Monday, July 6, 2009

"Survey SAID..."


American Conservative blogger Daniel Larison submits a thoughtful piece about the nervous breakdown witnessed around the world: the resignation of Sarah Palin. For me, at least, the money quote:

While I initially gave her some benefit of the doubt, I never pretended to be a supporter, because I could not bring myself to cheer on anyone who would work so closely with McCain, but like many on the right I found something initially very likeable about her. After the first week or so, likeability became much less important once we started finding out something about her record. What came to be so annoying about her was not so much that she performed poorly in interviews, had no policy knowledge outside of issues related to oil, and had an unremarkable record as governor (except when she was jacking up windfall profits taxes to redistribute liberate the money from oil corporations), but it was that her supporters seemed intent on never acknowledging her errors, refused to hold her accountable when she made misleading statements and began making virtues out of her weaknesses. Whether or not Palin could have become a much better candidate, there was no way that things could work out well for her or the country with supporters like this.
My emphasis. When I read that sentence, I immediately flashed on any episode of "Family Feud." The host would call up one member from each of the contestant families and say something like, "Name the top things one might find in a bachelor's refrigerator." One family would win by selecting a more popular item and the survey would continue with the rest of the family members. Inevitably one of the family members would be a moron and give the most improbable answer imaginable, such as, "The neighbor's cat." Audible groans would emanate from the audience, and one would not be surprised to hear the patriarch heave a sigh or some other unvoiced example of deep scorn. But then, as always, the family would rally and cry out, "Good answer! Good answer!" Then, of course, the buzzer.

This, to me, exemplifies the Palinites. So deeply in denial are they of their hockey-mom's vapidity, that anything out of her mouth, even though it may have sounded like it was uttered at a backyard BBQ while under the influence of one too many Smirnoff Ices, is considered gospel.

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