My Feelings About Sarah Palin's Debate Performance

I have been doing it so long I might as well say I've been doing it forever; it's a very disagreeable habit. Every time I sit in church -- watching how people worship, and listening to prayers and sermons -- I imagine what some outsider who has dropped in for a visit might be thinking -- some gigantesque intellectual, a skeptical professor perhaps -- as he or she observes what is done and said in the presence and name of an "awesome God." It is interesting how I often I find myself squirming when I yield myself to such fantasies. Of course, I recognize nearly any practice, system, custom, ritual or ceremony can appear impenetrable to the uninitiated eye; even an opera, play or symphony can be esoterica to those untrained in the finer arts. Nevertheless, whenever I find myself in church playing the role of the outsider, I discover that I am often utterly uncomfortable. It all seems so strange. No. It all seems so weird, even insane.

OK. Perhaps I've gone too far. I admit this has not happened to me in all churches, nor has it happened to me in any one church all the time. But I have indeed witnessed what is clearly insanity, especially in those lower-type churches, ones given to informalism; you know, those pentecostal churches that have open mic Sundays. I tell you, when I have sat in services where there is virtually no order, authority or clearly defined leader, I am doing all I can not to call 911.

Last night I had the same sort of feeling -- that feeling of identifying with someone else in a psychological act of transpositionalism (invented term) -- when I was watching the debate. Like a fool, perhaps, I was thinking about what my more liberal friends were thinking and feeling when they watched and heard Sarah Palin. Indeed, I found that if I projected some of my own types of biases onto the motives of my friends, or if I actually absorbed into myself the sort of biases they articulated beforehand, I found, as you can expect, that I was terribly uncomfortable. Sarah Palin looked, at least at times and even if for but the briefest moments, like some sort of automaton. She was a bit like a kind of sexy android from Heavy Metal or Blade Runner. OK. Perhaps that says too much, but it did appear, at times, not so much that she was reading from a teleprompter but that she had become one.

Forgive me. I like Sarah Palin. I like her in many ways because she comes from my sort of stock. I know that. I get it. I've seen babes with dirt under their fingernails; I've dated one or two: Sarah Palin is not the sort of woman a man would have ever had to hold the branches for while bushwhacking in the Great North Woods. In fact, she wouldn't need the branches held because she would be leading the way. Sarah Palin is clearly, at least to some, a BMW -- a beautiful mountain woman.

And I also like Sarah Palin in a sort of inversion of the way my father hated the New York Yankees, who always, or so he spat, won: she's the underdog challenging the well-heeled and conceited pinstripes in the Beltway. I am rooting for the smaller payroll, the roster of the Lesser Knowns.

But there were times when she made me leave my seat. Not because she was sabotaging something. She wasn't. Nor was she imploding or melting down. But what she was doing was missing opportunities to turn Joe Biden's words around on him. Because she was constantly looking at her notes when Joe Biden was speaking (I recognize that's OK for her to do), she would miss things he said that she could have rebutted without any notes. One example:

When Sen. Biden (apparently wrongly) insisted that John McCain also "voted against funding our troops in Iraq," he added that Sen. McCain did so because there was a timeline provision for troop withdrawal added to the bill. Of course, all sharp debate coaches were probably screaming at the telly, as Mr. Biden had just informed the American people that John McCain had a different but apparently rational reason for rejecting the bill. A shrewder debater would not have given Sarah Palin or the viewers any clues about Sen. McCain's motives. Sen. Biden should have just let it all hang in the obscurity of implication: McCain rejected the bill because he does not care for our troops.

Hurray, the door was wide open, and yet Sarah Palin somehow did not walk through it. And not a more courteous gesture could the gentlemanly Biden make! Here was an opportunity for Gov. Palin to think on her feet: 'Jeez, Joe. Don't you think a timeline is not in the best interests of both our troops and our objectives? Timelines are a bit like an invitation to capitulation via micromanagement of war, for it essentially says to our enemy, "You can stop fighting us now and return to your vicious objectives after we leave on this particular date." No wonder John McCain voted against it. Oh, and by the way, since I am not an archivist in the US Senate, I can't immediately refute your claims. Are you willing to provide our campaign with the documents that prove Sen. McCain -- and Barack Obama -- did what you are asserting?'

