Don’t Underestimate The Power Of Palin

By on September 21, 2010 in News 20

Mark Halperin issues a warning memo, in TIME:

FROM: Mark Halperin
TO: Coastal Elites, the Media and Establishment Politicians of Both Parties
RE: Sarah Heath Palin

Don’t underestimate Sarah Palin. Yes, she is hyper-polarizing: she sends her fans into rapture and drives her detractors stark raving mad. But she can dominate the news cycle with a single tweet and generate three days of coverage with a single speech (as she did this past Friday in Iowa). Her name recognition is universal.

You are right to complain that she is not offering specific policy proposals and that her inaccessibility to media outlets other than the one that pays her — Fox News — puts her beyond the kind of scrutiny and accountability we have come to expect for our leaders.

But the mistake you are making is to assume that Palin needs or wants to play by the standard rules of American politics. Or that it even occurs to her to do so. Trash her all you want (even you Republicans who are doing it all the time behind her back) for being uninformed, demagogic and incoherent, and brandish the poll numbers that show fewer and fewer Americans think she is qualified to be President. Strain to apply political and practical norms to Alaska’s former governor. You are missing the point.

Surely you’ve come to accept the reality that as a businessperson, Palin is a genius. The gusher of revenue from her speeches, books and television deals sweeps away any doubt that she can brilliantly harness her energy, charisma and popularity into a moneymaking bonanza.

But what you need to appreciate is that the same dynamics of supply and demand that Palin has cleverly exploited for financial gain also make her inimitably formidable as a political force…

[continues in in TIME]

,

  • Liam_McGonagle

    Sucking up all the energy in a room can be a goal in and of itself if your ideal is torpor.

    • Palin_Is_A_Puppet

      Lol… Ahh just another puppet… It’s amazing that any person can have ANY faith in ANYTHING after the constant lies and let downs. Palin is just a celebrity, “Ooh she looks kind of ok and shes a politician. Wow”. She could be easily be used as a tool by the establishment, and I would bet that she will be. Another disappointment.

      • Liam_McGonagle

        I don’t know if she’d necessarily be a disappointment.

        Her job isn’t to make real progress in anything–just suck energy away from the people that CAN. If you’re a fat cat financial mogul, the LAST thing you want is change; Change upsets ‘The Model’, introduces ‘uncertainty’, gets in the way of sustained increases in margin.

        My guess is that her true ultimate masters, whether she realizes who they are or not, have considered two competing scenarios for her eventual fate:

        1. She comes into her own and powers previously unimagined by us are finally revealed: She really knows how to hang a scape goat. Whether she is elected to office directly, or merely becomes a ‘puppet mistress’ of a new right wing political machine, there is still the possibility that she could prove incredibly imaginative in identifying and demonizing weak innocents to pay the penalty for the misdeeds of her corporate sponsors. This is the orgasmic best-case scenario payoff for the Mogul’s investment.

        You would hope that the ‘light would finally go on’ for contemporary Americans and they’d realize that we’re being asked to apologize for our own victimization, but there is historical precedent for well-educated, culturally sophisticated societies to crumble before even stupider come-ons. At the beginning of the 19th century, I think most Europeans would have considered Germany and Italy to have had particularly high standards of cosmopolitan sophistication.

        2. The public consensus finally sees her as the half-wit she truly is, and her cultural and political influence dry up overnight. Her utter lack of concrete economic and foreign policy catches up to her. But you know what? That’s okay, too. She served her purpose by preventing any meaningful focus on corporate malfeasance for a good three years. And the likes of her are a dime a dozen; wait fifteen minutes and another one is sure to come along.

        She doesn’t have to really do anything more than be a distraction.

  • Anonymous

    Sucking up all the energy in a room can be a goal in and of itself if your ideal is torpor.

  • Palin_Is_A_Puppet

    Lol… Ahh just another puppet… It’s amazing that any person can have ANY faith in ANYTHING after the constant lies and let downs. Palin is just a celebrity, “Ooh she looks kind of ok and shes a politician. Wow”. She could be easily be used as a tool by the establishment, and I would bet that she will be. Another disappointment.

  • O. Spengler

    Fluffy pets dominate YouTube and image boards, but that doesn’t make them geniuses.

    • http://www.theamericanbookofthedead.com Henry Baum

      Thank you. This piece does nothing but further the Palin myth. It does nothing to address the countless lies she spews every day. It is just building her up even more as a media creation that cannot be questioned.

      She’s not a genius any more than Thomas Kinkade is a genius. Halperin is a hack.

  • O. Spengler

    Fluffy pets dominate YouTube and image boards, but that doesn’t make them geniuses.

  • Word Eater

    Why be a politician on a leash when, with the right cash flow, you can be the one pulling the chain?

  • Word Eater

    Why be a politician on a leash when, with the right cash flow, you can be the one pulling the chain?

  • Hornet Montana

    “Surely you’ve come to accept the reality that as a businessperson, Palin is a genius.”

