jab: Strong conservative? Really? If Obama ever let the word “collectively” or the phrase “share the wealth” slip out of his mouth, the right would have gone bonkers calling him a socialist, Marxist, Communist… oh wait… Gee, must be easy to rail against the evils of big government while simultaneously handing out checks for over $3000 to every Alaskan…

A poor choice of words for someone who wants to be the darling of the conservative movement, I agree. However, I prefer to judge people by their actions.

Alaska received a major windfall of oil wealth not long after Gov. Palin took power, some of which was due to the general rise in oil prices on the world market.

However, much of it also resulted from a farsighted overhaul of the severance fees the oil companies pay to pump the oil that the people of Alaska do collectively own on their common lands, for better or worse. Fees on established fields were raised, while new exploration and development were incentivized with lower fees, and a crusty accumulation of back-scratching loopholes written by many generations of good ol’ boys of both parties in the Alaska Legislature were abolished.

The person who went nose to nose with some of the biggest multinational corporations and their armies of lawyers and lobbyists, and bent them to her will, was of course Sarah Palin. So much for her taking no interest in governance.

Considering the influence that Big Oil wields in Alaska, I’d like to see one thing President Obama did before taking office that even remotely compares. Hell, he’s completed much less in comparative terms even after being inaugurated. Cash for Clunkers, anyone?

Now, a “true” collectivist of the kind infesting the progressive wing of the Democratic Party would have taken that big pot of gold, and squandered every penny and then some on big-government boondoggles.

Gov. Palin realized that this would be foolish and unsustainable when oil prices fell and hard times returned, so instead she socked away something like $10 billion in the rainy day fund, and returned the remainder to the people who own the oil.

Every Alaskan has benefited from her good sense and willingness to defy the special interests. They benefited then, and they are benefiting now, and that is why she had an 88% approval rating when she was just Sarah from Alaska and not the damaged unsuccessful VP candidate she is now.

If she can recapture that magic– and I think she can– and win the nomination on her own merits rather than the token selection of an old has-been… well, the sky’s the limit. She’ll need to bring up her game in interviews, which is already obviously under way, and we’ll need to see more detailed policy proposals. And if I were her I would run as a Goldwater style libertarian conservative, soft pedaling the theo-con stuff, which is indeed the way she governed Alaska. If she does all that, I can surely see the possibility of her winning the nomination.

A female candidate who has achieved that milestone via her own efforts will be seen in a very different light by many of the women who voted against her, perhaps even by some of the nastiest feminist bitches on the far Left who profess to hate her. Those Democrats guffawing about how much they’d like her to win the GOP nod should be careful what they wish for.

Richard Aubrey: Did you ever try to have a conversation with an engineer who shows signs of Aspergers? They know everything about something but are almost completely incapable of anything but the most literal communication.

Hillary, Bill, Condi and Newt are all wonks. Neither Aspergers nor big picture deficiencies in any of them.

PersonFromPorlock: I think flyover-America hopes Palin will reduce unnecessary government interference with its daily life, something that neither Establishment Republicans nor Establishment Democrats have shown any interest in doing. [emphasis original]

I think this is known as ‘begging the question’. Hard as it may be to believe, few liberals support government interference entirely for its own sake. There is at least a nominal purpose. We see over and over again pseudo-conservatives mouth absurd bromides about waste-fraud-and-abuse control paying for tax cuts. When the deficits hit, they wash their hands of all responsibility. I’m not surprised Sarah Palin doesn’t explain which “unnecessary” government programs need to go (the Alaska Permanent Fund might be a good place to start—snicker); she is courting the crowd that literally carries protest signs “Get your Government hands off my Medicare”.

In the book, Palin proclaims what we liberals knew all along, that she is a Biblical Creationist. She comes from a (hopefully shrinking) strain of evangelical America that is downright contemptuous of book l’arnin’. I can’t understand why readers of an intellectual blog, regardless of their political place on the right side of the spectrum, feel some connection to her. Maybe it’s the wink.

I will never cease to be baffled by the far right’s pseudo-populism of asserting, without evidence, that ordinary people in what they insist on calling “flyover country” share their views about everything. In reality, the people of “flyover country” are big fans of their Social Security and Medicare and curbs on the ability of Wall Street bankers to destroy the economy.

