Boo fucking hoo

By Kathy G.

Rebecca Traister, whose ungoing coverage of the presidential race in Salon has been among the highlights of political journalism this year, has written a scorchingly brilliant piece that is the mother of all Sarah Palin takedowns. Traister notices a certain disturbing trend of pundits across the ideological spectrum all of a sudden writing about how "sorry" they feel for Palin. But Traister, bless her heart, is having none of it:

I guess I'm one cold dame, because while Palin provokes many unpleasant emotions in me, I just can't seem to summon pity, affection or remorse.

She continues:

When you stage a train wreck of this magnitude -- trying to pass one underqualified chick off as another highly qualified chick with the lame hope that no one will notice -- well, then, I don't feel bad for you.

When you treat women as your toys, as gullible and insensate pawns in your Big Fat Presidential Bid -- or in Palin's case, in your Big Fat Chance to Be the First Woman Vice President Thanks to All the Cracks Hillary Put in the Ceiling -- I don't feel bad for you.

When you don't take your own career and reputation seriously enough to pause before striding onto a national stage and lying about your record of opposing a Bridge to Nowhere or using your special-needs child to garner the support of Americans in need of healthcare reform you don't support, I don't feel bad for you.

When you don't have enough regard for your country or its politics to cram effectively for the test -- a test that helps determine whether or not you get to run that country and participate in its politics -- I don't feel bad for you.

[. . .]

I don't want to be played by the girl-strings anymore. Shaking our heads and wringing our hands in sympathy with Sarah Palin is a disservice to every woman who has ever been unfairly dismissed based on her gender, because this is an utterly fair dismissal, based on an utter lack of ability and readiness. 

Sing it, sister!

Really, though, you've got to read the whole thing. 

I do have this to add: in the comments thread to my anti-Palin post from earlier today, commenter Melinda argues that Palin's record is "a lot more complex" than another commenter implied, that she has "governed largely as a pragmatist," and that "the only whiff of corruption so far has been troopergate, which I regret to say is pretty much canonical small-town politico behavior and is a much bigger deal outside of Alaska than inside (business is conducted a lot differently when everybody's related to everybody else)." Melinda makes it clear that she's no Palin supporter, but nevertheless, she says she's "not enjoying the Palin trainwreck at all and wish it didn't have to happen like this."

Well, I'm sorry, but as far as the corruption business goes, "everybody else does it" is not an especially compelling defense. And perhaps it's proof positive of what a cold, vindictive bitch I am at heart, but I am thoroughly and unabashedly reveling in the spectacle of Palin's implosion.

Sarah "Rape Kit" Palin is pathologically dishonest, gob-smackingly ignorant, terrifyingly reactionary, and overall quite a nasty piece of work. Traister does a great job at enumerating the reasons why every decent American should stand up and cheer the spectacle of her political career going down in flames.

But there's one reason above all that I can't summon an ounce of sympathy for this wretched woman,  and it's this: if we lived under the kind of legal/political regime Palin has spent virtually her entire life working to bring about, and if my 11-year niece were raped and became pregnant as a result, she would  then be compelled, in Sarah Palin's America, to carry her pregnancy to term and to give birth.

The very thought of it raises the temperature of my blood to boiling point.

Forgive me if I remain resolutely dry-eyed at the Sarah Palin pity party. Because, you know what, Sarah? Fuck you very much. This country can't be rid of your sorry ass quickly enough.

Comments

[Melinda]

I really wasn't intended to defend Palin on troopergate but to explain. Things are just done differently when performed within a complex of existing relationships. I don't think it speaks well of Palin that she carried that forward into statewide office - to the contrary.

The core issue for me (or maybe rather the core meta-issue) is that I don't think that it's particularly a good idea to demonize people or turn them into distorted caricatures. I've hated what the GOP has done to Democratic candidates and I've been dismayed this year by the behavior of Democrats, who've fallen into the same patterns. All Palin is is wrong.

I'm from originally from a town about 1/10 the size of Wasilla and currently live in one (well, not *in* - we don't really have a town center) less than 1/2 the size. I went to graduate school in Hyde Park and became friendly with someone who'd grown up there. He said that he loved it that he could go down and stand for hours on 57th Street and not recognize a single person. That was a big WTF? for me and remains one. Here in the boonies there's a pretty good chance that you don't agree with your neighbors about much but they are, after all, your neighbors, and you all get along in your way. It seems to me that the urbanization of the US, and particularly the urbanization of politics, has allowed this kind of crazy polarization where because you just don't have much contact with people whose views you find repugnant it becomes easier to broaden that to finding the person repugnant, too, which I think is an intellectual process failure.

