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Sarah Palin Will Never Be President -- Trust Me
The small smear of red on the otherwise blue electoral map looks more like a minor bloodstain on a dirty Band-Aid than anything resembling a national political party. Who voted for McCain/Palin in bigger numbers than they even voted for Bush/Cheney? Only one shrinking group: uneducated white folks in the deep south and a few folks in Appalachia. Take away the white no-college-backwoods-and/or-southern McCain/Palin vote and the Republicans would have been approaching single digit electoral college oblivion.
Sarah Palin will never hold national office nor will any Republican at the presidential level for a long time to come. Why? Because America has uneducated jerks in it but is not a nation of uneducated jerks. The Republicans are done, hoisted on the petard of their own "southern strategy."
The Republican Party is only a step away from becoming the fringe of the fringe, identified more with cross-burning weirdoes wearing hoods, folks like the Alaska secessionist party, all those gun owners stocking up on assault weapons before the "Socialist/United Nations/Obama/Muslim" conspiracy comes to fruition, than with anything remotely like a serious national political force.
The Republican Party--and I speak as a former lifelong Republican who, up through the 2000 primary campaign supported John McCain and even worked for him by arguing his case on various conservative and religious radio stations--is now the toy of the Rush Limbaugh windbags. These folks include outright crazies (such as Sarah Palin's Assemblies of God pals who are waiting for Spaceship Jesus to rescue them and/or rooting out "witches" from their midst), white racists and a few not-very-bright attention seekers, including Ann Coulter, Sean Hannity etc.
Read their blogs! Listen to their talk radio! You'll be in the twilight zone of front page tabloid fantasy on a par with Bat Boy Attacks! headlines. Bill Buckley roll over.
The Religious Right, the racists, the anti-gay hate-mongers are now not only marginalized but thoroughly out of step with even members of their own former constituency. For instance the Gordon College student newspaper (Gordon is an influential Evangelical College north of Boston) endorsed Obama this year. Many young evangelicals voted for the Democrats. James Dobson, Fox News, Limbaugh et al. were utterly powerless to do more than stir up hate. They are losing the next generation of their "base."
Meanwhile many former Republicans--like me--ran to Obama as fast as our legs could carry us and away from our willfully "we're not an elite" moronic former party. Republican commentators such as David Brooks and George Will mourned the loss of the Republican center. Others noted the Republicans have become anti-intellectual. "Anti-intellectual?" They wish! How about simply anti-literate?
Meanwhile the fringe of the fringe is holding meetings where they'll talk to themselves and look at the "facts" of their alternative universe in order to figure out "what went wrong." These are the same "leaders" (like William Kristal) who think Sarah Palin has a big political future!
Sarah Palin will never be president because the right wing of the Republican Party has perfected the art of believing their own bullshit, starting with the idea that Palin has a future. Palin and her fans don't know it yet, but having reduced itself to a grim angry joke, the Republican Party has also divorced itself from American politics and, along with that dirty used Band-Aid, is destined for the garbage can.
What's the best defense against the rube/Palin voters derailing the Republican Party forever? If the statistics of who voted for whom are correct, the education of white people in the deep South and their economic empowerment is the best answer. Maybe it will take a black Democratic president to figure out some affirmative action program that can get our southern born-again white underclass into colleges and thereby save the Republican party.
Frank Schaeffer is the author of CRAZY FOR GOD-How I Grew Up As One Of The Elect, Helped Found The Religious Right, And Lived To Take All (Or Almost All) Of It Back. Now in paperback
Follow Frank Schaeffer on Twitter: www.twitter.com/frank_schaeffer
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Some Republicans are looking at the success of unfortunate gay-marriage ban referendums and the buzz around Sarah Palin and thinking this is the future of their party. Social issues are then end of the Republican party. Americans don't want government officials to tell them how to make moral decisions, even if they agree with them. They didn't need Republican leadership to pass the ill-advised referenda - they used church leadership for that. Religious conservatives were used by Bush and may not even believe a whole party organized around social issues anyway. It seems a little like opportunism.
In four years, the U.S. economy may not be recovered and the Dems could be experiencing some backlash. The best thing about a Sarah Palin candidacy is that it means that it is our best shot at giving Obama a second term extension and it could serve the G.O.P. by helping to get this social issues thing out it's system. If Palin is tromped by an economically beleagured Dem, maybe Republicans will see the light and go back to pragmatic, limited government and fiscal conservativism - their standard in the 60s.
You like more Government why aren't you living in Russia?
