The Palin Trap
On Friday, following McCain's announcement that Sarah Palin was his choice for running mate, like way too many others I allowed myself to indulge in the fantasy that this was the stupidest decision of a GOP presidential candidate since Dan Quayle was tapped for the role. Now that my post-DNC sense of invincibility has worn off, however, so has my triumphalism. I woke up yesterday morning with a much different sense of the Sarah Palin choice. I think it's a trap.
The McCain campaign knew exactly how both Democrats and the traditional media would respond to the Palin announcement, because it was entirely predictable. Choosing someone this plainly unqualified wasn't a mistake, and it wasn't even a gamble. It was a trade-off.
My suspicion is that the McCain campaign doesn't really care that Palin undermines McCain's case for experience, because they're not planning to use that argument anymore. They've decided that the experience argument is ineffective against Obama's change message, and they're more or less giving it up. Moreover, they know how to respond to attacks on Palin's total lack of qualification for the office, and are in fact inviting those attacks as a way to build sympathy with working class independent voters. That's where Palin's value lies.
Instead of continuing on the experience theme, McCain is front-loading his "Country First" message, and his campaign is taking the competition for working class voters on economic issues much more seriously than they were a few months ago. McCain has finally figured out that this is not going to be a national security election, and that Iraq is a distant second to the recession as the central issue in 2008. So it doesn't matter that Palin has no foreign policy experience. That's not what they need her for - they need her for the debate over the economy.
Of course, Palin is useless for any actual debate on the subject that might require policy expertise and persuasive argumentation. In that, she's similar to McCain, who is not identified as a Senator with any special knowledge on economic issues, and has been exposed as an out of touch multimillionaire. For all these reasons, and with GOP-style economics completely out of style, the McCain campaign is at a major disadvantage in any wonky policy debate on fixing the economy. Knowing this, and knowing that the election is going to be won or lost on whether their ticket is regarded as the best equipped to meet that challenge, the McCain campaign is doing what the GOP always does when it has to fight for working class voters in a debate that Republicans can't win on its merits: they are reverting to symbolic politics, a role for which Palin is tailor-made.
Palin was educated at a not-famous public university, received a bachelor's degree in journalism and became a sportscaster before entering the political arena. She married her high school sweetheart, a commercial fisherman and oil company worker (not an executive, or even a manager). Her political career began at the PTA. She raised four kids while holding down her career, and recently had a fifth. Compared to McCain, Obama and even Biden, her story is easily the most sympathetic to working class voters, especially white women. While the McCain campaign whispers to voters in Peoria that Obama is not 'one of us,' with Palin they will be able to present a face and a story that is reassuringly familiar - much more so than the top of the ticket.
The McCain campaign is going to trot Palin out whenever they need to make the case that they feel America's pain. They're going to contrast her story to Obama's, and even to Biden's (not the part about being a scrappy kid from Scranton, but the part about being in the Senate for a million years). They're going to have her stick relentlessly to her personal biography, and avoid at all costs any discussion of policy. And whenever any Democrat attacks her for being inexperienced, they're going to turn to working class voters and ask why all these Harvard-educated, pointy-headed know-it-alls think that they know better how to help working families than a woman who worked her way through a demanding career while raising five kids, stayed married to her hard-working husband, and was so successful that she became a governor and then a VP nominee. They're going to turn any question about Palin's 'experience,' whether from a Dem or from a journalist, into another elitist attack on working class culture, another example of snooty, brainiac liberals condescending to ordinary Americans. And to boot, a bunch of good old boys picking on Mrs. Mom.
I don't believe that this is a bid for Hillary supporters, I think it's a bid for the same segment of the electorate that almost every tactic from both campaigns has been aimed at: white working class swing voters. I think the inevitable attacks on Palin are part of the purpose of her selection. By turning her into a lightning rod, they will be able to deflect attacks away from McCain toward a far more sympathetic figure, and then use those attacks as evidence in a far more powerful counterattack against typical liberal elitism.
We're best off not taking that bait.
Follow Leighton Woodhouse on Twitter: www.twitter.com/lwoodhouse
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Obama/Biden should criticize this pick only in what it says about McCain's temperament and poor judgement. Make it about McCain. But focus on the issues.
The people who should criticize Palin are Democratic women and it should be issue based. Palin is an anti-abortion hardliner who will support Bush/Cheney/McCain policies. Leave the "experience" debate out of it. That's the trap. Palin will reveal her inexperience herself.