Look, there's no question that Palin's humiliation is almost entirely Palin's responsibility. But just because I don't agree with her doesn't make that humiliation fun to watch and certainly not something to celebrate.

[Low Key]

So we should hold ourselves to no higher standards of transparency than those that obtain in small rural towns?

That way lies national ruin.

[Barry]

Melinda:

"I really wasn't intended to defend Palin on troopergate but to explain. Things are just done differently when performed within a complex of existing relationships. I don't think it speaks well of Palin that she carried that forward into statewide office - to the contrary. "

'just done differently when performed in a complex of existing relationships' - what a neato defense of small town thuggery, crimes and abuse of power.

Also, that's what we've seen for the last 8 years in DC - it's not like Bush came out of Arkansas, with no family connections dating back several decades.

[amy]

Melinda, I think your point is really interesting - as i understand it, the anonymity of a large-scale society paradoxically leads us to personalize politics and demonize our opponents. I think it's exactly the kind of antagonistic politics that Obama has been campaigning against (or trying to), and for good reason - it's led to a lot of political paralysis and distraction with petty matters. I'm still outraged by what palin and mccain want to do to this country, and I do feel that principled anger has its place in politics (and also admit to sharing some of kathy's schadenfreude - or maybe even all of it), but I appreciate your point and I think it deserves some reflection.

[GGB]

Kathy G.

You are an animal!!! Way to say it like it is!!!! You need to get your voice out there. Rock on!!!!

[GGB]

OK. I gotta get back to work. Last note. I just checked your reference, i.e., read the so called "scorchingly brilliant piece." Its ok, but reads a bit too "Mary Poppins" for me.

Kathy G., your "voice" via the written word has a clarity untouched by pg-13 (RT).

Keep it comin'

[Oscar Zoalaster]

A rather uneducated, conservative, and 'bitter about women', friend of mine decided, upon hearing that she was 'anti-choice', that Sarah Palin is an unacceptable candidate for vice-president. As he put it "if she is going to tell other women what they can and can't do with their bodies, think of what she would be willing to tell me to do and not do".

It is nice to know that feminist memes are part of the consciousness of crusty bitter old rejects.

[Green Eagle]

Palin's humiliation is McCain's humiliation and the Republican party's humiliation. It's been a long time coming, and it has been earned over and over again.

Sorry, Melinda. I think it's one of the best things that has happened to this country in years, and it's got me dancing in the street.

[TomK]

Sarah Palin is one scary evangelical nutjob.

I don't understand why more people aren't talking about how utterly absurd this whole thing is. This is really beyond parody. Instead of democracy, we have a game between marketers, where if John McCain's marketers can trick enough low information voters into voting against their interests and Barack Obama's marketers can't stop them, then our country collapses.

Both must be careful not to say how dumb they have to know people actually are, or the dumb people will vote for the dumb candidate and our country will collapse. I hate it.

[Fred Fnord]

"...if we lived under the kind of legal/political regime Palin has spent virtually her entire life working to bring about, and if my 11-year niece were raped and became pregnant as a result, she would then be compelled, in Sarah Palin's America, to carry her pregnancy to term and to give birth..."

I've long thought that conservatives do not think there is as much of a difference between sex and rape as liberals do. Certainly there have been studies that show that people who believe strongly in traditional sex roles (who tend to be conservative) are much more likely than the general population to think that if a girl lets you take her out on a date and pay for everything, and then invites you back to her apartment, that this is an implied contract for sex, and that if she backs out you are justified in forcing yourself on her. (And there are studies that, depending on how you ask the question, can get between 20% and 50% of men to admit that they'd consider raping someone if they knew they wouldn't be caught. For a good little list, see: http://www.holysmoke.org/fem/fem0286.htm . Terrifying, isn't it?)

If that is the case, then this attitude is perfectly understandable and self-consistent. Of course, the premise on which they are reasoning is obviously insane, but the conclusion they come up with does logically follow the premise.

-fred

[Bugboy]

Melinda:

I spent 2 years a director of a small municipal service district on an island off the east coast of the US, where small town politics was rampant.

