David Writes a Love Letter

With Valentine’s Day fast approaching, David Broder is skewering Cupid with his love for Sarah Palin in an op-ed at the Washington Post. Looks like someone else is seeing “little starbursts”.

And it’s so sad.

Blessed with an enthusiastic audience of conservative activists, Palin used the Tea Party gathering and coverage on the cable networks to display the full repertoire she possesses, touching on national security, economics, fiscal and social policy, and every other area where she could draw a contrast with Barack Obama and point up what Republicans see as vulnerabilities in Washington.

Her invocation of “conservative principles and common-sense solutions” was perfectly conventional. What stood out in the eyes of TV-watching pols of both parties was the skill with which she drew a self-portrait that fit not just the wishes of the immediate audience but the mood of a significant slice of the broader electorate.

Tea baggers = conservative activists? I was thinking pig-ignorant, racist assholes, myself. Or maybe just the ones that cheered Tom Tancredo’s earlier speech. Or Joseph Farah’s re-hashing of birfer memes.

But the mis-guided adulation doesn’t stop there.

This is a pitch-perfect recital of the populist message that has worked in campaigns past. There are times when the American people are looking for something more: for an Eisenhower, who liberated Europe; an FDR or a Kennedy or a Bush, all unashamed aristocrats; or an Obama, with eloquence and brains.

Yes, because Sarah Palin is EXACTLY LIKE Eisenhower, FDR or Kennedy. And I won’t even touch the comparison of Sarah Palin’s brains to Barack Obama’s. Bush comparison? Well, I’m having less trouble seein’ that one, you betcha. Also.

And finally his gushy conclusion.

Those who want to stop her will need more ammunition than deriding her habit of writing on her hand. The lady is good.

David, David. People are not deriding her for writing notes on her hand. People are deriding her because SHE NEEDED NOTES ON HER HAND TO REMEMBER THAT CUTTING TAXES WOULD BE A TOP PRIORITY FOR HER IF SHE WAS IN CHARGE!!!! She couldn’t trust herself to remember the most basic of all the conservative Republican mantras that exist. “Cut taxes”. She didn’t think she’d be able to remember that. Jeebus.

But what’s really funny about this whole thing? In the very same paper in which the love-struck David was writing his little Cupid’s message was a survey showing that Palin’s favorability ratings are continuing to tank and, furthermore, that over 70% of those polled believe she is unqualified to be President. Yeah, David. She’s good. Real good.

UPDATE: Minor edit above to clarify Rich Lowry/starburst thingie.

Posted by marindenver on 02/11/10 at 09:00 PM • Permalink

Categories: Politics • Barack Obama • Bedwetters • Nutters • Sarah Palin • Teabaggery •

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Ha! Rich Lowry doesn’t understand the grammatical distinction between “like” and “as,” so I fixed it for him:

Palin too projects through the screen ~~like~~ as crazy.

Comment by StrangeAppar8us on 02/11/10 at 09:09 PM

Fuck it, I think it’s time to pass a law that no one is allowed to wax rhapsodic about those wonderful “populists” in Teabagger Land unless they actually spend weeks and weeks and weeks with these people. Yes, Ms. Hamsher, that means giving up Tee Vee Face Time, and yes, Mr. Broder, that means getting out of fucking Georgetown or wherever you live and actually traveling to rallies all over the country, talking to these people, and (at least in Jane’s case) trying to make the argument about why MORE government intervention in healthcare is what these wonderful salt-of-the-earth anti-corporatists REALLY need.

I mean it. Wouldn’t it be hilarious to see Hamsher and Broder team up in their own 21st-century version of Sullivan’s Travels? (But I think we can all do without “a little sex” in this scenario. Shudder!)

Comment by Oblomova on 02/11/10 at 10:05 PM

This is a pitch-perfect recital of the populist message that has worked in campaigns past. There are times when the American people are looking for something more: for an Eisenhower, who liberated Europe; an FDR or a Kennedy or a Bush, all unashamed aristocrats

Populist message & “unashamed aristocrat?” What? George Bush was so “unashamed” of being an aristocrat that he bought a phony ranch on Rove’s instructions, so he could be seen “clearing brush” Reagan-stylee. Which he, of course, did on his August vacation, for the media, rather than in the winter months when real Texas ranchers do that sort of thing. Don’t think he’s even been to the place since he left office.

It’s one thing for Broder to acknowledge “she’s good,” w/o a qualifying “for & only for her base/fans/groupies,” but that paragraph indicates that he &/or his editor(s) are into full dementia.

Comment by M. Bouffant on 02/11/10 at 10:43 PM

On third reading, maybe Broder meant Bush Sr., H. W., 41, who has so receded into history that I’d forgotten him & his aristo ways. He was pretty shameless.