"This is the most compelling and exciting Republican politician in a generation," - Jonah Goldberg, National Review, on Sarah Palin.
Are the Republicans crazy? Why pick a woman with zero experience, a mountain of scandals and a collection of youtube gaffes as Vice President. It sure "seems" crazy, but you guys know Republican strategists are a lot of things but they are not crazy. They are smart and they win elections.
The key to this election (namely winning, not just the White House but a filibuster proof majority in the Senate) is to understand what they are doing and why they are doing it.
It seems like it was a huge mistake (and may turn out to be) when you think intellectually about it but the Republicans are not thinking intellectual like us. They are working emotionally and it does pose a threat.
Here is what the Republican strategist Rick Davis who ran McCain's 2000 and 2008 election said two days ago:
"This election is not about issues. This election is about a composite view of what people take away from these candidates."
Rick Davis is smart and knows what the campaign is planning but he isn't in charge anymore. He was one of the people kicked to the edge of the campaign during the staff shake-up. He was replaced by a guy called Steve Schmidt.
Who is Steve Schmidt? Well he is Karl Roves protege and member of Rove's infamous "Breakfast Club" which met during the 2004 Election to discuss with Rove what tactics he was planning. According to his Wikipedia profile he specialises in "message development and strategy".
So what's the message of the Sarah Palin pick, what are they playing at here. To Quote Will Wilkinson's recent blog about it from his article "Sex, Culture, and Sarah Palin".
Palin exudes sexual confidence and maternal authority, which in a relatively conservative culture like ours is the most recognizable and viscerally comprehensible form of female power. It makes a lot of men uncomfortable, but that’s because it’s the kind of female power they are most often subject to, and most often fail to successfully resist. I spent much of my life taking orders from women a lot like Sarah Palin — women like my mother and my Iowa public school teachers. Indeed, it makes a lot more emotional sense for me to feel led by by a woman like that.
Palin's appeal is NOT intellectual, it is based on an "emotional trigger" in a strategy by Republicans to appeal to base emotions like sexual appeal, but not Hollywood style sex appeal, more rural American almost basic hunter-gatherer appeal.
But we all know that politics is a primate sport. We’re used to marveling over the fact that the taller man usually wins, that a commanding, alpha-male jock toughness is de rigeur for successful presidential candidates. Palin’s gut appeal drives home the perhaps inevitable but nevertheless regrettable fact that female political success is at some level going to be grounded in primate appeal, too. And, as a female primate, Palin is evidently "a force to be reckoned with"
It is in this context that you need to look at Palin's appeal. You can look at her sarcastic speech in which she scrunches up her face when talking about the "Old Boys Liberal Media" as an attack but at an emotional level as a effective tool she is using.
Will it work?
The Obama campaign I'm sure knows what the GOP are doing and Obama is a master at electioneering. I think the biggest problem for the Republicans is that elections are not won with a Vice President. Palin is going to be a strong personality with a weird rural matriarchal appeal but that doesn't beat the fact that they got a wet towel on top of the ticket.