Palin Runs For Senate Dictator - TV Repubs Ride The "Straight Talking Points" Express

It was creepy to watch Sarah Palin ignore Gwen Ifill's questions and repeat the same scripted answers over and over, as if she were oblivious to her physical surroundings. Even creepier was the fact that so many Republicans interviewed afterward seemed to do the same thing, each robotically repeating the same stock phrases. It was like that scene in Children of the Damned where their eyes start glowing and they all speak in unison.

Instead of "straight talk" we got "straight talking points," from Pat Buchanan on down. Here are some of the buzzwords that spinmeisters in Greater Roveland apparently distributed to any Republican likely to wander within 500 feet of a microphone:

• She was "terrific."
• Joe Biden is "slick."
• She's "younger" and "attractive" and "that represents change."
• Biden and Obama are "looking back" by discussing the last 8 years, and John McCain's role in them. We want to "look forward." (That one's classic Rovian Bushspeak, as is McCain's "let's not place blame" routine.)

Note that there were only a few of these phrases in play. The Art of the Talking Point demands that you don't present too many at one time - and if the GOP understands anything, it's the Art of the Talking Point. Unfortunately for them, early polling shows that viewers aren't buying it. CNN's flash poll said that 51% of polled viewers thought that Biden won, as opposed to only 36% for Palin.

Paul Begala, on the other hand, made what I thought was a brilliant observation. He said that Palin did very little to help John McCain, and that he didn't even think she tried. He said that it appeared to hm that she was more interested in positioning herself for a 2012 run. That feels right.

Palin's performance was weak, scripted, and disrespectful to voters in its refusal to give the public the answers it deserves. Pundits say she beat expectations because she didn't say anything outrageous - but she did. She mis-stated the Constitution as she made a blatant play for power. Here's what she said:

I'm thankful the Constitution would allow a bit more authority given to the vice president if that vice president so chose to exert it in working with the Senate and making sure that we are supportive of the president's policies and making sure too that our president understands what our strengths are.

The Constitution doesn't say that, and apparently she doesn't support the fundamental principle of separation of powers. It sounds like she wants to assume semi-dictatorial power over the deliberations of the United States Senate. It's odd: Her original objective tonight was to convince a minority of voters - the Republican base - that she would be at least minimally competent to perform the duties of Vice President. Instead, she demanded far more than merely those historic duties. She wants to be more powerful than any Vice President in history.

Apparently Dick Cheney's been too much of a pussycat for her liking. At least Cheney had some grounding in government when he started assuming authoritarian power. But Palin wants more power than Cheney - with vastly less experience. She made a play tonight for nothing less than an elimination of constitutional checks and balances, so that the Executive Branch can manipulate the Legislative.

Observers who think this was merely a poorly-thought-out phrase are gravely misjudging Palin. What she lacks in experience or skill she more than makes up for in blind ambition. This was not a randomly uttered sentence: It was a statement of intent which she will no doubt attempt to fulfill should her ticket win.

So as robotic Republicans repeated their straight-talking points, many of us saw a repeat of George W. Bush in Sarah Palin. We saw the same pseudo-folksiness and fundamental dishonesty. We also saw with the same unquenchable thirst for power - power that she (like he) isn't competent to wield.

And by an overwhelming margin, viewers also saw a candidate who lost the debate.

Yes, she exceeded expectations, and yes, she did better than she did with Katie Couric. But Joe Biden was warm, human, engaging, effective, and anything but "slick."

The GOP continues to use the playbook of the last eight years: contempt for the press and the political process, an endless thirst for unilateral power, and a willingness to subordinate independent thought to the talking points of the party line. Their only problem? It looks like the public has stopped buying it. Let's hope so, or the duly elected (and undoubtedly Democratic) Senate may soon find itself under the legislative equivalent of martial law.

RJ Eskow blogs at:

A Night Light
The Sentinel Effect: Healthcare Blog
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Comments

[KenFL]

Sarah repeated her assertion today in a Fox News interview, saying that the VP has the authority to "oversee" the Senate if she chooses to exercise it.

[KenFL]

Excerpt from transcript of Fox News interview

CAMERON: One of the things you talked about last night was the flexibility of the vice presidency (INAUDIBLE)

PALIN: Yes.

CAMERON: What do you mean by that?

PALIN: That thankfully, our founders were wise enough to say, we have this (INAUDIBLE) and it's Constitutional. Vice presidents will be able to be not only the position flexible, but it's going to be sort of this other duty as assigned by the president. It's a simple thing. I don't think that was a gaff at all in stating what the truth is.

