Blogs and Stories
Palin's Second Act
If one more Republican grandee or neoconservative bigwig endorses Obama, his campaign will collapse under the weight of counterintuitive adoration. It seems it’s not enough to garner the blessing of General Colin Powell; now he’s collected the imprimatur of the neocon foreign policy hawk Ken Adelman, the guy who introduced Dick Cheney to Paul Wolfowitz at a Washington brunch the day Reagan was sworn in. Adelman came out for Barry yesterday to George Packer on his New Yorker blog.
The Republican turncoat movement is now rolling across the Atlantic. Yesterday Boris “Crikey” Johnson, the flophaired mayor of London and former editor of the UK’s prestigious journal of conservative opinion, the Spectator, told the Guardian that an Obama victory would “have a beneficial influence on the self-image of some of London's black male youth." Asked if he himself endorses Obama, Johnson replied, “Yes.” Democrats must hope Crikey doesn’t start canvassing Ohio like all those Brits in 2004 whose letter-writing campaign to testy Buckeyes helped doom the candidacy of John Kerry.
I suspect that Palin is harboring an angry contempt for her running mate and his handlers.
Adelman, like Powell on Sunday’s Meet the Press, piled onto McCain’s disastrous choice of Sarah Palin as a big reason for deserting the GOP ticket. “Not only is Sarah Palin not close to being acceptable in high office—I would not have hired her for even a mid-level post in the arms-control agency,” he emailed Packer. What about hiring her for a part in a Shakespeare play? Adelman is the co-author of Shakespeare in Charge: The Bard's Guide to Leading and Succeeding on the Business Stage, which purports to show how “Shakespeare’s shrewd understanding of palace politics and the strategies of work can just as easily be applied to the twists and turns of the corporate world.” Try this, Sarah, from Macbeth: "I dare do all that may become a man/who dares do more is none.”
The more Palin is blamed for John McCain’s demise the more I think she will outstrip them all. In fact, forget about Shakespeare. She reminds me of Nicole Kidman’s character Susanne Stone in Gus Van Sant’s classic 1995 comedy To Die For. Stone/Kidman, if you recall, is the relentlessly ambitious small town redhead who is as keen-witted as she is dumb, manically focused on getting to anchor her own show on TV. She is propelled toward her celebrity goal by such killer lines as “Gorbachev might have accomplished so much more if he had had that big purple thing taken off his forehead" and the Warholian insight “You aren't really anybody in America if you're not on TV.”
On Saturday Night Live last week Palin showed she had a key attribute for long-term political survival: the ability to pretend she finds humiliation amusing. The comedy-show ritual for politicians is a bit like humor in the seventh grade. Everyone wants to be in on the joke, but no one wants the joke to be on them. So Palin gritted her teeth and confronted Tina Fey’s devastating impersonation in the same red jacket and cottage loaf hairdo. Her newness to the game was reinforced by the way she pronounced Lorne Michaels' name—“Loren.” America’s most famous comedy producer is part of the new crowd that Palin is learning how to conquer.
According to Michaels, Palin couldn’t have been more of a gracious pro. She got to the NBC studio punctually at 4 p.m. “That’s the nice thing about Republicans,” he told me yesterday. “When they say they’re coming at four they arrive at four.” Then, says Michaels, she got down to work without any angst. “She absorbed changes very quickly. She could always ‘find her light.’ There was no attempt on anyone’s part to alter the moment, or change the tone of it.” She was actually more credible in the skit than her superstar co-actor Alec Baldwin who phoned in a weirdly perfunctory performance from cue cards. Michaels doesn’t agree with anything Palin believes but does think she’ll be continually underestimated just as “our end of the world” continually underestimated Ronald Reagan.
