Sarah Palin: Feminist Ronald Reagan?

Running for Vice President of the United States: a moose-hunting, gun-toting, oil-drilling conservative feminist point guard with an attitude and a penchant for cutting pork. To top it off, she’s never appeared on Meet the Press! Could Sarah Palin be a female Ronald Reagan? The horrors.

The prospect of such blatant political unorthodoxy has liberal journalists (and some Alaskan establishment Republicans) apoplectic. They just can’t believe that their erstwhile darling, John McCain could ever do this to them.

George Lakoff (ht: Doran Williams) is a “liberal” case in point. I place the term “liberal” in quotes because Lakoff is not a real liberal. He’s a neo-liberal; he believes in pretty much everything that real liberals abhor, especially that people derive their power from government, not the other way around. He also suffers from an inadequate understanding of political history. On Sep 1, Lakoff wrote:

[Political campaigns] are always framed from the perspective of a worldview. The Obama campaign has learned this. The Republicans have long known it, and the choice of Sarah Palin as their Vice-Presidential candidate reflects their expert understanding of the political mind and political marketing. Democrats who simply belittle the Palin choice are courting disaster.

So far, so good. But then,

The McCain campaign is well aware of how Reagan . . . won — running on character: values, communication, (apparent) authenticity, trust, and identity — not issues and policies. That is how campaigns work, and symbolism is central.

Not issues and policies? Reagan won in 1980 on the issues — economy, taxes, Cold War, and stifling government regulation — because the electorate trusted him because he was so adept at telling the truth and making people feel good. Well, most people. There were exceptions. Mr. Gorbachev comes to mind. Jimmy Carter, by contrast, was adept at lying and making people feel bad. For the Republicans, it was a mismatch made in Heaven.

Anyway, back to Lakoff:

I think Obama is right when he says that America is based on people caring about each other and working together for a better future-empathy, responsibility (both personal and social), and aspiration. These lead to a concept of government based on protection (environmental, consumer, worker, health care, and retirement protection) and empowerment (through infrastructure, public education, the banking system, the stock market, and the courts). Nobody can achieve the American Dream or live an American lifestyle without protection and empowerment by the government.

Here, Obama and Lackoff want to turn America upside down. Here, in this land, since at least 1789, empowerment has run from people to government, not in the opposite direction. In important ways, so does protection in the sense that all of us have a solemn duty to protect and defend the Constitution that keeps the nation together without bloodshed, for the most part.

Government of the people, for the people, by the people moderated by due process and rule of law. Ronald Reagan knew and loved this tradition. More, he knew how to persuade his fellow Americans to love and preserve it. I sense that Sarah Palin has the same commitment and a similar capacity to communicate and persuade. We’ll know more this evening. Maybe another heavenly mismatch.