Politico Defends Palin And Co-author Lynn Vincent

I sure hope Ben Smith doesn't lose his job over this one. ha! Actually, Ben has seemed to be a decent guy and straight shooter as far as the limited extent to which I've dealt with him behind the scenes. Good to see him step up here. He even gave Stacy McCain a link in an update to his piece at link above.

Blumenthal writes that the collaboration offers "the clearest window into her far-right politics." But -- having done my own profile of Vincent using many of the same data points a couple of months ago -- this seems both off target and missing something pretty basic about the version of Evangelical conservatism to which both Vincent and Palin belong.

The pastor of the San Diego megachurch Vincent attends (with Carrie Prejean, natch) is black. She's also spent most of the last few years on a pair of inspirational books about, basically, racial reconciliation in the friendship between a rich white art dealer and a homeless black drifter, the first of them a Times bestseller. More broadly, she hails from a (large) stream of Evangelicalism that puts racial reconciliation very high on the agenda.

Vincent is -- like Palin -- well to the right, as Blumenthal notes, on abortion; but the race card (in both cases) seems out of place.

Comments

[Al in St. Lou]

Well, some that lean left still have some integrity.