I like the way you talk Mr. Schaeffer.
18 - 29 year old voters are decidedly not interested in Palin's agenda. Excellent article.
As long as Republicans believe in Joe the PLumber, they're doomed. Once they learn how to get to Sam Wurzlebacher, they'll be back in the game. Fewer and fewer Sams are going to pretend they're Joes in order to fight for the rights of the rich.
I couldn't agree more. Never has there ever been a more out of touch group of people!
Unfortunately, the article is all too true. I might have voted for McCain if he had picked Tom Ridge or Joe Lieberman as his running mate. But Sarah Palin scared me away, and I voted for Obama. Palin in particular is a mistake that no major party should ever make again; I can't think of a worse VP candidate in modern American history.
You can't think of a worse VP candidate in modern American history???
That's because there NEVER was a worse candidate in modern American history! She was a horrible bad joke that McCain wanted to play on us. Fortunately and thankfully, the American people saw right through it.
"The American people saw right through it"? Nah, not really. 47% of the popular vote went to McCain. That's a scary figure.
Sarah Palin will never be president because if she runs in 2012, whoever runs against her in the primary will not hesitate to eviscerate her. If you're running for president, you can't just duck out on media interviews either. No more being babysat. Maybe she's an adequate governor, spreading the wealth up there in Alaska, but she's not President material.
the funny part of the article was his encouragement to listen to Coulter and Hannity on radio, and read their blogs. Hilarious! I'd rather eat my own vomit. I already knew all they stand for is hate, hate, hate.
That's true. If the Republican Party is known for anything it's as a political institution that eats its own--without hesitaton or reservation. If Palin is around in '12 and dips her toes into the water, the sharks will be there to make Sarah Stew out of her.
she has to get through the primaries to get to the presidency.
She'll never make it.
She was handled with kid gloves and only now complains that the media didn't bother to correct her record as mayor and governor. Well why didn't she have a press conference and correct it herself?!? After watching Palin during the GE, I think we all know the answer to that question! But the truth is the MSM didn't dig as far into her record as some blogs did. And the Obama camp was wise to simply ignore her. However, if she had been the frontrunner, they would have had enough material to stuff in the belly of her plane, with or without wardrobe. If somehow she manages to win the 2012 nomination, I am sure that the 55% of Americans who loathed/feared Palin will be sure to make it out to the polls to prevent her from ever rearing her head in DC. It pains me to be so critical and to have such a visceral, fist-shaking reaction to her, but she has come to represent to me much of what I disagree with in American politics - this divide and conquer mentality, hyper-nationalism and partisanship, guilt by association and character assassination, anti-intellectualism, disregard for the Constitution, and stepping over the line of separation between church and state.... I could go on and on. I wish Palin and Alaska well, but I would like to see smart and competent Democrats like Obama in the White House for many years to come.
Now if we can just get THE REPUBLICAN PARTY OUT OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH in many parishes, we might just have a chance.
And I am a Catholic Pro life Democrat!
Taking the Church's tax-exempt status away would be a good start. If the Church wants to push it's political views, they deserve just that. But there is no arguing with some of these single issue (abortion) Catholic voters. I consider myself prolife in a way, as well. But I think supporting a candidate who says he is commited to ending the war in Iraq, improving the care of our veterans, offering healthcare to all Americans, finally addressing global warming, and giving all children a better start with greatly improved education is considerably more pro-life than just offering an insincere promise to try to put an end to abortion in this country. Improve people's quality of life and then you will see the number of abortions steadily dropping. But telling us from the pulpit that we should vote for a certain candidate or else is really asking to be taxed.
"The small smear of red on the otherwise blue electoral map looks more like a minor bloodstain
Frank,
You really don't know what you're talking about. Here's the electoral map by county:
http://artoriuscastus.blogspot.com/2008/11/2008-electoral-map.html
It looks more like a blue inkstain on a red handkerchief. The truth is, that McCain couldn't energize the Republican base.He was too centrist. Over 6% of republicans didn't show up to vote. That would have been enough to turn the election around, and if Palin had been in the front of the ticket, it probably would have happened.
"... and if Palin had been in the front of the ticket, it probably would have happened." LOL! Unbelievable.
Just because you didn't like her, doesn't mean she wasn't popular.
Hm...compare it to this one (click 'county leads'). On your map -for some obscure reason- only the +15-points leads by Democrats are blue. Perhaps you can explain this weird twist of reality...? Because to me, this is beyond spinning facts. It's rewriting history.