The people of flyover country are indeed scared that they will lose their Social Security and Medicare – things that the government forced upon them. Does that mean they are big fans in the sense they would vote for them today?

The bankers are part of the elite that this reaction is against. Those bankers, btw, vote with the left for the most part. It is the left that seems to believe that capitalists are conservatives or vote conservative, when capitalists tend to vote (or better yet, donate) in their own interests – which in the case of big money/big corporations often means supporting whatever pols will benefit them. Money has no ideology, and money people often leave their ideology at the door when dealing with the policy of on over-present government.

So I guess my question is: if we agree on the only fact related assertions you made, why is my post attacked on “asserting, without evidence, that ordinary people in what they insist on calling “flyover country” share their views about everything” ? Besides, I have lived in flyover country almost my whole life.

Perhaps you have your own pre-conceived notion on what the “far right” (meaning anyone to the right of you, I guess) know or believe about the folks in flyover country.

John Moore: Anti-intellectualism is a healthy response to intellectuals who believe that their superior education (read: narrow but privileged) and elite status entitles them to be masters of the universe. It is saying, correctly, that elites who get too full of themselves, start acting entitled, and decide they know better than Joe Six-Pack in flyover country, need to be brought down to earth.

Wow, so many fallacies wrapped into one paragraph. Straw man, false dichotomy, appeal to imagined majority, mind-reading …

I will never cease to be baffled by the far right’s pseudo-populism of asserting, without evidence, that ordinary people in what they insist on calling “flyover country” share their views about everything. In reality, the people of “flyover country” are big fans of their Social Security and Medicare and curbs on the ability of Wall Street bankers to destroy the economy.

Leo Marvin:
Because the President’s familiarity with subjects he makes and executes policy about is preferable to his ignorance.The more familiarity the better.

Does “wonk” not have the connotation of being so tightly focused on specifics that one does not get the big picture? Too abstract and not real-world? I don’t know, maybe it doesn’t.

I see her pandering to an anti-intellectual populism which apparently appeals to some Tea Party conservatives.

Those anti-intellectual populists are on to something real: the “intellectuals” and other elites are now loudly lording it over us, telling us how to think and what not to say, controlling our health care, spending our tax money in advance, and avoiding blame for screwing up our economy royally.

Anti-intellectualism is a healthy response to intellectuals who believe that their superior education (read: narrow but privileged) and elite status entitles them to be masters of the universe. It is saying, correctly, that elites who get too full of themselves, start acting entitled, and decide they know better than Joe Six-Pack in flyover country, need to be brought down to earth.

Intellectuals have brought us great things, but they have also brought us such horrors as the French Revolution and Communism.

Learning is good; higher education is good; both are worthless without a grounding in reality and a recognition that neither by itself provides wisdom.

Richard Aubrey: Wonk, disguised or not, is a good thing for the POTUS to be because….

Because the President’s familiarity with subjects he makes and executes policy about is preferable to his ignorance. The more familiarity the better.

Richard Aubrey: Wonk, disguised or not, is a good thing for the POTUS to be because….

I never said anything about this one way or another.

I hear you. But as someone who is highly critical of Sarah Palin, I think it’s legitimate to criticize BOTH the people defending her as some sort of wonk-in-disguise, AND the people deriding her sparse credentials notwithstanding their having voted for now-President Obama.

As someone who is not highly critical of Sarah Palin, I certainly agree.

I can find things to like about Palin. Her being a wonk-in-disguise isn’t one of them.

I have already offered one VC drinking game today, but if you want a second one, here it is: Every time a commenter defends a perceived weakness in Sarah Palin by arguing that Barack Obama has the same weakness — drink.

I hear you. But as someone who is highly critical of Sarah Palin, I think it’s legitimate to criticize BOTH the people defending her as some sort of wonk-in-disguise, AND the people deriding her sparse credentials notwithstanding their having voted for now-President Obama. Might you at least agree to that?

