can only aspire to. A proud member of both Opus Dei and the Democratic party, he is a reminder of the utter vacuousness of culture war stereotypes”
I have to admit you got gumpton wrtiting this paragraph after what else you wrote. Who is engaing in a cultural war here? Look in the mirror
“They might have nothing in common with the kind of white rural culture that is somehow being held up as the embodiment of sublime virtue, but do not dare tell me that they are not “normal” simply because of some latent insecurity on your part. Do not dare.”
Good Grief. THis is the same electorate that elected a Harvard MBA to the WHite House. Please do not blame white rural culture (whatever the heck that is) for the fact that a good portion of the voting populance likes Palins views on issues.
Mark you said:
“This talk of real America stuff is just a longing for those times in which the prejudicial Institutions and Traditions in America did not have to be challenged by the cumbersome notions of eqaul rights and real universal dignity.”
What ever. Get to know your fellow Americans a tad more. It is not 1960 anymore. As someone that grew up in the SOuth in the time that the laws had to be incorporated in society all this is amazing insulting.
I guess I’m surprised at the vehemence of the objections to MM’s point. . . which is simply that there is no “normal”, different people have different standards of normalcy.
If a majority of Americans feel more comfortable with Palin. . . fine.
But to claim that her detractors are “freaks”. . .and that such a claim is perfectly reasonable, is either insane, or cold bloodedly divisive in the most narrowly partisan way.
(I can predict the conservative response: we were just kidding! Learn to take a joke!)
phosphorious: As I stated, normalcy is based on each person’s perspective. My commentary is on the actions and commentary directed at Palin. It is not a statement of comfort. The ‘freak’ commentary directed at her detractors is due to the subject of the detraction, detractions that have nothing to due with policy but focused on personal issues many in mainstream America deal with on a regular basis. Their behavior was freakish, it is not that they are ‘freaks.’ The commentary on the outlandish commentary and behavior is not partisan other than the bad behavior was from an extreme element of the Democratic candidate supporters. Worse yet, the Democratic party is supposed to be more caring for the person, and all the extreme element accomplished is to out shout the middle portion of the party with hateful commentary destroying any chance of claiming that Democrats care more than Republicans.
Many of those same immaterial attacks were made here on this Catholic blog, and that is very distressing.
MZ, where are you getting all of the Palin’s income information? (Also, $46,000 gross from a fishing business is not the same at $46,000 in income, FYI).
sc:
That’s a very nuanced, subtle distinction you make between the freakish actions of some democrats and the democratic party as a whole.
Unfortunately that nuance is lost in the “Palin represents normality” nonsense that the right engages in. Obama has been presented as other and alien for the past few months, and the right has resorted to outright lies in doing so.
It’s vaguely possible that the majority of republicans feel the same way you do. . . that it is a small majority of liberals who are the freaks, while the majority are well meaning if mistaken.
But given that Tim LaHaye had to make a public statement saying that he didn’t think that Obama was really the anti-christ, my money is on a majority of republicans thinking that they are normal, and democrats are freaks.
“Anyone who claims to “support” Sarah Palin automatically discredits himself and places himself outside any possible rational discussion.”
We’ve found an extremist.
What is uniquely Alaskan? Motherhood? The outdoors? Hunting? Tanning beds? Bookbanning?
And is Sarah’s motherhood somehow more ordinarily American than Michelle Obama’s?
Wipe away the thin veneer of this stuff and you have raw prejudice, pure and simple…
M.Z Forest: Your definition of middle class does not apply to the country as a whole, $40,000 in Washington D.C.: poverty. $30,000 in Wheeling WV, solidly middle class.
lol…the Godwin’s law for Obama supporters. It is always prejudice, racism, etc. One could point out that as a Princeton, then Harvard law AA beneficiary who married the President of the Harvard law review, Michelle Obama is hardly the ‘ordinary American’. No ‘ordinary American’ goes to Harvard law, although most the people I’ve met who went there are fairly nice and down to earth; they just aren’t ‘ordinary’.
Winston,
Why the need to include AA beneficiary?
I wonder how McCain made it into the military Academy with his grades?
