The Sarah Palin Binge

By Patrick S. Adams 11/07/09

   When Sarah Palin left the governorship of Alaska at the end of July, her supporters stood strong and tall. Websites devoted to the former governor continued springing up across the web with the same vigor as they had before her resignation and since her selection as vice presidential candidate. Membership in pro-Sarah websites grew instead of contracting as most typical thinkers would have thought. But the termination of her Twitter account timed simultaneously with a self-imposed exile so she could write her book and “bone up” on the issues left her fans somewhat hungry. Like addicts “jonesing” for a fix, Sarah supporters were doing radio broadcasts and writing blogs just so they could talk about her and keep the positive flame alive in an environment where left wing bloggers and the mainstream media were doing everything they could to finally put her to rest. Now, Sarah Palin is coming back to bookstores and TV screens across the nation and her fans are about to binge.

    It was about a week after the election and I’m having a conversation with a friend of mine who, although far from being a liberal, was raising concerns about Sarah Palin’s viability as a potential 2012 candidate. Of course, the usual things came up like how she didn’t seem to be ready for primetime and that he didn’t think she was as smart as a Newt Gingrich or a Mitt Romney. That’s when I asked my talking point question. Upon what information are you drawing these conclusions? Are you drawing these conclusions based on what is being said about her in the mainstream media, or have you actually researched her and found areas of legitimate weakness that need to be brought to light?

    His response was “that’s a good question.” My friend then went on to say that he thought the Katie Couric interview killed her and that seeing Alaska from her house was just a childish answer to a serious foreign policy question. That’s when I pounced. I was like, “see! See I told you the mainstream media lies were why you think the way you do.” I told him that, of course as we all know, Sarah Palin never said she could see Russia from her house. I made him Youtube the video where she talks about being able to see Russia from an island off the coast of Alaska and how she as governor is responsible to activate the National Guard if Putin rears his head in Alaskan airspace. He agreed with me that I was right about the Russia from her house comment and ended the discussion by saying “right now, I wouldn’t vote for her. But she still has four years to get up to speed and who knows.”

    I’m an intellectually honest guy. A lot of people respect my political knowledge. I consider my credibility to be a very important and valuable thing. I’m not about being all high and mighty about having a B.A. in political science, but I am proud of my interest in the subject because I love America to the bone and my degree is a personal symbol to me of my love for my country as well as the love for Ronald Reagan that interested me enough to pursue that degree. So, I would never do my credibility or degree a disservice by lying about a candidate or spinning a candidate just to fit the square peg of a misguided ideology into the round hole of reality. Nor would I ever back a candidate that I did not think was qualified, honest or representative of my views.

    For example, I had a deep affection for Mark Sanford. I would yell at the screen every time he came on Fox News. All of the information I had to that point told me that this was a quality guy. Would I chose him over Palin if he ever ran against her in the primaries? No. Palin, as far as I still know today has the most integrity I have ever seen in a political candidate since Ronald Reagan. She is ideologically my soul mate. And I do admit the bias. But the bias comes after the fact, not before. I am a political scientist, albeit by hobby since I don’t get paid for it, but it helps me in my business and it helps me learn the human stuff that you need to know in order to work at being successful. As a political scientist, I consider it my job to research and learn about issues and candidates. I have my beliefs and I have my reasons through my understanding of natural order as to why I think our country’s leaders have to do things a certain way and have to believe in certain philosophies and principals.

    It was with great sadness and heaviness of heart (okay I admit I even shed a couple of tears) that I had to step away from Mark Sanford. I could not in good conscience spin what he had done and continue to push him as the conservative voice I once thought he was. The first time I ever jumped off a political bandwagon because of moral turpitude was when I was 11. Nixon was about to be impeached for Watergate. I admit in 1976, I didn’t know who Ronald Reagan was. I rooted on Ford because that’s all I knew. But as I grew into a more aware high school student and the events of the Iranian hostage crisis were unfolding, I got more involved. I knew there was a tough guy named Reagan out there. And I knew Jimmy Carter had to go. Ronald Reagan won in 1980, I bounded up the stairs toward the projectionist booth of the movie theater where I worked fist pumping. When inside I high fived my co-worker, Kenny, who was also my age 17 (and thus neither of us could vote) and Don, the projectionist who was a middle aged guy.

    The statute of limitations has probably long since expired, so I will admit this. Don gave Kenny and me a beer and we drank in celebration of Ronald Reagan’s victory. That’s when I began binging. No, not on alcohol, but on Reagan. When the hostages were released a half hour after Reagan’s inauguration, I knew I had found my man. The more I learned about him, the more I loved him. I even went to the library after getting frustrated over the New York Times’ reporting on supply side economics. I studied it and read magazine articles about it. And in doing so, I gained a deep interest in political science itself. I learned about different ideologies. They taught Marx in college of course, but they also taught Nietzsche and Nazism. I sought out knowledge about the entire length of the political spectrum. I soul searched and questioned myself, just like any good existentialist should do. I realized two things after examining ALL the facts. I am a Catholic and I am a conservative. So it wouldn’t surprise anyone to know that I “binged” during the Ronald Reagan / John Paul II era. I mean I really binged. Because I was drinking beer with some friends on the Fourth of July one year, I had to go in the house to use the bathroom. But I never came back out for  over an hour.

    It was during that “beerless” hour that I binged the most. It just so happened I walked into the house just as Ronald Reagan began delivering the Statue of Liberty speech. I immediately hit the couch and glued my eyes to the set. My friends asked me what happened and I told them that I was watching Ronald Reagan. The economy was booming and good times were being had by all. I advanced my career quickly during the Reagan years and made a decent buck, which allowed me to drive a nice car and do things like go to the Hamptons or go on canoe trips with my friends. Then it was over. Until now.

