Talk to Me (Us All) About Palin: Open Thread

let me preface this by saying that I do. not. support. Sarah. Palin. ahem.

but. I think some conservative voters like her stance on abortion. They like that she's a born-again Christian, and will bring those kinds of “values” to the White House. Some look at her record in Alaska and call her a reformer, so they think that she will bring change (and she's not “establishment” since she hasn't been on the national political scene.) She's “just like you and me” – folksy, down-home, gun-toting. etc.

If you lurk in the McCain/Palin support groups on Ravelry, you will hear more. But be warned – the political groups on Rav are all very, very heated right now.

blondechicken

I'm not a fan, but my mom is. She thinks that Palin is well-spoken and clearly reflects my mom's stances on, well, just about everything.
I think what my mom means is, she's well-spoken, FOR A WOMAN politician. She is completely tuned out from anything aboyt Hilary and Nancy Pelosi, so Palin seems incredibly impressively “together”.

LisaB

From my few years of living in the US during the Bush Jr. reelection we asked a similiar question of our friends and co-workers, trying to understand why they would reelect him. We discovered a lot of people who were single-issue voters. The stance on abortion, for some, was more important than anything else – including the fact that his cuts to the space program directly resulted in the collapse of the industry they worked in.

Amy J.

Gah. Do not even get me. started. Anyway, I think Carrie hit most of the major points about Sarah Palin's appeal. The social conservatives like her because of her stance on abortion and religious background. Others like her because she is perceived as being 'folksy' and 'just like us'. My MOM, who usually votes democratic, gave me this nugget straight from Palin's talking points–she thinks that Palin will 'shake things up' in good ol' boy Washington. I guess some people see her as 'together' (the whole being Governor while raising five kids bit) and well spoken, but if you've seen one of the three paltry interviews she's given, I'm not sure where people get THAT impression from (she may be well-spoken from a teleprompter, but 'off the cuff' on actual, substantive issues? I don't think so).

For some reason, over the past 10 years, it's been some sort of prerequisite for people to 'want to have a beer' with you in order to be U.S. president–I'd rather have someone who was smarter than me, more patient, and better spoken. I don't think *I* would be a good president–and while Sarah Palin has more experience in public service and executive experience than I do, I don't think what experience she DOES have qualifies her to be a potential president of the U.S. (and John McCain ain't looking so hot lately). Oh boy, I'd better stop while I'm ahead, eh? :)

gleek

good luck getting sarah palin supporters to comment here. dooce recently asked for palin supporters to come forward and no one would!

Huh! I wonder why? I really don't want to start a kerfuffle over here. I
wonder if there's somewhere to ask where people will answer? Going to a
McCain/Palin forum isn't what I want, since I really just want to put down
arms and chat with someone who thinks differently from me. Pipe dream?

Dawn

I think online is difficult. It's way too easy for things to escalate.

I've had some interesting conversations with other mothers that I know are more of the republican ilk. They seem to fall into 2 camps. For some it's not at all about Palin and they wish people would focus on McCain. They just don't want to talk about her. Others are very into her social stances on abortion or special needs kids or what her perceived family values are. I've not had anyone tell me they support her for really anything to do with her political or governmental background. Purely personal. Interesting no?

Amie

I don't think I can add anything new to the conversation other than to be another head-nodder on the single-issue stance (abortion) as well as the whole silly thought that she'd “shake things up.” She's been very handled by the GOP, working those talking points and sticking to a very boiled-down list of topics. Then again, it's not like we'd actually get to hear what those points are because she lets the press in to take pretty pictures, but then ushers them out the moment she begins to speak to whoever she's meeting with. It's just SO STRANGE.

I'm just looking forward to the debates. If you've peeked in on some of the major conservative columns/blogs, you'll see that there are those amongst that crowd who are having second-thoughts and some are even heavy-handed with their criticism. Check out this blog entry on ABC News for more of that ( http://blogs.abcnews.com/theworldnewser/2008/09…).

If she gets elected and is a stone's throw from the Presidency, I just want to be assured that there is still room left in Canada for me and the fiance. But I'm confident in my candidate that I won't be house-hunting anytime soon.

Peri

For me, it's easy.
I am not a supporter of Palin. Nor McCain. Nor Obama. and I don't even know who his runing mate is, heh.

I'm a registered democrat, and have been since I was able to register to vote. However, I have seriously been debating which 3rd party candidate I will be voting for. It's not a waste of a vote in my mind, if I can justify why I am voting the way I am. I just wish more people thought the same way…. if you don't like the big two options, then vote for another option. (Also, it's not like you vote for the VeeP anyway, you vote for the head honcho.)

Amie

I disagree. You're voting for both. And as old as McCain is, it's very important to consider that his running mate is not prepared to be next in line to run our country. So yes, you're voting for both.

kristi

A neighbor said to me, the day after Palin's first big interview, that she thought Palin was very knowledgeable about the oil industry and that it was so nice to hear a woman talking about something besides childcare or “women's issues”. It was an unsolicited comment; she genuinely liked her. That and just a general sense of her being “a breath of fresh air”.

Single-issue voting terrifies me. It's the most civically irresponsible form of throwing the baby out with the bath water. Most of the registered Republicans I'm close to are family members* who navigate politics solely on their perception of a party's approach to Israel.

(*Jews are famously left-leaning, in general. Though I must admit I lean more to the left than most of my other relatives, too. :)

I agree that people should vote for the ticket they truly support. But I'm with Amie on the VP issue. Presidents die in office. Truman hadn't been elected President when he ended up with the responsibility of ending the second World War. He admitted at the time that he was in over his head, butâ€”whether you agree with what he did in office or notâ€”he dove in with integrity and responsibility and strong leadership. Nothing about Palin makes me think she'd do that; in the absence of any evidence besides ill-answered interview questions and reports of underhanded politics and dogmatism, I think we'd meet a sudden President whose top agenda would be to destroy natural resources, institute creationism as preferred science in classrooms, and stare at the sky wondering which direction to gaze toward to find Russia from Washington.