AWH: hardly, one of the advantages of coming from a rural background where my father had is own farming business and then going to a top school is that I gained the ability to fairly judge both arenas. It’s given me the ability and experience to see when either side isn’t what they appear. The problem with many “wonkish” types is that they want to closely define the boundaries and terms of their debates — even if those terms and boundaries have nothing to do with reality. One funny part of the past election was that Brooks was entranced by Obama’s ability to talk about Niebuhr. Big deal, on my undergrad campus there were probably at least a thousand people who could have discussed Niebuhr in more depth than Obama,and of that group there was probably only a handful I’d trust to manage a local McDonalds.Of course, you keep a straight face while writing this — even as you dismiss Palin as someone who appeals to “anti-intellectual populism”. The problem is that the people who support Palin don’t think that “nobody is smarter than anyone else”. Indeed, they think they are smarter than the people who are on the other side (or at least who were on the other side last fall) — and the reality is that they have generally been proven to be correct given the current presidency.

Guys in my high school used to discuss Niebuhr all the time. No big deal. Most of them are not only manager at Mickey Dees, but also much more knowledgeable than Obama.

…In other words, if someone you disagree with sounds like he knows what he’s talking about, he must be a clueless liar pretending to be smarter than you.

hardly, one of the advantages of coming from a rural background where my father had is own farming business and then going to a top school is that I gained the ability to fairly judge both arenas. It’s given me the ability and experience to see when either side isn’t what they appear. The problem with many “wonkish” types is that they want to closely define the boundaries and terms of their debates – even if those terms and boundaries have nothing to do with reality.

One funny part of the past election was that Brooks was entranced by Obama’s ability to talk about Niebuhr. Big deal, on my undergrad campus there were probably at least a thousand people who could have discussed Niebuhr in more depth than Obama,and of that group there was probably only a handful I’d trust to manage a local McDonalds.

Of course, you keep a straight face while writing this – even as you dismiss Palin as someone who appeals to “anti-intellectual populism”. The problem is that the people who support Palin don’t think that “nobody is smarter than anyone else”. Indeed, they think they are smarter than the people who are on the other side (or at least who were on the other side last fall) – and the reality is that they have generally been proven to be correct given the current presidency.

These charges of hypocrisy are asinine in many cases.

Perhaps, just perhaps, these fly-over folks can distinguish between federal, state and local governments and what their appropriate (per the various controlling Constitutions) levels of involvement in daily life are.

The VA, for example, rather squarely falls under Congress’ enumerated powers to manage the military in all its aspects. Conversely, health care for civilians rests on an expansive reading of the interstate commerce clause or an even more abstract reading of “promoting general welfare”. The interstate highway system can be said to have a logical relationship to both Congress’ military powers (probably its strongest basis) AND a collateral benefit of enabling the freedom of travel and commerce nationwide simply by improving access and efficiency for all citizens.

Those are distinctions that don’t fit well on signs or soundbites but are very real. The snarky hypocrisy charges, which are trotted out as game winners, are trite and simplistic reponses to very real fundamental Constitutional issues.

C’mon…. I have to get work done today. I’ll be blott inside of thirty minutes with these two games in effect.

Heck, I’ve seen three motivations for liking Palin:

1. But….. Obama!
2. She’s really just like Reagan. Really.
3. She pisses off liberals. Because the best way to gauge the effectiveness of a leader is by how much they go out of their way to make large portions of the population angry.

Per Alaska’s Constitution (the rule of law) Alaska is an “Owner State”; the resources of Alaska (timber, wildlife, oil etc) belong to the people of Alaska (not the government of Alaska) as a group. The state government is required to manage those assets on behalf of the people and for their collective benefit.

Think of it as the Board of Directors of a corporation. They manage the assets, pay the bills, invest for the future and are regularly elected by and responsible to the citizens of Alaska.

The Permanent Fund (the state’s investment account) pays “shareholder” dividends from the investment dividends received (after operating costs and inflation-proofing are taken care of) to the people of Alaska.

That may be “socialism” by definition but it isn’t authoritarian statism.

Palin’s embrace of the process shows allegiance to the rule of law, not hypocrisy. There’s a lot of things to disagree with her on, hypocrisy on this particular topic isn’t one of them.

I’m not saying that I agree with any or all of this, or that these are the proper functions of government. I’m just saying that people expect a lot from their government, and I don’t see vast numbers of people saying that we have too many people checking up on the safety of our food supply.

