Palin, Reagan And Thatcher

Before people think I am saying Sarah Palin is everything Reagan was, I'll clarify - the Left perceives her to be a Reagan-type. Whether she eventually proves herself to be Thatcher-esque, shall we say, is another matter. And it's fair to say she has something to prove if she's entertaining running Nationally. I discussed the issue of the Palin attacks two days ago.

If you think the Reagan, Thatcher stuff is unhinged, I'd suggest that too many of the pups out here today weren't around when they tried to destroy Reagan - long before he was elected POTUS. He was a light-weight, stupid, a hick, superficial, dumb, etc.... The attacks are all the same. Somehow, I think they spring from a certain cynicism that passes for hip these days.

I see Ace and VanDerLeun are discussing Palin today. And Conservatives4Palin is going to war with Hot Air over Palin. That's too bad but it isn't surprising given certain trends. I've lost patience with folks aligned with the Right who don't want to at least give Palin a chance. But as I think they're doing it for either silly, or in some cases possibly even selfish political reasons, I'm not going there just now. There's a larger problem here for Republicans and Conservatives.

If anything like a genuine Conservatism via a Palin, or someone else, is going to make a come back, a number of Republicans are going to have to lose their cynicism. More than anything else, that's what Reagan fought against to re-awaken a Center-Right American spirit with his so-called revolution. He gave first Republicans and then most of America something - many things, actually, to believe in, again.

Today, out of power, without a lot of good leadership, it's easy to understand why some Conservatives may be finding it hard to believe in anything. Though I suspect that number is small. It's the soft-Right more than anyone else which is suffering from that the most. Solid Conservatives, firm in their beliefs and principles, have enough to believe in to see them through.

I'm not going to predict where things will be in two or four years. And maybe the soft-Right in America has to get hammered on a little more before they find themselves down enough to be willing to believe in something, again. But whatever it might take, more Americans are going to have to shrug off their funk and drop some of their cynicism if there's to be a resurgence of a serious Conservatism in government in the years directly ahead.

Comments

[southdakotaboy]

My sister-in-law is a die hard lefty and she goes absolutely nuts at the mere mention of Palin.
Their fear and hatred of this women is beyond reason. It defies logic or reasoned arguement.
If nothing else the right can use Palin as an attack dog to set them into foaming at the mouth frenzies.

[Just Asking]

Again I'm not being snarky, I just don't understand. The hate for Palin among the Republican Intelligentisia is stranger still. Why are they terrified of her? And it is bug-eyed and unreasoning terror, it seems. It can't all be cultural, can it?

[Dan Riehl]

"It can't all be cultural, can it?"

Not entirely. There are people who see her as a potential threat to their own political aspirations. They have friends and even paid consultants in the blogosphere. So an opinion may not always be what it seems.

It other cases I think it's just plain cynicism and an instinct to diminish anything that sounds old fashioned, too good to be true, etc. I don't think it's any one thing and can't really speak directly to another individuals own motivations. Some don't like the God stuff, perhaps. Though Palin isn't really an ideologue in that area based upon her life and record.

She has her views, her faith, but doesn't seem to want to impose them on any one. But then, maybe some folks just don't want her to have them at all.

Whatever the case, assuming she wants a national career, she's bigger than most of her critics, especially on the blogs - so I'm not sure how substantial all the criticism is. I know she has at least some powerful friends out there across a rather wide front.

[Just Asking]

Friends and paid consultants in the blogoshpere are fine by me, but shouldn't those sort of folk admit their connections before launching into rants? Isn't that something we constantly pound journalists for?

[Terry Gain]

"The hate for Palin among the Republican Intelligentisia is stranger still. Why are they terrified of her?"

They (Parker, Frum etc)believe she lacks the intellectual heft to be POTUS. Curiously they don't have the same concerns about Obama's intelligence - not to mention his many other glaring defects which make him not merely unfit but a disaster of historic proportions. All of which calls into question their intelligence.

[unseen]

But whatever it might take, more Americans are going to have to shrug off their funk and drop some of their cynicism if there's to be a resurgence of a serious Conservatism in government in the years directly ahead.

The problem is not the people. the problem is are elected leaders who use all the right poll tested words when running for office and then do whatever the hell they want to when they get it. Th problem is tha fact that 90%+ of congress gets relected because they have usurped our rights to free and fair elections thru gerrymandering. The problem is not the people. And this also answers the question on why they hate Palin. she is truely not beholden to anyone at the moment.