He was a legacy admit…and acted like it…I’ve said before that I don’t think McCain is very bright. Blackadder linked to a Time/Newsweek? article that listed his IQ as well above average, but I couldn’t help but notice that the IQ test in question was taken after McCain had taken office which makes me suspicious about the integrity of the test. Either way, the way law school admission works, it is far more probably than not that Michelle was an AA admit. I’ve heard that Barack was not, and I believe it because he did very well there.
Either way, McCain is not normal, having been born into military aristocracy, and somebody as impressive as Barack is not normal either…Palin is more ‘normal’ insofar as she doesn’t seemed to have spent her whole life plotting her ascendancy to the presidency, contra McCain, Obama, and Biden.
Winston,
What is behind the political effort to frame Sarah Palin as more authentically/really/ordinarily American than Brack Obama, if not prejudice?
Uh, the political effort is the same as any political effort: to be elected. Is that your question?
More generally, I would say the following:
1) People are more likely to trust elected officials who they believe share their interests. Palin, like any politician, wishes to convince people that she shares and understands their interests.
2) She has unique advantages in this respect given that she has not, in fact, been planning to be President her whole life. This is a compelling part of her story for some voters, and they are trying to make the most of it.
3) Palin also has to attack Barack Obama; that is the job of the VP candidate (see Biden, Joe from earlier today for an example).
4) The best way to do this is to portray him as elitist and out of touch; that is the front where he is most vulnerable (what comes to mind; guns, religion, cling). Not many pepole know any community organizers.
5) This is not the same as racism. Indeed as the Onion has pointed out, it’s almost the reverse. (http://www.theonion.com/content/video/portrayal_of_obama_as_elitist) It is essentially the Kerry-ification of Obama. You may think it’s unfair, but it’s not racist.
Playing on prejudices is not only racism.
Perhaps this makes her more authentically/ordinarily American in many eyes:
“A campaign spokesman says Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin won’t speak with an investigator hired by lawmakers to look into the firing of her public safety commissioner.”
You identifiers tell me. Apparently, I do not have the powers to gauge this trait, as some others do here.
As Phosphporious noted, the point here is not to denigade the kind of white rural culture of which Palin is a part– it is merely to say that it cannot be seen as “normal” when one is talking about the US as a whole. My problem is that a lot of people are assigning some kind of virtue to this rural culture, when none exists. It is what it is, no more, no less.
“I wonder how McCain made it into the military Academy with his grades?”
By the same process all but a very precious few do. Use wikipedia for pete’s sake.
Those precious few are children of Medal of Honour winners. They merely have to meet the minimum requirements and pick their school. But, since none of the McCain’s have earned that medal, it doesn’t really apply here.
“(I can predict the conservative response: we were just kidding! Learn to take a joke!)”
I’d hope not. Especially considering the raft of out and out freaks we’ve seen the last couple of weeks lampooning her choice and her child.
But if you’ll shill for a baby-killer, you’ll do anything, even object to the use of freaks to describe the folks I just mentioned.
“My problem is that a lot of people are assigning some kind of virtue to this rural culture, when none exists. It is what it is, no more, no less.”
Hmmm, mostly Christian, patriotic, pro-life, hard working, and generous. Yeah, not much virtue there.
Excuse me while I go back to clinging to my guns and religion.
“one particular culture abrogating the terms “normal” and “ordinary”….
I think you meant “one particular culture arrogating”
sorry…I’m a stickler.
Todd
As with much of what you write MM, the partisanship drowns out whatever valid points you were trying to make. When people refer to the ‘freaks’ who attack Sarah Palin, they are not referring to your friends, unless your friends happen to be hysterical people who write for leftist newsmagazines.
People like Andrew Sullivan, who demanded that she release the birth records for Trig and hysterically referred to her as a ‘dangerous, vindictive Christianist cipher’. Or people like Wendy Doniger, who said her ‘greatest hypocrisy is her pretense that she is a woman’. Or Salon, which called her a hypocrite…for carrying Trig to term. I could go on…
These people, writing for respectable leftist publications, are determined to paint Palin as some sort of fundamentalist breeder imbecile. These are the ‘freaks’, and they certainly are not normal. And I will certainly ‘dare’ to say it.