Ok. So, yeah. Since no Palin supporters showed up, I sorta let my opinions fly outta the bag there.

Cecily

I think she just simply has some charisma. Because we are capable of doing whatever we need to in our minds to justify our reaction to charisma, I think it's that little bit of charisma that takes people who share her political affiliation from simply agreeing with her to thinking she's got something special. And I can't help feeling the need to mention that “good ol' girl from the west” bravado she sports owes a lot to former Texas gov. Ann Richards…

I am not a one-issue voter myself, but I ALWAYS vote with the Supreme Court in mind…

Annette

All this is very interesting. I obviously have nothing to add, but it's very informative to me – esp to be able to read things in a place where things aren't totally overheated.
The strongest feeling you get from a European point of view when looking at US politics from afar is that you're absolutely clueless. We're all more or less members of the same (Western) civilization. we can communicate in the same language, the US has an enormous cultural influence through movies, TV-series, books and the Internet, so you would suppose you would be able to understand. But you don't.
However, I sometimes think this difficulty to understand is just as great between US citizens of different opinions. Right or wrong?

Amie

And I applaud those opinions. ;-) You know, perhaps your listenership is more liberal – I use that word loosely – than conservative – again, used more loosely considering all the shades of grey that fall in between – and that's why you're getting only those opinions. Who knows.

And as far as Palin's knowledge, or lack there of, we'll get our next crack at that Oct. 2. Don't expect any more lengthy interviews from her as her numbers are dropping the more often she speaks; her handlers are using all this time to cram international affairs into her head – and hopefully erasing the “I can see Russia from my coastline” type of comments.

knitgrrl

http://www.metafilter.com/74487/Sarah-Palin-as-…

Metafilter, my home-away-from-home online, had an EPIC thread on this. Longest one in site history, which is saying something… 5400+ comments at last count:

There's a lot of single issue voters in there, for sure, and since Mefi slants very liberal most of the time, I think a lot of people were having the same reaction I did, which was “Wait, WHAT? You're picking an untested one-term governor with pretty much no real experience”? coupled with the anger of what I call the “interchangeable va***a” — HEY HILLARY SUPPORTERS, LOOKEE! WE GOT A GIRL, TOO!

Had he picked a woman with a heck of a lot more experience (Maine senators Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe come to mind), I would've had a realllllly hard time sticking to my Democratic guns. And I say this as someone who got into a fistfight with my best friend's brother over the Reagan/Carter election………when I was FIVE.

I have to say I'm pretty frightened McCain might win. After watching his debate performance the other night, even more so. He just cannot control his temper, can he? And as much as it amused me to see Obama doing the “can you believe this guy?” looks in his direction, that turns off a lot of independent voters — remember Al Gore's sigh during his debate with W?

I wish I could find out. I've really only started talking about politics in the last few weeks after years of keeping my mouth almost entirely shut online, and I hope that isn't driving away readers who disagree with what I say, but it might be. I guess only time will tell.

That's a tough question. I think to a certain extent you might be right, but even more liberal Americans can be liberal in a specifically American way that doesn't mesh with European perspectives. My perception is that the status quo in the US is so qualitatively different than it is overseas, and to a more muddied extent in Canada, and so it's hard to compare the nature of differing opinions within the US to those between the US and other countries.

Amie

Shannon, did you see McCain's interview on “This Week” with George Stephanopoulos? You could see McCain on the edge of his seat again, having a hard time controlling his temper (I'm referencing the last 5 minutes or so when George was putting some tougher questions to him about his Vp choice, his refusal to look at Obama during the debates, and his VP's apparent verbal diarrhea on her stance with Pakistan). The man simply doesn't like to be questioned about things he believes are set-in-stone ideas.

As far as Obama's looks towards McCain, I say there wasn't enough of them. But then again, I equated those to the same “what are you talking about?” looks that Katie Couric gave Palin in her interview, and I can't say I've heard a stitch online about those.

If anyone is looking for it – not sure it's been YouTube'ed yet – check out ABC News.com for the full 21 min. video clip from McCain “This Week” interview.

crowingram

I'm absolutely behind you on the Supreme Court issue. I've watched over my adult life as the court has gone more and more staunchly conservative. I thank my lucky stars that Clinton was able to get a couple of justices in during his administration, but with all of the discussion of Roe v. Wade over the last few months, it makes my skin crawl to realize that only those two of the nine justices were appointed by a Democratic President. Chief Justice Roberts and Alito were W's, H.W. has two, Reagan still has two, and Ford has one. Can you imagine who McCain or, heaven forbid, Palin might appoint? And how horribly long might we have to live with that abomination?

Vashtirama

This year for the 1st time I designed a few political-theme things and then chickened out before uploading them to Flickr/wherever. Can't decide! I've never been inspired to crochet something in reference to a political campaign before! And it's possible that I'm in the political minority within the larger crocheting public. Or not, hopefully.

Vashtirama

For what it's worth, I finally put my finger on who Sarah Palin has been reminding me of for some reason, and it's someone I might have seen a lot more of here in my neck of the woods than people outside of FL: Katherine Harris. Is it me?

I totally hear you, Vashti. Despite being occasionally fascinated by
politics (and often opinionated) I kept my mouth shut about it online for
years, precisely because it's irrelevant to my work in crochet and I didn't
want to alienate anyone. I just got tired of not writing about things I'm
interested in and decided to throw caution to the wind. I'm perfectly happy
to work with and respect people I don't agree with, and I've decided to
assume people are just like me at least about that.

julie