I think I can now answer my question about "who does this appeal to". From the reviews, especially of republican pundits, they responded in a sexualized way to her eyelash batting, winking, and tight skirt.
Even her initial introduction to Biden (open mike) was flirtatious ("can I call you Joe?") So she is using what God gave her. She don't need smarts, or book-learnin. As I watched it, (mouth actually agape) it reminded me of stuff woman used to do (in the 1950's???), that is sexualize, flirt, shamelessly, to get their way. It is the same as witholding sex for household favors. It is the ultimate disgusting manipulation, and some men respond to this. I am sure there has been quite a gender gap in this approach. Upscale, educated (and attractive) women were turned off. They were saying to themselves, "so why have I gotten my PhD from Ivy League again, when all I had to do was wink and use the tanning bed." Why have I worked hard to really shatter the glass ceiling, she is shattering the mirrors over the bed. This is putting smart, real, hard working women, behind hundreds of years.
Today male journalists are responding. They like it. They think she was winking at them. OK, for the literalists who suffer from the OCD need to correct every misspelling or typo, I don't mean literally, I mean unconsciously. In other words,they were turned on by the winks,etc. It is kinda amazin' to me, an also, that, in this day and time, we go far that kinda thing, an also-energy.
Follow up: To distinguish what I am talking about in terms of consciously sexualizing the message and the messanger- what I am saying is that Palin is packaged to be provocative-she is purposely appealing to this aspect. Bill Clinton and Barack Obama may also have women fantasizing, which is fine, because they are not consciously packaging or presenting themselves in this way. It comes from the woman (or men) not the other way around. Get it? There is actually an important difference here.
An afterthought-
I ran into a distinguished older woman in the grocery store today. She and I were both wearing our Obama buttons so I approached her and like a secret society, we shared our disgust. She was more disgusted than I at Palin, she said, "I was deeply offended." I realized that older women have been dealing with this kind of crap their entire lives. The trampy woman in the office gets the promotion, the slimy flirt gets all the attention, I really thought we had gotten past this kind of crap. Leave it to the republicans to bring sluttiness back into fashion...