And that is we've got flexibility in the position. The president will be directing in a lot of (INAUDIBLE) with the vice president does.
The vice president, of course, is not a member -- or a part of the legislative branch, except to oversee the Senate. That alone provides a tremendous amount of flexibility and authority if that vice president so chose to use it.

[KenFL]

(cont)

CAMERON: One of the criticisms of Vice President Cheney is that he is (INAUDIBLE) the power and influence of the office and that during the Bush/Cheney presidency, the power of the executive has been a standard beyond perhaps that which is good for a country that wants to make sure that we don't have an imperial presidency.

Would you change any of that, (INAUDIBLE) than the Bush/Cheney administration in terms of the power of the executive?

PALIN: Well, again, as I tried to explain last night, our executive branch will know what our job is. We have the three very distinct branches of government. You know, we might be bleeding our authority over to the Legislative or Judicial branch to do our job in the Executive branch as administers.

[oldfart1]

The people who criticized Gwen Ifill got it completely wrong, she handled Sarah perfectly.

Look what she did. Sarah was excited and well-prepared. Fine, give her her head, just like Fast Eddie (Paul N, RIP, we will all miss you). Let her go. You could see she was starting to tire after the first 20 minutes. Be supportive. let her go some more. Then near the end, when she's running out of prepared speeches, and her small mind is just about empty, ask her an innocent question: what is she planning to do if she replaces Dick C?

Hell, she's probably never even met Dick C, but she does know what she can do if she's VP! She did what she wanted when she was Mayor, and told the complaining town council to stuff it. She will redefine the job! And she was off and running.

Of course, Joe B closed it down. He said what she wanted to do is dangerous, and he looked the whole country square in the eye when he said it.

[Taiyo]

OMG! When Buchanan said that Palin was "sensational" I almost threw up. Then he had the hutzpah to say that she wiped the floor with Biden. In whose estimation? His? He's a lunatic, radical conservative and belongs on Fox News. I ALWAYS mute my TV when he's on!

[brief candle]

Sister Sarah wants all the POWER and all the GLORY. Another neo-con clone using religion to divide and conquer. When will these people see that they are being used?

[hopeless277]

The public buys what it is told to buy. It's called marketing. The public will be told in thousands of ads that Palin is 'New' and 'Fresh' and a 'Reformer' and they will eventually come to believe it. To fail to take the marketing arm of the Republican party seriously it to lose one more critical election.

[MathIsTruth]

Palin told us last night that she felt no obligation whatsoever to answer the moderator's questions.

Similarly, she feels she would have no obligation to abide by the U.S. constitution were she elected VP.

There are probably at least a few people who, like me, believe that if she were to swear an oath that she "will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States," that it is a given that she would have actually READ the Constitution.

Unfortunately, I suspect that if you ask Palin if she's ever read the Constitution, her reply would be: "Yeah, all of them, any of them."

[bronceye]

Cheney put the neocon mantra best when he said simply-the voters have their say once every 4 years.

[USA1776]

So now I guess the question is what is the difference between Sarah Palin and Dick Cheney? Lipstick.

[feo]

She did say one important thing that's been largely ignored: She proudly said she raised taxes on oil producers in Alaska. Now, inasmuch as she is just another tax-hating Republican, how could she do such a thing? Wasn't it bad for business? Didn't it impede job creation? Didn't the oil producers leave the state in a tizzy over higher taxes? What kind of socialist is she really? Talk about redistribution of income!

[TheIndependenceParty]

Exactly right! Doesn't an Alaska sate tax on the oil producers simply drive the prices up for the rest of us? Not much of a team player, Sarah!

[johnwcowan]

I realize this is irony, but:

No, a tax on primary production doesn't drive up prices, because there is nowhere that the producer can shift it to. The oil is where it is, and the market price is independent of any one player (granted, Saudi Arabia could manipulate prices downward if they wanted to). So the profit on oil, the difference between what it costs to get it out of the ground and what the oil company can pay for it, remains in the hands of the oil company -- unless it's taxed away.

Please note carefully that we are only talking about taxing the value of the oil *in the ground*, which is what Alaska does. The oil company adds a lot of value by refining and shipping it. Taxing *that* would indeed raise prices.

The difference is a subtle one, which means that most economists don't get it -- not their fault, the fault of their training, which induces them to treat natural resources as the equivalent of capital, which is properly the product of human hands and minds (or its money equivalent).