Right on, PLDan. I agree 100% - there are plenty of women in office who should step up to this one, starting with Hillary.
There are 53 women in the House and 16 in the Senate. Most, though not all, are Democrats. Someone's got to get them to stand up and expose Palin for being out of step with most Americans on a woman's right to choose, on teaching evolution, on gun control, and other issues we care about that they've been fighting for...for years.
No one needs to even mention her inexperience - she's vulnerable on her far right wing stand on the issues!
Most Americans who are not rich would not at all mind becoming rich themselves, but very few of them have any desire to become, or even be considered to be, "intellectual" - it's the "Rodney Dangerfield" effect.
you are absolutely right
I know of a handful of Republicans that are embarrased by McCain's pick and will vote for Obama - I pray that more working class white people who are independent or republican will realize that they are being played for fools. As my grandmother would say, fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me.
I wonder if there is anyone in the MSM that has the guts to begin pointing this out, that just like 2000 and 2004, the Republicans are pandering to the low information voter and will use them only to discard them again after the election.
Unfortunately, that handful of Republicans you know may be the only thoughtful Republicans in the world.
The Palin pick makes
light of the VP job. We
all deserve better.
http://the
Pretty much correct. I'm thinking the only angle, is put Hillary out there, a lot. She doesn't challenge Palin. She doesn't condescend. She says nice things about a nice person, but remains puzzled about the selection, and Very concerned about Johnnie Mac's age and health.
I would love her if she did that... but I don't know how far she is willing to go for Obama.
Hi, Leigh: I made a related point in a post a few days ago:
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Hopefully this trap will remain unsprung! This weekend the Obama campaign released an ad that doesn't even mention Palin by name. Good start!
In solidarity, Scott
She will hide behind her gender and her motherhood. Criticize her and you're a sexist. Doubt her and how dare you say that about a mother!
I'm having trouble with the "McSame as evil genius" scenario. Sure, there are many ways that O and the dems can go wrong in dealing with the Palin situation. But this is the most likely scenario I think that went through McSame's head:
1) I really want Lieberman! But those party b******s won't let me get away with it. He's my only real friend.
2) They want me to choose Romney, Pawlenty or some other boring person that's smarter than me. No way!
3) Damn, Palin is cute! And the neocons could never complain..
McCain's reckless and irresponsible VP pick SHOULD spell certain doom for his campaign. Unfortunately, the past eight years have driven home the fact that a significant portion of American voters are breathtakingly ignorant. I'm banking on the Obama campaign to succeed in its strategy of expanding the electoral map.
Stay on issues!
We are supposed to want to drink a lite beer with her.
It's come down to personalities.
Maybe a Moosehead lager - made with a real moosehead!
Interestin
I don't think we know what she's capable of yet. O picked an old insider. She's a true unknown. She's got a great reformist resume, but that's about all we know.
We'll learn more, but I am guessing she's brighter than any Dem is willing to give her credit for being. They tend to dismiss anyone who doesn't agree with them on particular issues as idiots, and then whine later when they find out they were wrong.
Underestimating people is a failure of character.
You underestimated Barack Obama, right wing Hillary phony McCain double agent.
PumaAnn - let's not exagerate the talking points. She doesn't have a "great" reformist resume. Sher an against a corrupt incumbent. Anyone who beats a corrupt incumbent is automatically labelled a "reformer". It doesn't mean its true. Her "fiscal reform" of selling the state's jet on E-bay is largely symbolic as the cost of the jet was a grain of sand in the giant ocean of Alaskan state budget. She now pretends she is against the bridge to nowhere although there is ample proof that before she knew federal politics was in the cards, she was totally in favor of it. What is this "great reformist resume" you refer to. It is all smoke and mirrors to me.
If they keep hammering home that McCain has voted with Bush 90% of the time, this election is Obama's. It's that simple. Keep it about the policies and issues, and it's a done deal.
Let the media vet Palin, but only to the point of digging up real scandals and flip flops. This will highlight McCain's poor judgement skills. Also highlight HOW & WHY he picked her as a VP--that also speaks to judgement.
But I generally agree that Obama should keep his eyes square on McCain. Biden, too, actually. Palin will be made useless cause she sure as hell can't attack Obama or Biden effectively.
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