I still find it funny that people find the need to make up derogatory terms to call the tea party movement and also find the need to put down Sarah Palin at every turn.
Victimhood & appeal to emotion, thats Palins MO. How typical of todays 21st century Republicans. As long as the right trot her out to do these public appearences, she is fair game, get over it. After all this woman is the future of the Tea Baggers and the Rebublican party, correct? It looks like 600 tea baggers paid roughly $350 to $500 to listen to helf speak!?!. I think it's all well and good to say that we all use notes when we speak. On the other hand, if I asked you, "On what three topics you would expect to hear mindless talking points from Sarah Palin?" wouldn't you predict something like taxes, budget and energy? If you thought really "appeal to emotion" pablum, you'd probably predict something like "lift American spirits."
It's also funny that these seem to match the question she was asked by the moderator. "What three things do you think need to be done when we have control of the house and senate?" So, it appears to be a set-up, but she seems to have needed help with what she was prepared to say. Now she is wearing the Isreali lapel pin along with the American one, and is now advocating bombing Iran. All this.."fire and brimestone/rapture appeals to emotion"., more of the media creation. Palin is and will become a bigger media creation as long as these groups and Faux news give her a pulpit. She is a byproduct of the reality show, bubble boy infotainment industry, "appeal to emotion".
I wonder how many appeals to emotion about how the left/liberals and some conservitives are mean to Palin coming from these defenders of goodwill would actually vote for her or think she is what is best for the Republican party and moving a diverse country forward. Almost all rational conservitives and Republicans I know cant wait for the infotainment industry to suck her up with cash so she has no asperations what so ever of running for office, or this portion of the populace to stop buying this act, so these elitists in the infotainment industry like Palin/Limbaugh/Olberman etc. stop padding their pockets, so we can get back to restoring the Republican party with rational no nonsense politicians. I, as was many of my Republican freinds were happy to see a rational, on nonsense somewhat moderate Republican win in Mass.
About Palins intelligence, She is FAR from "stupid". But she plays "ordiniary" for the cameras. The less intelligence you have, the more likely you are to view intelligence as some sort of pretentious, book-ish trait, rather than a general trait that people can use to solve problems. People who really are smart (in the sense that their brains work quickly, they have good memory, and so forth) aren't considered by those much less intelligent or ordinary than them to have anything special.
Why is this? Because nobody can really imagine what it's like to be much smarter than they are. They can try to imagine, but they can't really do it. I could try to imagine what it is like to have the mind of Terence Tao, but it's a fruitless endeavor. The less educated or ordinary people who admire Palin think that they don't need a leader who is really that smart. They just need a leader who "gets it". "Getting it" is "truthiness" in verb form: the knowledge that a certain view of life is just right, and that's that, end of story.
Palin, not merely despite but also because she does not seem very smart, projects the "rightness" of certain fundamental conservative views. She's just a Christian mother who is against abortion and doesn't know too much "bout histery". Some might call my characterization unegalitarian, but sometimes these views fits. Palins hardcore appeals to emotion supporters are the kind of people who say "book smarts aren't what matter, it's people smarts that matter.
These people like Palin because they know she won't say the truth. You aren't 'gonna' hear her say that tax cuts have helped cause the deficit, or...the Democrats are just as committed to fighting terrorism as the Republican, tax rates are lower now than they were under Reagan, chances are pretty good that estate taxes aren't going to apply to you, etc. She's like McDonalds. The food might not be that good, but you know what you are going to get.
To them, people smarter than Palin aren't reliable. They might change their minds in the presence of facts or changing conditions. Imagine what would happen if a conservative like Palin said something like: "You know, I don't like high taxes, but in addition to cutting spending we need to raise taxes to pay down the deficit. Maybe we can lower them again once we have dug ourselves out of our present hole".
I don't think she's an idiot, but she is a ordinary citizen with no special gifts other than beauty. She comes off stupid in the arena of national politics, because nearly everyone else, of every political stripe, has so much more knowledge and insight at their command. They can inspire confidence not by demonstrating their "next-door ordinariness", but by their ability to address complex issues in ways that do more than "appeal to just emotions". William Bennett is an example of a social conservative whom I respect, because he does this. I don't agree with him most of the time, but I will listen to him.
Sarah is a barometer, helping determine who can be taken seriously and who cannot. It's been that way since she was nominated. Whenever she ups the ante by, say, quitting her job as Governor or saying something stupid or "emotional", she is tuning the instrument. A few people snap out of it each time, and the un-serious become more clearly visible. Nonetheless, it still seems like roughly half the country falls for it.
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