Anyway the map Frank Shaeffer was referring to (that looked like bloodstains), you can find when you click 'voting shifts'. Funny you mentioned 'red hankerchief', from what I understand this part of the US is Redneck-country (appalachia, Ozarks).
http://elections.nytimes.com/2008/results/president/map.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Redneck
apologies, I linked the wrong one. The comments indicate it was a mislabled 2004 map.
Try this one:
http://www.subchat.com/otchat/read.asp?Id=384157
which seems to agree with this one:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/politics/interactives/campaign08/election/uscounties.html
Still not a lot of blue
If the Republican party really believes they must move further to the right, the next step would probably be adding something to their platform about "clarifying" the establishment clause to say that religion is and should be a part of American life, and that incorporating religious doctrine into American governance is absolutely fine and what the founders really meant by freedom of religion.
Of course, they won't be that far off base, since *some* (though by no means all) of the founders did have something like that in mind. This battle between religion and secularism has been part of the American scene virtually since the beginning, and also part of the rift that developed between John Adams and Thomas Jefferson. The argument is not about to die away peacefully either. Probably it will always be a part of the American political and cultural dynamic, with one side and then the other getting the temporary upper hand.
But as America continues to diversify demographically, I don't see how a heterogeneous party offering only Christian values can possibly keep us united and inpire voters to go to the polls; it is amazing how they continue to further marginalize themselves. The Obama campaign has left a briliant blueprint for other Democrats to follow. Let's just hope it would works for the next Democrat in 2016.
Some other considerations: There are only 8 states that have over 20 electoral votes. Obama won 7 of them, with only culturaly right wing Texas going for McCain. If the Democarats can keep this pattern in place for the next couple of election cycles the Republicans could be in the wilderness for a long time. Where the people are, where the money is, where the educated and non-fundemental religionist live, the Democrats tend to win. The Democrat's electoral college base in the Northeast, the upper Midwest, and the West coast is strong. They also took 3 out of the 4 largest states in the South, which should make the Republicans sober up, if that is possible. And now inroads have been made in the Rocky Mountain states. It was great to watch Colorado, New Mexico, and Nevada turn blue, and I'll venture to suggest that if McCain hadn't been the nominee Arizona would have jumped too. The reality based part of America is taking over. We're tried of propoganda, outright lies, and phoney culture issues holding sway. Ideas, brains, and ability matter. Best wishes for President Obama.
I think your prediction is optimistic. The media will have a big part in the future of America. If people start educating themselves and if education gets a boost under Obama maybe you'll be right. But if people keep falling for the MSM, as they're sure to spin anything Obama does as wrong or not enough we could still be in trouble. It's about spin and perception. We also may have become addicted to our own self destruction
This election has proved without a doubt that the Republican Party does rely on racism and bigotry to win elections. That whole "palling around with terrorists" business was most certainly a call to all bigots. The issue was completely irrelevant. The campaign just wanted to use the words "terrorist" and "obama" in the same sentence because they knew their base have mostly empty heads that were begging to be filled with a "legitimate" reason to hate Obama.
If it were a white democrat running they would have found some other way to exploit the racism and latent racism.
If there were a way to eliminate the racism, Republicans would have a very difficult time winning a national election.
I agree. The same goes for the smears about Obama not being 'born American' or his alleged 'Muslim' faith.
Keep in mind the Democrats have won the popular vote in 4 of the last 5 presidential elections. It's also highly probable that Al Gore would have been elected in 2000 if the Supreme Court hadn't stopped the re-count in Florida. Bush was president twice by the thinnest of margins, and enjoyed a tempoary inflated popularity driven by the September 11th attacks and a phonied up war that wore out it's welcome rather quickly. The Rovian idea of governing from 50 percent plus 1 and cutting out the rest of the country was really bad judgement. They almost lost in 2004 to a rather weak challenger, John Kerry, and even that win is suspect because of the questionable outcome in Ohio. So much for the "permanet Republican majority." May it rest in peace with the 1000 year Riech. We Democrats are in pretty good shape considering we now have a dynamic new leader in Barack Obama. He may have to rise to the level of a FDR or even Lincoln to get us out of the mess Bush has left in his wake, but he may be just the man to achieve it. As for Palin, forget about it. If the Republicans nominate her in 2012 they will be compounding the blunder of putting her on the ticket in 2008 and will be soundly defeated. I don't think they're that stupid, but they could prove me wrong. If the do, all that much more for the better.
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