She’s Lina Lamont. No wait, she’s Geraldine, too.
“Palin has devoted a dismayingly prominent chunk of her book to scapegoating communications aide Nicolle Wallace for supposedly forcing her to wear designer clothes.” Nov. 17, 2009, Boston Globe editorial.
Salon’s editor, Joan Walsh, put this headline on her opinion piece yesterday: ”I have Palin fatigue already.” Me too. No, not really.
Here’s Walsh’s thought, way down at the end, that prompted me to awaken from blog hibernation.
So while I’m not worried about President Palin, I remain worried about President Obama. I’m particularly concerned that his increasingly triangulating, anti-deficit administration will do the wrong thing, morally and politically, and move to the right, without understanding that some right-wing rage could be rechanneled by acknowledging its roots: That the economic system seems rigged for the have-a-lots v. the have-a-littles, and despite their promises, the Democrats haven’t done enough to change that. Palin can’t change any of that, but Obama can. There’s still time for him to do so, but the clock is ticking.
I agree that populist sentiment on the right could be rechanneled, but I wouldn’t leave it up to the president or the Democrats in Congress to take charge of the effort.
Liberal citizens could do more. We could not only rechannel populist mojo but reclaim it. What if progressives started showing up at the next round of town halls to agree with bits of the anger at the way things are going, but suggest other means to change it? To decry Wall Street dominance of the halls of power right along with our louder neighbors, but point to other ways out?
Cultural and ideological gulfs are so hard to bring oneself to bridge. Reminds me of a Therapy Sisters song. The Austin, TX-based female folk ensemble sings about how easy it is for feminists to claim identification with the suffering of third-world women, but not so easy to throw in with the bow heads (sorority members) across campus.
