The "Far Right" Sarah Palin?

In Allah's Quotes the Day, he featured two: One an attack on the self-styled elites who do nothing to advance anything at all except their own outsized sense of self-importance, and the other the elites ragging on the "far right" Sarah Palin:

The "elites," incidentally, seem to have a confused definition of "far right." Sometimes they speak of the "far right" as if it is a programmatic, ideological thing. But they mostly seem to speak of it as purely tonal in nature, as applies to Sarah Palin.

But elites are so smart they tend to be confused by how much brilliance is crackling up in their big brains.

I am a bit perplexed at how either confused meaning applies to Sarah Palin. She is not "far right" ideologically -- she is solidly in the mainstream of conservativism.

As for the case that she is extremist in tone -- what on earth could they possibly be thinking of? I can only think of two things.

First, the "death panel" coinage, which is perfectly accurate and perfectly par-for-the-course as far as political invective. Bear in mind that the same liberals and "moderate Republicans" (actually moderate Democrats) who shrieked about this either used, or had no particular problem with, the Democrats' standard playbook on Medicaid reform/cuts in the 80s and 90s, which consisted of claiming that Republicans would force your grandma to eat cat food and throw her out on the street to die.

Is "death panels" strident? Tendentious? Designed to provoke a reaction? Of course it is. As is most of political communication -- it just happens to be effective at expressing a dark truth the Leftwing Media, Democrats, and "moderate Republicans" wish to obscure.

The other thing that comes to mind -- and this is what I think the main "indictment" against Palin as a ranting, vicious member of the extremist far right -- is that she alone dared to insult the man whose trousers David Brooks noted were immaculately creased:

Liberals -- including liberals like David Brooks -- have never forgotten that performance, nor forgiven it. It was the first and only time a prominent Republican -- or hell, a prominent anything -- dared to stand up and clearly declare that Barack Obama was incompetent, inexperienced, and utterly unprepared for the Presidency, and a left-winger to boot.

All that has now been proven by subsequent catastrophe. And yet Brooks and Barack Obama's other down-low boyfriends are still stinging from the time this nasty bitch got up in front of the cafetorium and said their boyfriend ain't all that.

And that is what makes her "far right" -- she was so uncouth as to actually attempt to oppose Barack Obama in a way that might actually defeat him, as opposed to McCain, whose main goal was defeat with integrity (except, you know, when he was approving Palin's speech and telling her to say that Obama pals around with terrorists) and the "moderate Republicans" in the party who voted for Barack Obama and were pretty damn psyched to do so.

posted by Ace at 01:20 PM

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