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

Comments

[ABrindell]

Eh... you're reaching, at best. I'm not buying it. McCain's campaign didn't vett her the way they should have, and made a bad pick. Plain and simple.

[davidandgolliath]

No you deceive yourself in saying that Mc Cain did not think this through. He must have anticipated this kind of public outcry about Palin's lack of experience. So I really think this is a trap and the Obama campaign better not fall for the decoy and continue with focusing on Mc Cain and leave Palin alone. She's a trap.

[sleek]

Troopergate will bring Palin down - as well as McCain for not doing his job and vetting properly. Unless, that is, Rove et al don't tamper with the investigation first.

Abuse of power is just that - it doesn't matter at what level. Palin has typical Republican arrogance and above the law mentality. No more; it must stop now.

[530Rose]

Why do working class Americans fear intelligence and educational excellence? Between McCain and Palin, the IQ might be half of Bush/Cheny and a small fraction of Obama/Biden.

[taniacaa]

As a Republican from Central Florida, the Palin VP pick has confirmed to me that McCain, Palin, and the Republicans wants middle class Americans to live a “frontier lifestyle”….no job, no home, no education, and no healthcare insurance. We are to live off the land and hunt for our food. Palin is the person who will ensure that we are retrained to do just this.

Also, Bushnomics fits Palins’ executive experience because they were both governors of “oil states” and look where this experience has gotten us.

Vote for Obama/Biden and Democrats on Nov 4th 2008.

[Jingo]

I think McCain's choice was not as calculated as the article implies. I think the Republican Party wanted a running mate like Romney and pushed hard for such a choice. When McCain realized he couldn't have his BFF, Joe Lieberman, he decided to stick it to the Party honchos and select Palin. Once the media wades through Palin's scandals and inexperience and she is forced to drop off the ticket, a la Thomas Eagleton, McCain will push again for Lieberman to fill the last minute void. McCain/Liebeman '08!!!! or the "Scowls and Jowls" ticket.

[taniacaa]

As a Republican from Central Florida, the Palin VP pick has confirmed to me that McCain, Palin, and the Republicans wants middle class Americans to live a “frontier lifestyle”….no job, no home, no education, and no healthcare insurance. We are to live off the land and hunt for our food. Palin is the person who will ensure that we are retrained to do just this.

Also, Bushnomics fits Palins’ executive experience because they were both governors of “oil states” and look where this experience has gotten us.

Vote for Obama/Biden and Democrats on Nov 4th 2008.

[robXdion]

NO. They're gonna turn it into Democratic Party sexism.

[Insearchoftruth]

Excellent article, insightful and captures my thoughts. I just hope the Obama machine is tuned in.

[Ndw]

That's just what I've been thinking. Sadly, I don't have the confidence in the American people to believe otherwise. I hope 8 years of Bush will make the difference. Follow Reagan & ask, 'Are you better off now than you were 8 years ago?" - and maybe there's hope. What matters most is how people are actually doing - and a positive message.

[jOke]

Leigh: you should send this to the Obama campaign. (not assuming there not on top of this already..)

[BatedBreath]

Palin is an extremely canny choice and it is extremely dangerous for Dems. The only good thing about is, as a matter of fact, is that she will probably consolidate the Clinton vote behind Obama.

[kellygrrrl]

this decision is a huge turn-off to the Fiscal Republicans.
this decision is a huge turn-off to the majority of women.

she brings the Funda mentalist voters and that is all.

Her extreme positions with religious agenda are a huge Red Flag to a great many Americans.

[Beverly2]

Citizen's note to McCain: It is shameful that you, McCain, have called out this innocent, trusting mother of a newborn and respected worker of her Alaska constituents to try to save your floundering campaign. Shame on you, McCain! You know you are just using this "Norma Rae" of Alaska to place before your population of white shining, Christian faces -- revve them up and engender more cultural divisiveness in our already turbulent country. All so that YOU can get more votes. This woman has the energy and dedication to people to eventually run for President herself but you are making a mockery of her by tying her to your lies and bonds to Bush's Christian Right. I hope she catches on and saves herself -- goes back home to Alaska and gets ready to define her own entry into national politics

[tuaka1992]

Finally someone gets it!

You have hit the nail on the head. She is in play to win white poor people in Penn., Mich., and Ohio. Strategic move. All the Repubs had to do was give white poor people an alternative. Study after study has shown that white poor people vote against their own best interest when it comes to race over and over again. This is why there were masters and overseers. The overseers are the pawns in the power game. Let them do the dirty work, and the rich reap the rewards of labor. This is so funny. However, it saddens me to believe that America is still so racist. The goal is to pit Palin with Obama. This is soo Rovian! I've got to give him credit. My advce to Obama is to give the more of Barney Smith and attack "Smith & Barney." Make it about healthcare and paychecks.

[marijam]

Wrong. I'm not poor and a lot of those I work with aren't poor either. You think you have the demographics all figured out, but you don't. Not at all. Read Howard Fineman's latest commentary. Maybe then you will have a clue.

[davidandgolliath]

Fineman??? he has lost all credibility since judging from his latest talking points, he's been taking bribes from the GOP.

[patrice37]

Even Pennsylvania does not have enough know-nothings to make this ploy work.

[BGDiNLV]

BINGO!!!!!

[bac59447]

In the mad rush to dissect and analyze this putative "game-changer" I think this is the most trenchant comment yet. What some Dems have been saying for the past few days that experience is "off the table" is exactly right but they might not realize that this is precisely what McCain's brain (Schmidt) wanted. The hockey mom with the multiple kids, who has the added benefit of being about as white as you can get, is going to be sitting down with families in Ohio, Texas and Michigan, holding their hands while they say grace before dinner, and then nodding approvingly and saying all the right comforting things while they talk about their disappeared health care and jobs. And like Bush looking into Putin's soul, these people will be fooled into thinking she's one of them. And some will even vote for her because of that. It's a sad, dirty, mean-spirited little script. But hey, it's worked before.