“There’s a real intelligence there,” he said. “She connects with people. She's got a confidence. Whatever it means to be a star she is. Plus I think she will do the work. She has incredible discipline. There’s clearly not a lazy bone in her body. She has managed five kids for God’s sake. She has a very clear strength.” He regards the Katie Couric debacle as a hazard of political life rather than a Rosebud TV moment. “Nobody can control the first movie they’re in,” he noted.
I suspect that Palin is harboring an angry contempt for her running mate and his handlers. The way they chose her in the first place reeked of dismissiveness. When Hillary got whacked, they made it clear that any skirt on the ticket would do, as long as she was sure to rouse the base. Then they treated her as an idiot and wouldn’t let her talk to a reporter. The Couric debacle was just about those idiots giving her the wrong lines. Rove, now bestowed with magician status by both parties, never allowed that to happen to Bush.
The new received wisdom is that when the Republicans lose, Palin, with a supporting Reality Show cast of Todd, Bristol, Track, and Trig, will cash in politics to become a high-rolling TV star. Why does it have to be either or? “Sunlight is the best disinfectant,” Lorne Michaels observed. “People always think Americans are easily deceived.” But look at the crowds who still pack stadiums for Palin and SNL’s stratospheric 14 million viewers. Not this election, perhaps, in this economic collapse, but sometimes, as we have learned, Americans just want to be entertained.
John Talks Joe
Lloyd Grove is editor at large for The Daily Beast. He is also a frequent contributor to New York magazine and was a contributing editor for Condé Nast Portfolio. He wrote a gossip column for the New York Daily News from 2003 to 2006. Prior to that, he wrote the Reliable Source column for the Washington Post, where he spent 23 years covering politics, the media, and other subjects.
The Right Dumps Carrie
Jacob Bernstein is a senior reporter at The Daily Beast. Previously, he was a features writer at WWD and W Magazine. He has also written for New York magazine, Paper, and The Huffington Post.
Geithner's Stock Plummeting
Jeff Madrick is a contributor to the New York Review of Books and a former economics columnist for the New York Times. He is editor of Challenge Magazine, visiting professor of humanities at Cooper Union, and senior fellow at the New School's Schwartz Center for Economic Policy Analysis. He is the author of Taking America, The End of Affluence (Random House) and The Case for Big Government.
Sarah Drops the Act
Tina Brown is the founder and editor-in-chief of The Daily Beast. She is the author of the 2007 New York Times best seller The Diana Chronicles. Brown is the former editor of Tatler, Vanity Fair, The New Yorker, and Talk magazines and host of CNBC's Topic A with Tina Brown.
Sarah Palin, the Musical
Tina Brown is the founder and editor-in-chief of The Daily Beast. She is the author of the 2007 New York Times best seller The Diana Chronicles. Brown is the former editor of Tatler, Vanity Fair, The New Yorker, and Talk magazines and host of CNBC's Topic A with Tina Brown.
Hillary Finally Doffs Her Burqa
Tina Brown is the founder and editor-in-chief of The Daily Beast. She is the author of the 2007 New York Times best seller The Diana Chronicles. Brown is the former editor of Tatler, Vanity Fair, The New Yorker, and Talk magazines and host of CNBC's Topic A with Tina Brown.
Tina: You're far too smart not to know that "retard" is a grossly hurtful and ignorant way to refer to someone with an intellectual disability, and to use it in the context of a story about Sarah Palin - herself the proud mother of a such a child - was most insensitive and painful. Hard as it may be for someone as prominent as you to distance her/himself from the Hollywood "elites" represented by Ben Stiller (God help us), PLEASE find some other way to make your point without using this term that people with intellectual disabilities, and those of us who are truly graced to have them in our lives, find so deeply hurtful, uncaring, and offensive. You're clever enough and smart enough to show some true class and sophistication by removing this term from this article ASAP. PLEASE step up and do the right and caring thing without further delay. Thank you.
Americans want to be entertained? At time perhaps but during a crisis when our retirement, education and billions a month going to a war that we have no wager in? Are you Freeking nuts? IF that is YOUR take on what is happening in this country? Good luck maintaining your "opinion" as having value with anyone other than those sucking up.