    There are many I see online who are younger than me and do not have the warm and fond memories I have of living during the Ronald Reagan years. They don’t yet know what it’s like to binge, but they do know what it’s like to be out. These are the Sarah Palin fans who are in their 20’s. When she ran for vice president, we binged. But it was a short binge of only a couple of months. Yet we wanted more. We spent our waking hours wondering where our next dose of Sarah was going to come from. I mean come on, I even read the Anchorage Daily News every day hungering for anything Sarah, even if it was negative (I knew negative press would reinforce the fact they were scared of her and that meant she was still viable).

    The fear of the unknown only hit me twice since I’ve been a Sarah fan. First, when Troopergate broke and then when she resigned. It was because of Troopergate, though, that I was able to get through her resignation without having to be talked off the ledge. In fact, Sarah Palin herself made sure I didn’t even go on the ledge when she tweeted to her supporters that it was all good. But the real reason I didn’t go to the ledge is that when I researched Troopergate I realized it was bullcrap. The next day Sarah Palin was explaining it to reporters and I looked into her eyes through the TV screen and I had this feeling of calmness overwhelm me. I realized at that very moment that I trusted Sarah Palin to the core. The real reason I didn’t go to the ledge when she resigned is that I remembered the look in her eyes as she explained Troopergate. And I knew that she would not lie to us when she explained why she resigned. I told everyone that day not to worry. People asked me for answers. I told them only Sarah Palin herself can give you the answer.

    That discussion with my friend about a week after the election led me to sit down and be realistic with myself. I had to face the fact that Sarah Palin had a credibility problem with a lot of people (through no fault of her own). When I looked at her, who she really was, rather than be disappointed, I was amazed. The Sarah Palin who ran for vice president with whatever faults she may have had was still more amazing and more appealing than any candidate I’d ever seen since Reagan.

    Then I said to myself in a hypothetical dialogue with liberals: if you think she’s big now, wait until 2012. She’s going to be a behemoth! The political scientist in me realized that the left and the media elite were treating Sarah Palin as if she was a snapshot in time. I realized that was wrong. I rebutted that position by saying she is an evolving candidate. I was too young to watch what Ronald Reagan did before he became president. So I hit the computer and researched the hell out of the pre-presidential days of Reagan. I also bought “Rendezvous With Destiny.” I realized that what I was seeing with Sarah was the “political childhood” I had missed with Reagan. Reagan became the man for me a half hour after he was inaugurated, not in 1964 or 1976. Sarah Palin became “the woman” for me the night she gave her acceptance speech at the Republican National Convention.

    I got to see Sarah Palin’s governorship. I got to see her exile. I got to see the part that I missed with Reagan. If Sarah Palin could draw 60,000 people to a rally, electrify the Republican base the way she did and develop such a strong devout following all in the matter of a few months, can you imagine what she could do in the matter of a few years? It’s mind boggling. Katie Couric? That’s nothing. There was no 24 hour media or internet around when Ronald Reagan dropped his note cards, scrambling them, before screwing up a major speech big time prior to the 1980 primaries. His handlers thought he wasn’t up to the job, never mind the press. He’s just lucky Shannyn Moore wasn’t there when he dropped the cards, otherwise it would have been all over the Huffington Post and then later that night on Countdown!

    Sarah Palin was an accomplished governor and mayor when she was selected as the VP candidate in 2008. She had focused all of her efforts on governing Alaska. She knew every nook and cranny of energy policy and how the oil and gas business worked. Did she know who the president of Khazakstan was? Probably not. When asked about the bailouts, she told a reporter she would have to get more specific information on how the Fed wanted to do them but knew to say that in general she doesn’t favor bailouts. Sarah Palin did not spend the years leading up to her nomination as vice presidential candidate studying Federal Reserve banking policy. She was too busy putting together ACES and AGIA. The Bush Doctrine meant nothing to her, not because she wasn’t intellectually curious, but because she was a citizen politician learning the nuts and bolts of how to be a great leader. Learning the Bush Doctrine was not going to put any money into her pocket; being a strong leader for Alaska was, and as such, that got the priority.

    Handlers say that Sarah Palin was such a fast learner that they soon got over the fear they had about her going up against a political veteran like Joe Biden. There was the impression that Sarah Palin could cram more information in an hour than most could cram in a week. Now consider this. Since July it’s been what 3 months? Sarah Palin has done more preparation for being president than she’s ever done in her life. Sarah basically did the work equivalent of earning a PHD in political science during the last three months. And she wrote a book doing it. There are going to be a lot of people who are going to be not only surprised, but shocked at the politically mature and ridiculously charismatic Sarah Palin we are going to see in just a few short days. Buckle up and strap yourself in folks. The Sarah Palin we are going to see is going to blow our minds. Tina Fey is going to have to totally re-do her act if she wants to satirize the new Sarah Palin.

    Already, word on the street is that she looks great, is no longer looking too thin and has that twinkle in her eye again. They even (Beehive is going to love this) say her hair has gotten longer and fuller! Sarah Palin supporters are about to get more Sarah than they can possibly handle. It’s going to make liberals sicker than dogs, but it’s going to be binge time for Sarah Palin fans. Ladies and gentleman, you are about to see what happens to a snapshot in time when she becomes an evolving candidate. You are about to see what happens to a electrifier when she becomes a behemoth.