Abject terror of the lefty fems

Columnists Gail Collins and the forever cute Maureen Dowd carry on in a longstanding New York Times tradition, made famous by Walter Duranty, of ignoring news that doesn't fit their deeply treasured fantasies.  Specifically, the two lefty fems argue that the only candidate on either presidential ticket that has ever been chief executive of anything... lacks experience. 

Both accuse John McCain of picking Alaska Governor Sarah Palin for his running mate only because she is a woman who would attract disaffected Hillary supporters. Collins prays that it won't work.

The idea that women are going to race off to vote for any candidate with the same internal plumbing is both offensive and historically wrong. When the sexes have parted company in modern elections, it’s generally been because women are more likely to be Democrats, and more concerned about protecting the social safety net. “The gender gap traditionally has been determined by party preference, not by the gender of the candidate,” said Ruth Mandel of the Eagleton Institute of Politics.

Therein lies Governor Palin's problem winning over the disaffected Collins.  Palin is not a Democrat and is not, in Collins' conjecture, "concerned about protecting the social safety net." The gender gap is a party preference thing, and Hillary is the preference among women who are Democrats.  No gender bias there?  Governor Palin will undoubtedly attract Republican women.  Might she also attract some Democrats as well?  Collins denies the possibility.

This year, Hillary Clinton took things to a whole new level. She didn’t run for president as a symbol but as the best-prepared candidate in the Democratic pack. Whether you liked her or not, she convinced the nation that women could be qualified to both run the country and be commander in chief. That was an enormous breakthrough, and Palin’s nomination feels, in comparison, like a step back.

How odd that Ms. Collins would think the selection of a sitting governor, elected in her own right while opposed by the state's Republican establishment, could be considered a step back.  Compare her rise to Hillary's, who was First Lady, and who won her New York senate seat on the strength of name recognition garnered as the wife of Bill.  For Collins name recognition wins out over accomplishment.

If she’s only on the ticket to try to get disaffected Clinton supporters to cross over, it’s a bad choice. Joe Biden may already be practicing his drop-dead line for the vice-presidential debate: “I know Hillary Clinton. Hillary Clinton is a friend of mine, and governor, you’re no Hillary Clinton.”

Won't that be memorable line -- if Biden is fool enough to try it.  And he might.  Collins was fool enough to write it, no doubt thinking, what a clever finish to her column. 

But the queen of clever is the ditsy Maureen Dowd who begins her vacuous column this way.

The guilty pleasure I miss most when I’m out slogging on the campaign trail is the chance to sprawl on the chaise and watch a vacuously spunky and generically sassy chick flick.

Dowd then proceeds slog through her own invented but tiresome chick flick in fantasy -- while no doubt stifling herself at its hilarity.  The relentlessly cutesy Down distills the governor's life down to a paragraph.

Palinistas, as they are called, love Sarah’s spunky, relentlessly quirky “Northern Exposure” story from being a Miss Alaska runner-up, and winning Miss Congeniality, to being mayor and hockey mom in Wasilla, a rural Alaskan town of 6,715, to being governor for two years to being the first woman ever to run on a national Republican ticket.

And then she asks, "Why do men only pick women as running mates when they need a Hail Mary pass? It’s a little insulting."  The vacuous Dowd seems to think John McCain is in need of a Hail Mary.  This year's historic Democratic National Convention is history.  At its conclusion Barack Obama holds a narrow 3-point lead over John McCain, according to Rasmussen.  The Republican National Convention in Minneapolis hasn't even started yet.  And here's what should be even more troubling for Democrats.

-- A year ago Democrats were planning on riding opposition to the highly unpopular war in Iraq right into the White House, but voters tell us now they trust McCain over Obama on national security issues 52% to 41%.

The time for a Hail Mary hasn't arrived, but when it does I predict it won't be the McCain campaign that heaves one.  The Obama camp will have its hands full trying to convince voters that the most vocal proponent of the wildly successful Iraq strategy known as the surge, is somehow wrong about national defense.  Here's another problem for the Obama camp.  With his entire two years in the U.S. Senate spent almost exclusively campaigning for president, Obama he's going to try to argue that Palin's two years as Governor of Alaska have not given her experience.  Fortune Magazine gives us a flavor of those two years.