And when Senator Biden said this about his campaign's plans for Afghanistan, Sarah Palin missed a real chance to score major points:

"With Afghanistan, facts matter, Gwen.

The fact is that our commanding general in Afghanistan said today that a surge -- the surge principles used in Iraq will not -- well, let me say this again now -- our commanding general in Afghanistan said the surge principle in Iraq will not work in Afghanistan, not Joe Biden, our commanding general in Afghanistan.

He said we need more troops. We need government-building. We need to spend more money on the infrastructure in Afghanistan." [emphasis added]

Had Gov. Palin been willing to take a risk now and again and directly challenge Joe Biden's words -- not words two or three years old but those spoken right then -- she might have said this, though prefaced with a laugh:

"That's rather funny, Joe. I wonder if you see the irony. I mentioned using the principles of the surge in Afghanistan. You say they won't work, and then you not only call for a key ingredient to those principles -- 'more troops' -- you spell out pretty much key aspects of the Bush Doctrine: Building governments, investing in infrastructure. John McCain and I very much agree with our military advisers in this key area. I am glad to hear that Barack Obama and Joe Biden agree with us and what John McCain has been working towards since the beginning of the War on Terror: peaceful democracies in the Middle East and its surrounding regions."

These are but two of the several if not many opportunities missed by Sarah Palin. And I have to say that, without even identifying with my liberal friends, these missed opportunities irked me. But I recognize that these were not fatal misses; but had they been properly exploited, they may have proven fatal to Barack Obama's campaign.

I can understand, really, why Sarah Palin might make my liberal friends squirm. There were times that I found her "Aw, shucks" and "Doggone it" affects a little too premeditated: at times her attempts to appeal to "Joe Six-Pack" (Oiks!) seemed far too much like political artifice. The down-to-earth stuff was just a bit too canned for me, too designed. I know that a bunch of midwestern- and western-types in the media defended Gov. Palin's diction, pronunciation and cadence as all very familiar and real. Maybe I am tone deaf to Gov. Palin; maybe this is my east coast snobbery rearing its head. But the fact is I don't mind casual speech; I engage in it all the time. It just seemed that there were moments her idioms were too forced to be authentic.

OK. Where do I stand in all of this? Well, I should think my last post was clear. She won the debate because Joe Biden was not able to separate himself from her by the leagues and leagues his vast experience should have provided him. As I said, he was merely adequate, which is equal to failure. She came across as calm and confident; and she seemed bright in a way that was not simply cognitive: she seemed to actually sort of radiate. There is a light about her; well, perhaps not so much a light as an aura, a lambent gleam, a shimmer. And she looks unflappable; she was not daunted at any point.

Lastly, she won because of one thing, one very important thing: No one in this entire election season has been under as much pressure -- not by a long shot -- as Gov. Palin. Her every pore and corpuscle, every preposition and conjunction, have been scrutinized in a very compressed time: she comes in with virtually no national experience, and yet she did not waver, nor did she embarrass, nor did she fail. Her family has been abused, mocked and derided. Her parenting has been doubted, questioned, and dismissed. Her background has been explored and found wanting. And yet, without so much as a sigh, when she finished debating, she waved and smiled at America, walked to the center of the stage, thanked Joe Biden, and then took her little baby in her arms -- a seamless transition from one role to another.

She is impressive, I'll say that.

Peace.

©2008. All Rights Reserved.

Emerging From The Dark, Blinking: The Purpose-Driven Blog

A cave. That's what I've been living in for weeks now. How else to explain my complete surprise at seeing John McCain and Barack Obama being interviewed last night on CNN and FoxNews, you know, BIG CABLE, by an evangelical pastor, I mean, "mega-pastor?"

