Revisit: Sarah…Decent Speech, But A Big Strategic Mistake
By Justin Gardner | Related entries in 2008 Election, McCain, Palin, Republicans
With news of Palin’s popularity dropping like a rock, I felt it appropriate to talk about how she got here.
The day after her speech I wrote a post called “Sarah…Decent Speech, But A Big Strategic Mistake” where I laid out the reasons why her speech would ultimately fall flat. The biggest one, though, was this…
- Why give a speech that was really designed to rally the Republican base when John McCain consistently gets more Republican support than Obama gets Democratic support?
The answer of course is that she gave that speech because that’s Sarah Palin. She is part of the base, but she missed an opportunity to really reach independents and, at the time, I thought it was a mistake.
Now, it certainly wasn’t just her speech, but her speech (and the claims within it) paved the way for the tumultuous two weeks that were to follow.
- First, there were the multiple stories about her reformer background (Bridge to Nowhere, selling the plane on eBay, earmarks) that simply didn’t add up or were just outright falsehoods. Every day we were fed a new claim about Palin by the McCain camp that could be very easily disproven.
- Then there was Wooten and Monegan and the audio tapes and the judge’s order and all the other stuff surrounding TrooperGate. Ultimately, her firing of Monegan might be vindicated, but that still has yet to be determined. We’ll know more when the investigation concludes in a couple few weeks.
- Then the McCain camp hid her from the press and told them that they would tell the media what they needed to know about Palin. So instead of just sitting idly by, they started to dig through every publicly available inch of Palin’s past.
- And then there was the Charlie Gibson interview, which now had a giant klieg light pointed at it since McCain’s people refused to simply to open her up to the press. And she made a big flub about the Bush Doctrine and unveiled a flip-flop when she claimed she had never said that global warming wasn’t man made.
And so goes the misguided rollout of the woman who could be VP. The McCain/Palin ticket may still win, but it’ll be in spite of the strategy unveiled in her convention speech, not because of it.
This entry was posted on Saturday, September 20th, 2008 and is filed under 2008 Election, McCain, Palin, Republicans. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
September 20th, 2008 at 2:06 am
There should be no panic, no worry, no concern. Consider it a blessing that the darkest days leading to winter, simply leads to spring.
Natural Law.
The MediaOcracy-the new SEXY Government, developed by the puppet handlers, Wall Street, and Corp America.
Via Political “Ladies of the Night” The “media” going ALL IN, will now be at the back of the McCain-Palin Bus, Obama, having lost by 20%+.
No more access for traditional media as they rememberd it. They will want to forget it..It hurts so good.
Obama will NEVER be in national politics again. That simple.
It’s the culture stupid!. Thank you!
Tony Venuti experiential, social philospher
InPolitically Correct and BEYOND PUKE
KFNX, NewsTalk Radio – Phoenix
1100am, streamed live
Monday’s 10am – 11am
http:www.beyondpuke.com
September 20th, 2008 at 4:00 am
It’s a base pick. Of course it makes no sense to us; because we are rational, moderate thinkers.
Conservatives honestly believe that they are the majority … but that their message is unfairly suppressed by the “liberal” media. (I listen to a little talk radio in my car sometimes).
To be fair, I also used to post on a message board where the majority of members were Very Liberal. They just as honestly believed that Dennis Kucinich could/should be the President … if only it weren’t for the “conservative” media suppressing his message.
I still can’t quite figure out exactly how or why John McCain made this pick.
At this point though, no matter what else comes out about “Sarah”, the true believers are already fired up. In the end, I agree with you, I think it will actually contribute to McCain losing the Presidential race. But, I do think the enthusiastic base may help shore up some red state congressional seats.
… and whether McCain realized it or not, that may have been the ultimate goal of whoever convinced him to make this pick.
Just a theory.
Todd
September 20th, 2008 at 4:00 am
Yes and No. What your missing here is that McCain is lacking in the infrastructure of campaigning. He is missing the campaign offices and the organized GOTV effort that was essential to GWB getting elected. McCain may have been getting their vote according to polls but he was not getting their effort on the ground. He needed something to get those people out in the community. Palin was his answer to that.
The Republicans as a party are held hostage by the different aspects of their base. You cannot win without all the pieces and although McCain had the nominal support if he had gone the indy route he would have seen some major push back and possible loss of those votes.
September 20th, 2008 at 9:17 am
Hiding her from the press worked great when she was getting race reviews. Now that big questions concerning her credibility and ethics have come out, she either needs to answer real questions, or she’s going to drag McCain into the gutter with her.
http://palincounter.blogspot.com/
September 20th, 2008 at 6:33 pm
Palin was a gamble. McCain hoped that if he waited until the last possible moment to bring in a dyed in the wool far right wacko he could excite the far right base and keep the moderate and centrists he had already brought on board to win the GOP nomination. If he just kept her out of the limelight, there was a chance he could keep it all, but he;s now repudiated everything he once stood for and the middle and moderates are abandoning him.
It’s over. He’s done. He sold his soul for a shot at the presidency. He’s not a maverick anymore, and that was all he had going for him. Standing up to his own party only works when you actually do it–taking on Palin was the ultimate cave in to the fringe right
p.s.–Anthony, what the heck did any of that mean? Was that some sort of political Haiku?
September 20th, 2008 at 9:39 pm
It’s as Gerryf says. Favorability polls show McCain’s numbers falling more or less in unison with Palin’s.
http://www.prospect.org/csnc/blogs/tapped_archive?month=09&year=2008&base_name=mccains_favoribility_drops_too
While part of that may be due to recent economical developments, it’s hard not to attribute a lot of that fall to Palin. The buzz she generated gave McCain’s campaign a shot of energy and popularity, but with such attention comes scrutiny. With McCain’s campaign largely based on massive spin and outright lies these past two months, the McCain campaign just couldn’t afford any scrutiny at this point and would have been better served by letting Obama remain the center of attention and trying to define him as too inexperienced, too partisan, and not someone a responsible person would vote for during such serious times. This strategy was proving to be effective during the summer, but they threw all that out when they chose Palin and are now trying to run a “me too!” change campaign with zero substance.
That said, any person McCain chose for the vp slot would’ve been a negative for him, since he’s one of the few big name Republican with the reputation for being a moderate (though that reputation is looking more and more undeserved by the minute). Hagel and Giuliani are perhaps the only other two, but I can’t imagine his advisors would have allowed him to choose either–and with his base barely managing to stomach him as is, putting another perceived moderate on the ticket might have kept the GOP base at home in November. I still think Huckabee would’ve been a good fit with both social conservatives and moderates–his more populist economic leanings certainly would come in handy for McCain about now as he does a 180 on most of his past economic positions–but we’ll never know now.
October 4th, 2008 at 10:30 pm
To Gerry F. .Take a peek at http://www.beyondpuke.com I would be interested in your comments.
July 4th, 2009 at 2:42 pm
i can’t figure out if that first one is spam or not.