Once in office, Palin took an aggressive stance toward the oil companies. Her nickname from high-school basketball, "Sarah Barracuda," was resurrected in the press. Early in her term, she shocked oil lobbyists when she was so bold as to not show up when Exxon CEO Rex Tillerson came to Juneau to meet with her. Palin, after scrapping Murkowski's deal, would not give Big Oil the terms they wanted, yet insisted that the companies still had an obligation under their lease to deliver gas to whatever pipeline Alaska built. She invited the oil companies to place open bids to build a pipeline, but they refused. A bid by TransCanada, North America's largest pipeline builder, was approved by the legislature in August.

Shoots holes in Ditsy Dowd's chick flick fantasy, doesn't it.  Let's imagine Joe Biden resurrecting Lloyd Bentsen's 15 minutes of fame by claiming that he knows Hillary Clinton and Sarah Palin is no Hillary Clinton.  As it was then, the correct response is, "Damn right."  Sarah Palin has her own set of accomplishments that stand up well when compared to anything that either Barack Obama or Joe Biden have ever accomplished.  Gail Collins and Maureen Dowd simply can't bear to look.

Comments

[David Holliday]

I have a good friend who is a Democrat and who can't see the Palin pick as anything but a losing choice. His bottom line, "Palin is out of her league." I don't agree with him. But there is no arguing with him. That Obama has no demonstrated leadership experience. That Palin is a state Governor and a demonstrated reformer. These don't register.

Listening to my friend and watching the response of "professional" Democrats, I think the Democrats belief structure is such that they can't see Palin for what she is. They have this huge blindspot that is Palin. They aren't running against her or John McCain. Palin and McCain are both stand-ins in the Democrats third attempt to defeat George W. Bush.

The Democrats have a huge emotional investment in defeating Bush. They are practically frothing at the mouth because they think they are on the verge of beating him. That Bush isn't running doesn't matter. The Democrats have turned McCain into a surrogate of Bush. McCain is the equivalent of Putin's Medvedev in their minds.

I believe, whether they are consciously aware of it, that the Democrats belief is that winning this election is equivalent to being recognized within the country that they were right these past 8 years and that the "failures" of the Republicans and Bush Administration would have been avoided if they held the office. The proof of the country's recognition will be the election of Obama, the "anti-Bush".

But Palin doesn't fit the model. She isn't fitting in as a Bush surrogate. She is threatening the realization of their vision. Anything that stands in the way of their vision will be vigorously attacked. I expect this is only the beginning of what is going to be an incredibly nasty campaign.

I hope Sarah Palin has a tremendous amount of self-confidence and fortitude. Because she is going to need it. The Democrats are going to throw anything and everything at her. The more successful she is at defeating those attacks the more desperate the future attempts will be.

[Tom Bowler]

I think the bigger problem for the Democrats is that their key issue is rapidly escaping them if it hasn't gotten away already. They swept into power in 2006 on a wave of voter disatisfaction with the war in Iraq, but since the surge has settled things down over there unhappiness with the war has begun to dissipate. The war has been won, but Democrats can take no credit for it. All of their prescriptions for it were ostensibly aimed at mitigating our "inevitable" defeat. The fact is, following the recommendations from the Democrats would have guaranteed our defeat. It was in the face of Democrats' incessant demands for troops to be pulled out that John McCain pushed for the troop surge that made victory possible. Fast forward to the Democratic convention where that chain of events left Nancy Pelosi absurdly trying to work the convention crowd into a refrain, "Barack Obama is right, and John McCain is wrong." Making that case is going to get more and more difficult for them as we get closer to November.

The campaign will get nasty, as you say, but it's McCain who will be accused of the nastiness. When he sat down with the Wall Street Journal editorial board earlier in his campaign, he was asked what surprised him most about Speaker Pelosi and Majority Leader Reid regarding their positions on Iraq, and he replied, "their lack of patriotism." This campaign is going to be a beauty.

[MediaMentions]

Here is a link to an article that I find you might be interested in.

http://www.pressdisplay.com/pressdisplay/showlink.aspx?bookmarkid=4FIHEGAFMVT1&preview=article&linkid=67856da8-cbef-4f95-94af-2a8c099ff903&pdaffid=ZVFwBG5jk4Kvl9OaBJc5
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Sincerely,
MEdiaMEntions