All I've read of pastor Rick Warren's book, The Purpose-Driven Church, is the title. I've heard him speak for all of two minutes on the telly. I don't know a thing about him other than that he is the founder of what seemed to me a new evangelical fad. His book, and the para-church programs born of it, struck me -- and I admit I'm being superficial here -- as more of the same kitsch and gimmickry to which evangelicalism seems particularly prone. When I think of Rick Warren, I unfairly think of the Prayer of Jabez, bobble-head Jesus dolls and WWJD shoe laces. And I am always prone to cynical mutterings, like, "What about the Jesus-driven Church?" or the more philosophical "What about the Church-driven Church?" or, in light of certain prayer techniques, "What about the Prayer of our Lord?" But such questions get you nowhere; and they will certainly never get you the sort of broader cultural approval one can get standing between two presidential candidates.

I have not yet watched the "debate" or interview from Saddleback Church. I recorded it for later digestion; it's comfortably sealed in digital Tupperware just waiting for me to plunge in and get my fill. Of course, not having yet watched it, I will hold my tongue on its merits.

But last night, as I flipped over the news channels carrying the debate, I could not help ask the rather profane question, "Who the hell is Rick Warren?" Now don't get me wrong; this is more confession than polemic, so please know that I don't think the question a particularly thoughtful, moral or proper one. I would rather ask, if I was not prone to profanation, how it is that Rick Warren has climbed such heights that he is able to play James Lipton or Sir David Frost to two of the nation's most important men, historically and politically speaking. How does this happen? Yes, yes. I know that Mr. Warren's story is quite amazing; it is inspiring to learn of his many achievements and great generosity: his Wikipedia entry informs us that he "reverse tithes" at his church: due to the overwhelming success of his book, Mr. Warren has returned all of his many years' salary and gives 90 percent of his earnings to his church, leaving himself 10 percent on which to live. That is a decent and inspiring thing to do (and that is one fine book).

Part of me, the really cynical, jaded, fallen, and ineluctably corrupted part of me, believes that Mr. Warren was just using his platform to introduce his preferred candidate, Barack Obama, to a broader evangelical audience. Cover for this motive, of course, was to involve Mr. McCain. Besides, having both men appear gives the event the necessary gravitas to garner broad media attention. (One telling irony is that Charles Krauthammer said after the event that it was perhaps the best sort of political debate he had ever seen; if it is, what does that say about BIG MEDIA, who usually host these big-ticket political events?) But, I admit, this is me only guessing.

I admit my cynicism is utterly unjustified, though I know two things: there is a push on in the Obama campaign to truly secure the evangelical vote (and he appears to have it, according to polls), and Mr. Obama has appeared at a forum at Mr. Warren's church before -- sans McCain -- all to great applause and approval (and no small controversy).

But enough. I must simply stop, wait, listen, learn. Besides. I am late for church.

Peace.

©Bill Gnade 2008/Contratimes. All Rights Reserved.

The Audacity Of Fear: Playing Anxiety Politics

If one were inclined to rewrite holy writ for political advantage, perhaps the first thing one might pen is “Be anxious for everything.” No doubt this revision will offend certain Christians comforted by St. Paul’s exhortation to “be anxious for nothing,” but such Christians, generally, do not run for President of the United States. In fact, such a candidacy would be impossible: it simply is not possible to win votes without exploiting anxiety and fear. “Trust in God” will impress few voters as a campaign slogan, but “Fear Everything” has a chance at winning the White House.

Readers may scoff; I invite them to jeer and sneer. But the facts are evident: electoral politics is about fear – and nothing but fear. Yes, we all know the “playing the politics of fear” canard so well it has become a mere cliché, appropriate to the bumper sticker-set rather than the more reflective wing of the body politic. Ironically, nowhere is that cliché more popular than in Democratic Party condemnations of all things Republican, and – more specifically – all things Bush. Bush scared Americans into war, into torturing and incarcerating a quasi-mythic threat; into Gitmo and surveillance and civil rights erosions, solely because he was so effective at selling fear. The irony is in the telling fact that Democrats, if they do anything, at least exploit the fear of fear. And yet they do far more than that.