    Genius? Rather, WE are inclined to think that she is merely a person with connections [http://spitfirelist.com/for-the-record/ftr-652-palin-by-comparison/].

    And don’t call me Shirley.

  • Hornet Montana

    “Surely you’ve come to accept the reality that as a businessperson, Palin is a genius.”

    Genius? Rather, WE are inclined to think that she is merely a person with connections [http://spitfirelist.com/for-the-record/ftr-652-palin-by-comparison/].

    And don’t call me Shirley.

  • http://www.theamericanbookofthedead.com Henry Baum

    Thank you. This piece does nothing but further the Palin myth. It does nothing to address the countless lies she spews every day. It is just building her up even more as a media creation that cannot be questioned.

    She’s not a genius any more than Thomas Kinkade is a genius. Halperin is a hack.

  • TheWrongStuff

    TO: Mark Halperin (because you start a letter with a salutation, not by announcing who it is from you fucking tool)

    FROM: Me obviously…are you paying attention?

    RE: Sarah Palin’s Penis

    Dear Turd Monkey,

    Just because that brain dead half wit can vogue some creepy wink that stirs the genitalia of a bunch of crusty old GOP incumbents that haven’t seen their own dicks since the Regan administration does not make her socially, politically, or even comically relevant. She gets attention because you give it to her, not because she is deserving.

    P.S.

    Please get off Palin’s cock. It’s unseemly and disrespectful to our Muslim brothers and sisters.

  • TheWrongStuff

    TO: Mark Halperin (because you start a letter with a salutation, not by announcing who it is from you fucking tool)

    FROM: Me obviously…are you paying attention?

    RE: Sarah Palin’s Penis

    Dear Turd Monkey,

    Just because that brain dead half wit can vogue some creepy wink that stirs the genitalia of a bunch of crusty old GOP incumbents that haven’t seen their own dicks since the Regan administration does not make her socially, politically, or even comically relevant. She gets attention because you give it to her, not because she is deserving.

    P.S.

    Please get off Palin’s cock. It’s unseemly and disrespectful to our Muslim brothers and sisters.

  • ehmkec

    I’m so thankful when people do my thinking for me. Palin is a genius. Oh, wait a minute. This is all about her financial successes. Conservatives give her money. Money is power. We are idiots.

    I wish I could go a day without an article about how the conservatives are playing the public.

  • Anonymous

    I’m so thankful when people do my thinking for me. Palin is a genius. Oh, wait a minute. This is all about her financial successes. Conservatives give her money. Money is power. We are idiots.

    I wish I could go a day without an article about how the conservatives are playing the public.

  • Ironaddict06

    I think people are missing the point. Yes, she isn’t a genius, but she was an un-known govenor of a state that nobody really cared about two years ago. To a present day multi-millionare. Yes people either love her or hate her. Palin is one of the better looking politicans, which some people hate or like. Who cares who is paying her. The point is she is getting paid alot of money for being controversial.

  • Ironaddict06

    I think people are missing the point. Yes, she isn’t a genius, but she was an un-known govenor of a state that nobody really cared about two years ago. To a present day multi-millionare. Yes people either love her or hate her. Palin is one of the better looking politicans, which some people hate or like. Who cares who is paying her. The point is she is getting paid alot of money for being controversial.

  • Anonymous

    I don’t know if she’d necessarily be a disappointment.

    Her job isn’t to make real progress in anything–just suck energy away from the people that CAN. If you’re a fat cat financial mogul, the LAST thing you want is change; Change upsets ‘The Model’, introduces ‘uncertainty’, gets in the way of sustained increases in margin.

    My guess is that her true ultimate masters, whether she realizes who they are or not, have considered two competing scenarios for her eventual fate:

    1. She comes into her own and powers previously unimagined by us are finally revealed: She really knows how to hang a scape goat. Whether she is elected to office directly, or merely becomes a ‘puppet mistress’ of a new right wing political machine, there is still the possibility that she could prove incredibly imaginative in identifying and demonizing weak innocents to pay the penalty for the misdeeds of her corporate sponsors. This is the orgasmic best-case scenario payoff for the Mogul’s investment.

    You would hope that the ‘light would finally go on’ for contemporary Americans and they’d realize that we’re being asked to apologize for our own victimization, but there is historical precedent for well-educated, culturally sophisticated societies to crumble before even stupider come-ons. At the beginning of the 19th century, I think most Europeans would have considered Germany and Italy to have had particularly high standards of cosmopolitan sophistication.

    2. The public consensus finally sees her as the half-wit she truly is, and her cultural and political influence dry up overnight. Her utter lack of concrete economic and foreign policy catches up to her. But you know what? That’s okay, too. She served her purpose by preventing any meaningful focus on corporate malfeasance for a good three years. And the likes of her are a dime a dozen; wait fifteen minutes and another one is sure to come along.

    She doesn’t have to really do anything more than be a distraction.