I, and millions of others, could give a hoot if Sarah Palin can act, is she has strength or if she can spit out kids and drag them around the country with her! WE WANT someone who can LEAD us in times of crisis and make INFORMED decisions when the need arises! Palin Cannot and has shown that she is incapable. As a woman? I am OFFENDED at this pick by McCain and As a Republican? I am SICKENED that my party allowed it to happen when the majority of the party? KNOWS she is a detriment.
Your remark as to the people who swarm to see her? Do not represent a majority nor do they come close to the mumbers that Obama or even Biden command due to people honestly supporting their policies. One only has to look at the tons of video at UTUBE to see the racist spittle flowing at the Palin events.
Palin will be lucky if she can retain her position in Alaska when this is over if McCain loses. As for T.V? Good lcuk with that when thousands of talented actresses over 40 cannot find good roles.
Get real or leave and let someone with talent have YOUR spot before this blog goes under too.
"Sunlight is the best disinfectant" is not a Lorne Michaels line. It was first uttered by Justice Brandeis with reference to the 1st amendment.
Dear Sarah has experience in front of a camera sportscasting. Dear Sarah would, answering questions without a script, collapse under the demands of grammar and intellect.
Sarah Palin was awful on Saturday NIght LIve -- as unfit for TV as she is for office. If the medium is the message the message is She can't see Washington from Wasilla.
More importantly, the anti elite message she is meant to embody is insulting to our country. I don't want an uneducated President any more than I want a veterinarian to do my brain surgery. (my apologies to veterinarians). I want a President who was Editor of the Law Review at Harvard.
What Sarah Palin brings from Wasilla is ambition so boundless, she is blind to her own limitations. That is a huge failure of judgement -- something she needs for the job she is running for.. So yes, in that context she will endure ridicule or anything else she finds on the road to what she somehow believes she is qualified to pursue.
She will also lie -- say anything -- she is told to say which in the current context makes her perfect for the demeaning role
she is playing.
She actually appears to have no authentic sense of humor so I don't see a Sarah and the First Dude Reality Show lasting more than a few episodes. They aren't even the Brady Bunch.
But she may prevail and that is the worst thing I could say about the Republicans and politics in our country.
I'm a blue guy living in a deep blue state (New York). But if Sarah came to town I would definitely go her rally.She looks like a lot of fun and as long as her goofy ideas has no chance of effecting my life I wish her well.
The polarized response to any comments on Sarah Palin -- be they pro or con -- seem to say more about the writer than the subject.
Tina:
Your are getting lost in ther skin of things, your adoration of words and intelectual games takes away any substance from your article.
Unfortunately this country is getting divided between the elite media, that you so unfortunately caracterized above, and the blatant ignorance of Palin's followers.
Try to remember that two wrongs don't make a right, two false premises can't give you a true response. Next time you sit on front of the keyboard, please kick out the Tina that still plays the games of hide and seek, or stir and disturb, or droping names, and please allow the real writer inside you to take that seat and do what serious writers and politicians do, Lead. ( perhaps that is what people sees in Barack Obama, auntenticity)
Remember, there is a big difference between not being compromised, and not having a point of view.
In simple words, be honest, keep it simple, be truthful or you may find yourself with the crew of entertainers, dancing their lifes away in the circus of this world.
And we, the viewers with our insatiable need for drama and celebrity will be there sitting in front of the screens, anxiously waiting for the entertainers to burst in flames.
"Then they treated her as a retard and wouldn't let her talk to a reporter. "
I suspect Ms. Brown's choice of words is a lame attempt at appearing hip and youthful. To my ears it only accomplishes making her sound like an insensitive bully. Hopefully she will do better next time.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_disability-related_terms_with_nega tive_connotations
Joe Biden is the scary one - do you really want him a heartbeat away? He is loonly tunes. Sarah Palin is the new Ronald Reagan that the Republicans have been waiting for, Like Reagan she is despised by the left & like Reagan she is a governor & a former sportscaster. Her college degree in communications have server her well. She can wipe SNL off the map. Sarah will be the first female president whether McCain wins or loses.