It’s all too easy to dreg through the internet to find the most outrageous nonsense. You can be assured its out there on Obama. And it’s not all “fringe”– the Value Voters’ Summit delivered a racist “Obama waffles” display.
But the hard-core Palin admirers do more than express outrage for the perceived unfair attacks on her. They take these attacks and assume they are attacks on what they deem as “normal” and “ordinary”. In the process, they are holding up a certain narrow culture, and excluding many many decent people who have nothing in common with the habits and hobbies of rural life. They are elevating this “small town” lifestyle as something more virtuous than the big-city life. (And, as somebody pointed out, Catholicism has always been a vibrant urban culture.) Where they go wrong is to move from Palin the person, to Palin the representative of this rural white culture.
On the “Christian” point: yes, Palin is a Protestant, and she takes it seriously. Well, guess what, the same is true of Obama. But no, many Catholics are happy to attack Rev. Wright, while giving a free pass to the nutty pastors at Palin’s church. Why? Because this kind of Americanist end-times theology gels with the dominant evangelicalism of this particular culture. Wright’s theology does not. In fact, I would argue that Wright’s theology is actually less odious, but people are not thinking theology– they are thinking culture.
“And it’s not all ‘fringe’ – the Value Voter’s Summit….”
If you think the Value Voters’ Summit is the equivalent of the Atlantic, Salon, and the Washington Post respectively in terms of influence, then you live in a different country.
It is precisely the elite, mainstream news organizations that are hysterically making these attacks, and that is why their has been a backlash against the elites. This is not an abstract dislike of elites or a desire to call people freaks; it is outrage at the tone and substance of the attacks. Your post pretends these attacks don’t exist; as if people were calling your kind dry cleaner neighbor a ‘freak’.
You post was an exercise in feigning moral indignation at insults that were never leveled. It heroically defended people that were never attacked. Now if you would like to defend Sullivan at the Atlantic, or Doniger writing for the Washington Post; if you would like to insist that they are not elitists, or that they have done nothing to justify a backlash, feel free to make your case. Until then, you are attacking a straw man. Nobody is saying your kind neighbors (or mine) aren’t normal.
Mornings Minion,
Do you really think anyone who takes their Christianity seriously embraces infanticide as Obama does in voting against the Born Alive Infant Protection act? Recall that pagans practiced infanticide. Obama is a pagan at heart.
“I wonder how McCain made it to the military academy on his grades.”
I wonder why the Obama campaign will not release the SAT and LSAT scores for him and his wife? Could it be that there was some other factor in their admission to Ivy League Schools other than academic performance?
“Hmmm, mostly Christian, patriotic, pro-life, hard working, and generous. Yeah, not much virtue there.”
How is patriotism a virtue. . . especially when expressed in the form “God has given America a special shield of protection. . .” or however Falwell and Robertson put it?
As for the other virtues you mention. . . they exist exclusively in the rural culture represented by Palin. . . and nowhere else?
Seriously?
littlegal,
As a former attendee of an Ivy League school, I can tell you that– in addition to grades and SAT scores–interviews, family background, ties to alumni, and other extracurricular factors are at play in every candidate’s admission.
“If you think the Value Voters’ Summit is the equivalent of the Atlantic, Salon, and the Washington Post respectively in terms of influence, then you live in a different country.”
No. . .by the terms of this discussion the Value Voters Summit is exactly the right target: not some elitist news organization, but rather a grassroots organization that represents what all these normal americans believe.
As evidenced by this discussion, anyone who claims to “support” Sarah Palin automatically places himself outside the possibility of rational discussion.
As evidenced by this discussion, anyone who claims to “support” Sarah Palin automatically places himself outside the possibility of rational discussion.
Ha!
MM, great post. You are right to point to the real problem with those who claim to speak for “normal” (er — “average” or whatever other essentialistic term you want to use) “rural” americans. I have some thoughts I’ll post as a follow-up asap.
There is an odd definition of “leftist” floating around. When your average American hears the word “leftist” he or she imagines a radical, bomb-throwing communist, or maybe a campus radical from the long-ago decade that began almost 50 years ago, or both.