Ultimately, I was an early victim of the Great GOP Purge of liberal professionals from public service in 2000, and I was devastated at the time, but have since grown to realize I was better off leaving, as I was an "outsider" who "didn't know the island" and so would likely never have fit in. They had a real problem getting qualified professionals from the locals because it was such a small town, population around 2,000.

When Sarah Palin emerged onto the scene, her whole MO struck me exactly as that of the garbage I saw on this small island. Petty, personality politics, but on a state-wide level. When I fled that hell-hole, I took a job in a highly urbanized area of the state I am in, and I have never enjoyed the anonymity more. Something is seriously wrong with a representative form of government, whose representives are elected to office by so incessantly reinforcing narcissism.

So having lived in both extremes (several times in several cities in several states), plus having grown up in a Wasilla sized town in upstate NY, I don't think your argument holds water.

[werenotgonnatakeit]

Isn't it funny how it only seems to be liberals who can ever muster sympathy and pity for others? As much as I am prone to feel for other human beings, she permanently banished any empathy I would have had for her the very second she strode on that GOP stage and flipped me the bird.

Simply put I can't feel sympathy for another person who is incapable of having any for me. The sad part is that this is EXACTLY the dynamic that the Republican puppetmasters want.

[VJBinCT]

How about 'Rape Kit' Palin meets 'Rape Gurney' Lieberman for a toothsome twosome?

I am astonished by the hypocrisy of Palin riding on Hillary's coat tails with vanishingly small talent and merit and accomplishment. And I'm not a Hillary fan though I have a good deal of respect for her.

But what th' hey! They're both babes, so why should it matter. Sheesh.

[Melinda]

Werenotgonnatakeit, it's not that I feel particular sympathy for Palin but that I think the narrative is fucked up. Part of it is Olympics syndrome - much as every four years people who've never heard of a sport become overnight experts, people who'd never heard of Sarah Palin a month ago are now attempting to explain her entire career and getting much of it incorrect. For example, this morning Digby's got a post in which she suggests that Palin is a general bumbler and posits that she didn't know what she was doing when she put Murkowski's jet up for auction on eBay. To the extent that the example is incorrect, which it is, it fails to support the "bumbler" argument.

But a bigger part of it, I think, relates to a personal distaste for schadenfreude and a massive personal distaste for how politics is conducted in the US. There's a reason that hubris generally leads to tragedy, not comedy, and a reason why we tend to think that Icarus got what's coming yet we don't think it's funny and we don't revel in it.

[SFAW]

Melinda -
I grew up in a medium-sized (~50K) town near NYC. I now live in a town of ~5,000, and the politics, although sometimes frustrating, is just typical small-town stuff - no corruption. I saw worse in my previous town of 30K - but most of that was due to political and family alliances and old resentments/grudges.

But I have never seen the kind of crap Palin pulled: petty, vindictive maneuvers (Troopergate); bald-faced lying ("I said 'Thanks, but no thanks'"); abuse of power/privilege (the perqs she extracted from various merchants, etc.); and the "I got mine; you're on your own" punitive attitude (rape kit fiasco) that has been the hallmark of Rethuglicans for the last 30 years.

Pragmatist? As Inigo Montoya said, "You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means". A pragmatist evaluates the options, wants to pick the "best" choice, but realizes extenuating/external circumstances make the idealized solution impractical. The pragmatist then adjusts his/her plan accordingly. Palin? She "reformed" the system, alright - if by "reform" one means "she used what power she had to promulgate an extreme agenda, tried to get away with whatever she could, and hoped no one noticed she was playing fast-and-loose with the rules".

If she's a "pragmatist", then I'm Jeanne d'Arc. God save us from the "pragmatists"!

[anna missed]

Has everybody forgotten why Sarah pit-bull Palin was chosen in the first place? And it wasn't because of the lipstick part. It was because of the attack dog part. The problem of course is that when John McCain left the dog pound with his new toy he prided himself in her good looks looks and fearsome bark - but failed to notice she lacked any teeth. And there's nothing more hilarious, as opposed to threatening, than a barking and posturing pit -bull with no teeth. And no amount of lipstick will hide that fact.

[terry]

There are nasty big town people, and nasty small town people. I've lived in all of them, all over. You know the nasties in grade 1 - you know who to avoid for 12 years. There are Nasty people in every church and synagogue, every office, every PTA and nice people there too. It's easy - we all know who is who , and know the danger. Nasties get EVEN.

Sarah is Nasty.
Nothing to do with the size of her town.