Sarah Palin: Political Rorschach Test

In retrospect, it seems to me that Sarah Palin, as a media and political phenomenon, functioned most dynamically as an ink blot test for the left/right culture wars.

It is true that she was ill-prepared for the position and this reflected poorly on John McCain’s judgment, but there is no way to square the heat (both vitriol and adoration) that she spawned solely within the context of her as merely an inexperienced vice-presidential candidate. It isn’t as if selecting a running mate for primarily electoral motivations is an unheard of phenomenon.

It was the symbolism of her as a candidate, rather than her specific policy stances (to the extent she could even articulate them), that lead to nonsense such as the following from the left:

Her greatest hypocrisy is in her pretense that she is a woman. The Republican party's cynical calculation that because she has a womb and makes lots and lots of babies (and drives them to school! wow!) she speaks for the women of America, and will capture their hearts and their votes, has driven thousands of real women to take to their computers in outrage. She does not speak for women; she has no sympathy for the problems of other women, particularly working class women. [em: mine]

And as for religion, I'd love to know precisely how the Good Lord conveyed to her so clearly his intention to destroy the environment (global warming, she thinks, is not the work of human hands, so it must be the work of You Know Who), the lives of untold thousands of soldiers and innocent bystanders (He is apparently rooting for this, too, she says), and, incidentally, a lot of polar bears and wolves, not to mention all the people who will be shot with the guns that she thinks other people ought to have. An even wider and more sinister will to impose her religious views on other people surfaced in her determination to legislate against abortion even in cases of rape and in her attempts to ban books, including books on evolution, and to fire the librarian who stood against her.

The outrage here is that her gender identity is being used in support of political ends that are perceived to be in conflict with “real” womanhood. As if there is something logically incompatible with being both female as well as pro-life, pro-gun, and a supporter of the Iraq war. Isn’t this the ultimate in sexism? That one’s gender should ergo define one’s thoughts?

Look, you can argue against any of those political positions, but it doesn’t seem to me that there is an inherently “female” position to be taken. It is only when one passes through the portal of gender identity politics that the heresies become obvious.

By similar token, the symbolism of Palin to the right was equally nauseating:

At 44, Governor Palin is a bit young and relatively new to the political scene yet. These are no small considerations when electing someone who could assume the role of president (Democrats: Check out your nominee with that reservation . . . ). But if the youngest life she and her husband care for can wake up a nation that’s blind to the eugenics in its midst, a routine part of medicine today, she and John McCain would be offering human rights and dignity a great, honorable service. In contrast to Barack Obama, who would let the survivors of botched abortion attempts be killed, the Palins could serve as a great clarifier for voters this fall — and an education.

As much as she obviously struggled in her interviews, it mattered much less what she said, than who she was and what she represented symbolically to most partisans involved.