The Atlantic Monthly, Washington Post, Newsweek, etc., I would describe as slightly culturally “liberal” (as that word is usually used) but otherwise just…establishmentarian. They are owned by large companies in the business of making money, and thus are, broadly speaking, pro-business, would not advocate or support the radical overthrow of the ruling elites (which they are, along with captains of industry, titans of Wall Street, and assorted other “malefactors of great wealth”.)
Saying the Atlantic Monthly is “leftist” makes me wonder what the definition of “leftist” is for the person so describing it.
In case it wasn’t clear from the context (I think it was), the term ‘leftist’ was being used to describe publications that tend to favor the party on the left of the U.S. political spectrum. Obviously left and right are relative terms, and I don’t particularly feel the need to try and prove any of those publications favor the Democratic party.
Do you really think anyone who takes their Christianity seriously embraces infanticide as Obama does in voting against the Born Alive Infant Protection act? Recall that pagans practiced infanticide. Obama is a pagan at heart.
Saskia,
Anyone who takes facts (and the English language) seriously would not make these baseless charges about infanticide. Can you explain how the Born Alive Infant Protection Act (passed in 2005) stopped the infanticide that was allegedly occurring in Illinois?
phosphorious,
MM says that there is no virtue in the rural culture – I’m just correcting him. I didn’t say there is no virtue elsewhere.
What do you have against patriotism? I believe it is a virtue to be loyal to the country that has done more good in the world than any other.
And it’s not all “fringe”– the Value Voters’ Summit delivered a racist “Obama waffles” display.
Um, yeah, two guys who bought a booth at a “summit” and then got kicked out are the very definition of “fringe.” So you’re not even trying to be honest here.
Well, the parts of the country where people don’t engage in anus-bleaching certainly are harder for Obama.
“MM says that there is no virtue in rural culture”.
Oh for God’s sake, can you please portray what I write accurately?
Oh for God’s sake, can you please portray what I write accurately?
These people are incapable, MM. They must misrepresent you in order to “win.”
I think America is beginning to see in Obama what I have known all along – “the emperor has no clothes”.
MM,
Here is your quote: “My problem is that a lot of people are assigning some kind of virtue to this rural culture, when none exists. It is what it is, no more, no less.”
Sorry if I misrepresented it – that was not my intent. It just seemed like your post was implying a lack of virtue in rural culture.
“Oh for God’s sake, can you please portray what I write accurately?”
Much as I sympathize with you, MM, I am also tempted to say, “You asked for it” by assuming that there was anything that could ever be reasonably said, ever, by a “supporter” of Sarah Palin.
In 10 years, we are going to have female Rethug candidates debating in bikinis while brandishing armed bazookas between their legs.
And we’ll be told that this represents an “innovative” new stance on the relation of work and motherhood, and that the candidacy is a celebration of “fertility.”
G. Alkon,
I hate to break it to you, but Obama will lose. Not that the Democrats necessarily should, mind you. Historically speaking, this election should be a landslide. However, Howard Dean continues to drive the Democratic party further to the left of most Americans, and all the writers at Time magazine, Newsweek, and the New York Times can only cover for him (and Obama) for so long.
In short, and to be blunt, Obama will lose. Nice guy? Yeah. Means well? Sure. But there simply aren’t enough guilty Liberals in America for him to win.
Just for the record, Hannibal L (e-mail hlector): could you please change your nickname? I find your use of “Hannibal Lector” somewhat offensive. Thanks.
“In short, and to be blunt, Obama will lose. Nice guy? Yeah. Means well? Sure. But there simply aren’t enough guilty Liberals in America for him to win.”
This is just another way of saying “liberals are freaks”, isn’t it. . . and this has been a mainstay of republican blather since Reagan. Republicans are the real Americans. . .not those alien “libs”.
It just might work. . . lies and slander often do.
But that’s nothing to be proud of.
What will you all do when Barry loses? When he takes the stage and the average American rejects him. Not for the color of his skin, but for the color of his politics. Americans recognize RED – and they instictively loathe it.