PersonFromPorlock:
All true, but are you suggesting that it’s just too big a job? Or that government programs are Holy? I think flyover-America hopes Palin will reduce unnecessary government interference with its daily life, something that neither Establishment Republicans nor Establishment Democrats have shown any interest in doing.

I’m not suggesting it’s too big a job for anyone, I’m suggesting it’s too big a job for Palin, because she clearly has no understanding of the issues involved.

I’m pretty sure everyone is against “unnecessary” government interference, the question is what’s unnecessary. But “flyover-America,” as you term it, likes their Social Security and their Medicare and their highways and their financial markets regulation and their laws against selling contaminated beef…

JRL: Palin was my favorite of the 4 candidates.When I tell people why, they always laugh condescendingly–I liked Palin because she knows she’s not smarter than everyone else.The others were unaware that they shared the same limitation.

Maybe you’re referring to humility, which is very admirable, but it’s not what I see in Palin. I see her pandering to an anti-intellectual populism which apparently appeals to some Tea Party conservatives. It implies nobody is smarter than anyone else. The people who disagree with you are just dumber (or dishonest, or both). The logical gymnastics behind that sort of patronizing makes it pretty ironic, among other things. For example, you get stuff like this:

AWH:
When I hear the wonkish geniuses like Obama talk, I realize they are only trying to hide what they truly believe, or gloss over the fact that they have no clue about actually implementing anything.Governance to him is fooling the public into believing whatever seems most expedient to his career.

In other words, if someone you disagree with sounds like he knows what he’s talking about, he must be a clueless liar pretending to be smarter than you.

yankee: Nor is “getting out of the way” a trivial process. You have to decide what to cut, and how much, and which regulations to eliminate, and which regulations to reform with something less intrusive, and so on. Are you going to eliminate the “intrusions” of Social Security and Medicare? Repeal the Securities and Exchange Acts? Close our bases in South Korea? Cut taxes (which ones?) These are real choices with real consequences.

All true, but are you suggesting that it’s just too big a job? Or that government programs are Holy? I think flyover-America hopes Palin will reduce unnecessary government interference with its daily life, something that neither Establishment Republicans nor Establishment Democrats have shown any interest in doing.

geokstr: The left is absolutely disgusting. [...] The ends justify any means to help the Collective.

David Nieporent:
This is the second time in the past week I’ve been called a lefty in the comments on this site, though.

I don’t hear any denials.

Anyway, I’m not sure whether he’s calling you a lefty or a Borg.

This is the second time in the past week I’ve been called a lefty in the comments on this site, though.

I guess that settles it.

Oh my I do belive that Kerr has it.

And doesn’t this describe Obama’s career before he got the job? He voted present a lot, not taking his legislative role that seriously. He really didn’t accrue any executive experience (indeed, Palin has more) before taking the job at the top to which he felt entitled — much like congressional herd animal Kerry who had no clue what it’s like to be “the one man out there” before he decided to go big or .. go back to the senate and thankfully disappear back into the herd). Like Palin he talked a good game but hit me as frighteningly naive. He pretty much ran as the “It Girl” – and won as the It Girl.

No wonder why they hate Palin and have such hissy fits over her (I’m not her biggest fan and share many of Orin’s concerns but I like the dame – especially the Turkey incident and how it made certain people have conniptions). Palin is Obama in a dress.

Pailin’ purdier though (at least I think so.)

PersonFromPorlock:
By distinguishing “politics does” from “politics should.”
Cites? I suspect that for many Palinistas, government’s ‘doing something’ amounts to its doing nothing except getting out of the way, to the extent that it can; “a limited role” isn’t no role at all. Think Reaganomics.

Since when does anything Reagan did constitute “getting out of the way”? He cut some taxes (the top marginal individual income tax rate) but jacked up others (payroll, gas, corporate income tax) and also raised taxes by eliminating a bunch of deductions and loopholes. He jacked up spending and increased the number of federal employees. The C.F.R. got longer, not shorter.

Nor is “getting out of the way” a trivial process. You have to decide what to cut, and how much, and which regulations to eliminate, and which regulations to reform with something less intrusive, and so on. Are you going to eliminate the “intrusions” of Social Security and Medicare? Repeal the Securities and Exchange Acts? Close our bases in South Korea? Cut taxes (which ones?) These are real choices with real consequences.