In Tuesday night’s Democratic debate in Nevada telecast on MSNBC (see YouTube clip here [00:25 min.]), Barack Obama perfectly executed the Democratic fear play:

“There is no doubt we’ve been dominated by a politics of fear since 9/11… But I have to say that when Sen. Clinton uses the specter of a terrorist attack … during a campaign, I think that it is part and parcel with what we have seen, the use of the fear of terrorism in scoring political points, and I think that’s a mistake. Now, I don’t want to perpetuate that. I think that’s part of why we ended up going into Iraq and made a big strategic error that has made us less safe. Resources that could have been spent on homeland security have been spent in Baghdad. Resources that could have been spent hunting down bin Laden, have been diverted to Iraq, and that’s what happens when your judgment is clouded, and what I intend to do as President of the United States is to be honest and straightforward with the American people about how I am going to implement all the 9/11 Commission Report findings, make sure that we are hunting down bin Laden, getting out of Iraq so we can re-focus our attention on building the networks and alliances that are required to reduce terrorism around the world. That’s going to be my priority and that’s part of the reason I am running for President of the United States.” [Emphasis added]

That Mr. Obama’s contradiction – I will not perpetuate fear but we are less safe than ever -- will be overlooked by his charmed supporters is unarguable; that his position is nearly identical with everyone else in his party is equally unassailable. His entire statement could be reasonably construed as a reformation – at least in spirit – of the “Bush lied, people died” mantra.

But I am not here to quibble about the genesis of the war, especially with those who find the roots of war in Genesis. My complaint is that Mr. Obama and his party are also peddling fear; Mr. Obama – and Mrs. Clinton and Mr. Edwards – are fear-mongers. “We are less safe” is hardly the only dire warning Democrats voice. There is a whole litany of warnings issued by Democrats at every turn. And hardly a soul challenges those party-faithful who serve as prophets of doom. Below is a short list of examples (not direct quotes) that capture the essence of Democratic fear-baiting.

On economics:

“We are in recession. People are insecure.”

“The gap between rich and poor is growing.”

“There have never been so many foreclosures.”

"We must rebuild the middle class."

On international relations:

“America’s reputation in the world has never been so tarnished.”

“We must restore our image in the sight of the Europeans.”

“Neo-conservatives have pushed America into colonial expansionism.”

On domestic issues:

“Republicans want to rob women of the right to choose, and due access to health care.”

“Republicans don’t care about those of you without proper health care. We need universal care now.”

“The Republican Party has no qualms denying to all -- regardless of gender identity -- the right to marry. ”

On energy:

“We MUST free ourselves of our dependence on foreign oil.”

“The profits of BIG OIL are unfair!”

“We must work to end global warming today, before it is too late!”

On the war:

“The war on terror is a failure.”

“Iraq was a mistake.”

“We must reallocate our resources and redeploy our troops so we can capture Osama bin Laden. He’s still out there!”

On EVERYTHING:

“Republicans are playing the fear card!”

Of course, I admit that Republicans do play the fear card; I also admit that I am not really singling out Mr. Obama. All candidates exploit fear. Candidates even issue warnings about other candidates. But Mr. Obama himself has opened the door to my criticism largely for his sophistry quoted above. Even the title of his book, The Audacity of Hope, is rooted in fear: we are doomed without audacious hope in the face of our problems. (Is he the Deliverer we MUST have to lead us out of our many difficulties?)

As I said, there is irony to be found when Democrats refer to right-wing fear-mongering. I don’t know if the irony is in that they don’t know they themselves are also peddling fear; perhaps they do. But if they do, there is something really disconcerting about it all.

Peace.

©Bill Gnade 2008/Contratimes. All Rights Reserved.