Will you follow him to Jonestown? Will you head of the call of Keith Olbermann and others and say all is lost? Will the dream of a worker’s paradise fade away into the distance? Will you wonder what goodies you could have gotten for free? Or will you resurrect another Robin Hood in four years time only to seem them fail too?
Funny! G Alkon predicts the future based on a doctored photo spread around the internet by his kind. And the statement is made and supported by more than one here that ANYONE who supports Palin is outside the realm of rational discussion. This is a very serious blog. Right… Keep telling yourselves that.
Too funny Hanny!
Tim,
I think G Alkon was referring to jonathanjones link to the American Conservative piece.
Exactly which of Obama’s policies are being rejected?
“Americans recognize RED – and they instictively loathe it.”
Hannibal L: speaking for all Americans everywhere. Of course, you speak in tautologies. . .since anyone who disagrees with you is simply not a real American.
No, no, no…Not at all.
It is just after studying my old catechism, the Bible, several statements released by American bishops concerning the subject of “intrinsic evil”, prudential judgment, issues which are non-negotiable, etc., and contrasting these to the Democratic and Republican platforms, I have come to the following conclusion:
God is a Republican – But, he gives to charity and (before Michael and others choke on their Chai Tea Lattes) is against unjust wars. :)
Black coffee for me. (Fair trade, though.)
Hannibal L:
You forgot his predilection for alaskan oil pipelines. . . that’s in Genesis, I think.
It looks like ordinary Americans are now seeing through and turning on SuperMamma:
Newsweek, A. Romano
“But then a funny thing happened: Palin lost some of her luster. Since Sept. 13, Palin’s unfavorables have climbed from 30 percent to 36 percent. Meanwhile, her favorables have slipped from 52 percent to 48 percent. That’s a three-day net swing of -10 points, and it leaves her in the Sept. 15 Diageo/Hotline tracking poll with the smallest favorability split (+10) of any of the Final Four. Over the course of a single weekend, in other words, Palin went from being the most popular White House hopeful to the least.”
Maybe Tina Fey just did Ms. Palin a bit too well!
Oh…someone here better inform me if SNL is too chic, metropolitan East Coast to count in this discussion.
Phosphorious,
You are correct, and that is covered in Genesis 1:28, commonly known as the “Dominion Clause”.
Mark,
if I’m not mistaken I believe I read that you are British? If so, I just wanted to congratulate you and the British people on the establishment of five new Islamic courts to settle legal matters within Great Britain according to Sharia Law.
Personally, I find this to be very tolerant and multiculturally sensitive. I’m not quite sure what Churchill, Thatcher, or even the Queen would say, but I guess if you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em?
Oh, I’m also pleased to hear that Gordon Brown wants me to vote for Obama. Please tell Gordie I’m on it.
Sharia Law:
Anti-gay, anti-abortion, anti-divorce, pro-Bible. . .
What’s the problem Hannibal?
Hanny,
I grew up in a small steel town of 7,000 inhabitants, 40 miles northeast of Pittsburgh, PA.
Hanny,
And I congratulate you, Senator MccCain, Chairmain of the Commerce Community, and Phil Gramm, his ex-chief economic advisor for his campaign, for all of the wonderful things they have done to our economy–through deregulatory policies–during the past 8 years.
For this take on Palin’s appeal to “small town values”:
“Fascist writer Westbrook Pegler, an avowed racist who Sarah Palin approvingly quoted in her acceptance speech for the moral superiority of small town values, expressed his fervent hope about my father, Robert F. Kennedy, as he contemplated his own run for the presidency in 1965, that “some white patriot of the Southern tier will spatter his spoonful of brains in public premises before the snow flies.” — Robert F. Kennedy Jnr.
In short, I want somebody BETTER than me to rule my country. But I guess I’m just a deluded fancier of archaic and “aristocratic” systems of government.
Sure, if you’re looking for someone to “rule”. We are a representative republic, we are governed by our elected representative. If you read the first three words of the Constitution it’s WE THE PEOPLE.