I think this article makes a good point. I don't believe that Sarah Palin is dumb. I disagree with her ideas and don't think she is qualified to be vice-president, but many of my relatives are very impressed with her and think that she has a lot of potential. I think we will see Sarah on the national stage after this election, although only time will tell how much she learns and how smartly she conducts herself.
Tina,
I wouldn't be too quick to report "Loren" Michaels doesn't agree with "anything" Sarah believes in, since Mr. Michaels donated $2500. to McCain (Q2, 2007--after making a donation to Chris Dodd in Q1). Make you wonder doesn't it, or is he just hedging his bets?
Sarah Palin makes a great...Governor of Alaska.
Tina: it's Macbeth, not Lady Macbeth, who said "I dare do all that may become a man; Who dares do more is none." Act I. Scene VII.
Palin's appearance on SNL certainly falls into the category of "good sport" but it also came off somewhat lame. Her showing up on time doesn't mean much to the citizens of this country who realize that this woman wants to be a star, and she'll do just about anything to get there. That is not what we need in the White House.
The best insight in this piece is the one about Palin having contempt for McCain and his handlers. I suspect that Palin understands well that this race is probably lost (I shudder to say it, but we could all still be surprised). Her goal now is establish a firm base of enthusiastic support on the lunatic right of the republican party--something she can rely on when she runs for the republican presidential nomination, either in 2012 or 2016.
"Palin showed she had a key attribute for long-term political survival: the ability to pretend she finds humiliation amusing."
Brilliant and true.
Sarah Palin is Dan Quayle in a skirt.
Gov. Palin is the political equivalent of a trophy wife, or second wife. Cute in social situations, dresses appropriately, with just the right amount of sex appeal. Will defend her man, and make him look younger and virile. Smart enough to have a cocktail conversation, but you wouldn't hire her to run a part of your business without a handler. Citizens should treat her as thus and women should be offended.
"She reminds me of Nicole Kidman's character Susanne Stone in Gus Van Sant's classic 1995 comedy To Die For."
I think a more apt comparison is with Tracy Flick, in "Election." Remember her? That soundtrack behind Tracy during particularly psychotic moments plays in my head sometimes when I see Palin "performing."
Feminists detest Sarah Palin because of her stance on abortion, and that she hunts. Oh My God ... the woman actually knows how to gather her own food and lives off the land. Where do myopic elitists on the Upper West Side think their veal comes from and the brutal conditions the animals are subjected to, or what hormones their dinner was injected with? At least Palin and many of her fellow Alaskans know where their food comes from. The irony of some Liberal feminists ... they deplore the killing of animals as barbaric and backwards, yet abortion ... now that's modern humane forward thinking.
If Palin wants my approval, she'll first have to improve her voice. And if she can't, then I'll have to deny her the Broadmoor precincts of Colorado.
You give her too much credit. The Couric disaster was not about having the wrong lines, it was about not having enough lines and having to rely on her own "intellect."
Where's the job description for VP. Those that like her quote her experience and the haters dimiss her without judtification.
VP's go to state funerals and reside over an already established organization if #1 departs. She certainly is a new kid on the block not accepted by the establishment or news orginizations. I'll bet she will grow into the job like all the others.
Tina, what an excellent articulation of the deep, ignored nuances of the personal toll of being a candidate. Thank you for such a cogent and exploratory discussion.
Thank you.
As a first time user, your comment has been submitted for review. It can take anywhere from a few hours to a day or two for your comment to be reviewed, depending on the time of week and the volume of comments we receive.
Please log in to leave comments.