[lthuedk 1]

I said it two weeks ago: Palin is potentially the most dangerous person on earth. Last night she proved my point by blurting out the actual Neo Con plan to expand V.P. power beyond _BEYOND_Cheney.

That, all by itself, was the act of sabotage I was looking for-that tip of the hand so rarely committed by ideologues. Her's was a game ending mistake as she exposed the true nature of dictatorship.

http://www.light-to-dark.com/finger_puppets.html

[ProudLiberalDan]

She is nothing less than a trojan horse.

They know they will be facing a Senate with a much smaller Republican minority and they are trying to make the case for overriding the majority through the Vice President's office -- completely unconstitutional.

Palin's other answers were mediocre. This one was downright scary. It showed the evil hiding under the folksy mask.

[skertso]

I found Palin's delivery to be arrogant and indeed smug in a Joe six pack sort of way. That phrase about wanting to correct Biden sounded very condescending every time she said it. The thought of giving the Vice-President more powers was truly frightening after listening to Palin's talking points all evening. She was spouting prepared statements not answering debate questions and there was nothing to really be learned by a debate with her as a participant. She is pretty, cute and perky but those are not the qualities we need need in the next vice-president of the United States. Especially with a 72 year old President who has suffered with health issues. Biden on the other hand showed his knowledge, experience, thoughtfulness, emotion and level-headedness that we didn't see in Palin. It is easy to see who would make a better Vice-President!

[Kerris]

The only thing I disagree with in this article is the "2012" bit. Palin ain't eyeing 2012. She's eyeing August 2009, when McCain forgets to use a presidential taste-tester for the special moose stew she makes for his 73rd birthday. She won't be able to trust that he'll forget to use his sun screen, she'll have to be more proactive than that. John's not long for this presidency with a politician that ambitious and popular on his heels.

[pcplz]

I agree that she is not looking for 2012.....but, it is because she is going to be politically used up when this grand ambition fails. Alaska now knows who she is. They don't like her anymore. Sarah is going back to Joe sixpack and hockey mom.

[bluetick27]

I'm glad to finally see an article that focuses on this point. I've been searching in vain since the end of the debate last night to see if anyone was bringing this to the fore front.

Sarah Palin wants to be the next DICK. She is secretive, manipulative and dictatorial and she can't wait to pick up where Cheney left off. I believe she'd make Cheney look like a boy scout when "making sure that we are supportive of the president's policies." She is too ignorant to recognize boundaries that even Cheney wouldn't dare to cross.

To me, this was the salient point of all of Palin's talking points and should be the top banner on HuffPost and in every newspaper & political blog.

(Apologies in advance for some tangential venting) I felt like throwing a hammer through the TV every time she winked or sprinkled in an unnecessary "also" in her comments. It's disappointing that she's become the "American Idol" and that she sounded like a beauty contestant ... I half expected there to be a follow-up swimsuit competition.

[lincheryl]

For those who think Obama and Palin have similar levels of experience: do you now think that his law degree from Harvard and his years of teaching CONSTITUTIONAL law might make him a better candidate?

Put Sarah on Fox News. She is good at delivering scripts that someone else has written to people who don't question the validity of the material. She and Elisabeth Hasselbeck should both go there.

[demfriend]

Palin was a confusing mix of scripted questions she asked herself and went back to when she didn't like the question she was asked and "Tammy goes to St Louis". I had not heard as many "you betcha's" since Fargo and she was wrong about so many things it appeared like she had prepared for some other debate. Basic stuff about troop levels and the Constitutional placement of the VP job as well as even the stance of McCain on Afghanistan. Too many people may not map close attention to the details but they know the troop level and they remember Reagan's piece she gave about the end when we will have to speak to our grandkids about this time etc. To hear the spin of too many like Pat Buchanan it was if she walked on water and spoke honest and truthfully. Yep in her own world with her own questions and answers maybe....

[WorldofTomorrow420]

"....she was more interested in positioning herself for a 2012 run. That feels right."

Let's see....John Edwards, Joe Lieberman, Jack Kemp, James Stockdale, Dan Quayle, Lloyd Bentsen, Geraldine Ferraro.........

Yup, nothing like losing as a VP nominee to propel a candidate to future success.

[broilinginhouston]

It didn't keep Franklin Roosevelt out of the whitehouse, and it didn't prevent Bob Dole or Walter Mondale from securing their party's presidential nominations