However, I will point out to you that your Church has taught for centuries that “democracy” is not necessarily the most just form of government, nor the one that best promotes virtue among its subjects.,/i>
Then I guess it’s a darned good thing we don’t live in a democracy, isn’t it.
I would prefer to be ruled by the intellectually refined and elegant Obama, as compared to the pandering vulgarians, Palin and McCain.
Then move somewhere where there is a king. I think you’ll be a lot happier. I hate to break it to you. The elites generally don’t have your best interest in mind.
But to claim that her detractors are “freaks”. . .and that such a claim is perfectly reasonable, is either insane, or cold bloodedly divisive in the most narrowly partisan way.
Maybe I haven’t been exposed to a sufficient cross-section of “detractors”, but I have to say that the response to Sarah Palin’s nomination strikes me as a monkey house at feeding time. All the monkeys screaming, jumping up and down and flinging poo.
Looks pretty freakish to me.
Leave it to Toe Toe to become scatalogical…
Whatever it is, it appears on the surface to differ not much from the frenzy of rhetoric that the rise of Obama has elicited from you, as evidenced in your blog spot.
Tony,
It strikes me that all the criticisms of what Sarah Palin did as mayor of Wasilla and governor of Alaska are dismissed as trivial (Troopergate, failure to have clear title to the land the Wasilla hockey rink was built on, seeking earmarks for things like the Bridge to Nowhere, hiring an administrator to do part of her job for her as mayor, appointing old high school classmates to high-paying jobs when governor). But the underlying implication is that what you do as a small-town mayor or the governor of a state with a population about equal to Memphis, Tennessee, is inconsequential. If Troopergate is really just about a family spat, the implication to me is that it’s silly to charge abuse of power when the power is on such a small, personal scale.
I don’t know how to reconcile all that with the contention that her experiences as mayor and governor have prepared her to step in as president at a moment’s notice. If her flaws and mistakes as mayor and governor are unimportant because what she was doing was on such a small scale, why should her experience, on that same small scale, count for anything?
David Nickol,
She is merely being trained for Cheney-esque vice presidential assertions of executive privelege and getting all of the aides to speak in unison.
You should realize that to many this is indeed a pedagogy in political virtue.
Mark,
Speaking of Dick Cheney, why is this not getting more coverage:
Complete story at . . .
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/09/15/AR2008091503064_pf.html
[...] or why Palin does not represent “rural culture” Morning’s Minion is right to contest the rhetoric surrounding Sarah Palin’s supposed representation of “normal, white, [...]
[...] Minion at Vox Nova is right to contest the rhetoric surrounding Sarah Palin’s supposed representation of “normal, white, [...]
I don’t know how to reconcile all that with the contention that her experiences as mayor and governor have prepared her to step in as president at a moment’s notice. If her flaws and mistakes as mayor and governor are unimportant because what she was doing was on such a small scale, why should her experience, on that same small scale, count for anything?
David,
We haven’t had a chance to see this whole thing play out. “Troopergate”, jeez… The attempt to get a trooper who was drinking in his patrol car and tazered his son relieved of his duties. Sounds like a public service to me, regardless of his relationship. And if she didn’t try and remove him, you would be complaining that she was giving him special treatment because of his relationship. Such is the life of an in the tank partisan.
I don’t believe the Governor or Senator McCain are perfect. As a matter of fact, they have a lot to be desired. But when placed against that priest of Moloch, Barack Obama, they look like saints.
The attempt to get a trooper who was drinking in his patrol car and tazered his son relieved of his duties. Sounds like a public service to me, regardless of his relationship.
Tony,
First, on the tasering incident — the kid wanted to know what it felt like, Wooten used low power for one second. The kid wanted him to do it a second time. And it was reported to the police two years after it happened, right after Molly McCann filed the divorce against Wooten. And when the police asked Bristol Palin why they had reported the incident two years after it happened, Bristol said, “Because of the divorce.”
But setting facts aside, it seems the principle you are articulating for the behavior of elected officials is that if they are doing a good thing, then they may abuse their power. Is this really your argument?
[...] culture war that certain people with nothing better to offer are desperately trying to stoke– I talked about it before, as did Michael. Anyway, think of this less a criticism of Palin herself than of us [...]