I'm sure if she runs she will have to pay off favors but at the moment she owes no one nothing. She also truely comes from the people. She grew up middle class on the lower side of that middle class. She worked her way up. She is the personification of individualism whereas Obama is the personification of collectitism. The urge in america for freedom is very strong and if people are given a choice they usally choose freedom. the problem is that the deck is stacked against them by gov and the elites and the people figure if we are not going to have a fair playing feild they will get what they can. Think of it as the prisioner's gambit

[LOL]

i do hope she runs in 2012. it will, at the very least, prove to many that she is not only despised by people on the left.

[bansharia]

I have no time for AP at all.
MM finds him a useful idiot or condones the guy/gal ( never bothered to find out ) I do not. Ed has well thought out reasoned posts for most part agree or not with what he says he is an honest guy. AP on the otherhand no idea what his/her schtick is the hotair blog turns into kidtime when AP's time arrives,
obligatory this obligatory that. Is blogging such a chore you just post because
you have to AP?
bot line is it is MM's name behind the blog the longer she allows Ap to be 50% of it says something about her, whatever that shall be....

[Anon]

I really can't comprehend why Sarah Palin would ever be mentioned in the same breath as Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan. Yes, the media has treated her shamefully and she sends liberals into an inexplicable rage...but, come on. She's governor of Alaska and she did NOT acquit herself very well as a VP candidate. I put most of the blame for that on the incompetant McCain team that seemed not to trust her or know what to do with her and then let her take the blame for their own failings.

But, come on people. Yes, she's charismatic. Yes, she's a lot smarter than the media makes her out to be.

However, she is going to have a very hard time getting around the media caracature of her...the way Palin is portrayed is nothing close to the way Reagan was portrayed, the media purposefully destroyed this woman. Plus, there is the continuing baggage that her personal life carries, which shows no sign of abaiting...

If Sarah Palin can find a way to reconnect with the American people and go AROUND the media, then she indeed will be a force to be reckoned with...but I don't believe she can do that without a massive, massive pile of money for advertising and even then it might not work. I know many McCain voters who still bought into the idea that she was too stupid to know Africa wasn't a country. That's a big hurdle that Reagan and Thatcher never had.

[narciso]

First of all, find yourself an actual name, second get a clue, most McCain voters voted for her, he was just incidentally on the ticket, As from FrumBuckBrooks and co, they can't admit they made a mistake in judgements, and can't get off that bus.

I agree that there are similarities in the vitriol directed, at her, as with Thatcher and Reagan, put it's at a higher rate and much more personal, they've read the history and are trying to stop her before she reaches critical mass.

[Peg C.]

I disagree with those who say Palin was discredited last year and doesn't stand a chance. By any measure whatsoever she is more accomplished, better spoken, more admirable and inspiring in almost every respect than the fraud in the WH now. The MSM needs to be subverted, because they will destroy ANY Republican whom they perceive to have a chance with the conservative base, so we have to get over and past that now. They are already working on the destruction of Bobby Jindal. Our problem actually is not the statists per se but the soft right, as Dan has so aptly named them. These are country club Republicans who look down their superior noses at the rest of us. They are buffoons. David Brooks and Peggy Noonan are precious, smug twits. Mark Levin has annihilated them and justifiably so. We need to work to render them useless and meaningless as we re-awaken our conservative inspiration and work to lose our cynicism (which has infected every one of us to a certain extent).

Conservatives need to use any and all means of online and viral communication to help neuter the Drive-Bys' aggressive lies and manipulations. And we need to understand that we did not lose because Palin was on the ballot, but because:

1. half of the country is unthinking, incurious ignoramouses who believe the MSM's crimes of omission and comission;
2. we had a simply horrendous candidate for president that too many Republicans could not bring themselves to vote for;
3. we had an outgoing president who betrayed conservatives and rendered insane the rest of the country, and
4. we have a media that was totally in the tank for the fraud in the WH to the point where they hid all the truths about him from the public while spending most of their time printing and spouting and spreading scurrilous and repugnant lies about our candidates.

It's going to be very hard to double-down but that is what we need to do, while finding our inspiration. It's a tall order but we have to do it.

[Gary Ogletree]

As the corruption and incompetence grows in the Obama camp, and as RHINOs continue to vote for the Fool in Chief's programs, Sarah Palin just looks better and better. We have to start in the 2010 primaries to block the corrupt and incompetent among Repub aspirants to Congress and challenge every RHINO. Palin has a record to stand on that inspires. She's also a natural campaigner. And this time, should she run, there will be no McCain albatross pulling her down. She can slice and dice the Fool and smile all the way. Something to look forward to.