Elizabeth Wurtzel! Think out loud!
To paraphrase Lillian Hellman, I don't agree with a word that Sarah Palin says, including "and" and "the."
Fair enough. "And" and "the" are of course prominent among the few actual words Palin seems to be able to use correctly in sentences ("uh" doesn't count). If you're going to try to figure out what she says, you're kind of stuck with "and" and "the," given her well-known difficulties with polysyllables.
And as a liberal feminist, it drives me absolutely bonkers that Palin is the most visible working mother and female politician in America, that she is the best exemplar of a woman with an equal marriage, that she has put up with less crap from fewer men than those of us who have read The Second Sex and marched in pro-abortion rallies and pretty much been on the right side of all the issues that Palin is wrong about.
Hillary Clinton is a very visible female politician in America. She is the Secretary of State. Nancy Pelosi is also a very visible female politician in America. Both of them are women. Both of them are mothers. Both of them have far better claims also to be "working" as "politicians" than Sarah Palin does, insofar as they do other things than quit their political jobs, collect money from resentful morons, and pay other people to talk shit on Facebook.
I have my issues with both Clinton & Pelosi. But they didn't quit their jobs. They work. On the most elemental level, it's insulting to class them with Palin.
But let us grimly proceed.
So I suppose I should confess: I like Sarah Palin. I like her because she is such a problem for all these political men, Republicans and Democrats alike, with their polls, and their Walter Dean Burnham theories of transformative elections, and their economy this and their values that--and here comes Palin, and logic just doesn't apply. She speaks in spoonerisms, she raises wretched children, she's a quitter, she's a refudiater, she shoots moose and beats halibut, she has a dumb accent that doesn't have the charm of Charleston or the Brahmin of Boston--really, she is just a lot of quirks.
But it doesn't matter. It will never matter and I bet it never has mattered, because Sarah Palin is hot. She has sex appeal. That's why people like her. That's the whole story. Everyone has to stop trying to deconstruct and decode it, because there is no accounting for chemistry, and Sarah Palin has lots of it going on with her public. I don't think anyone knows or cares what in particular she stands for, other than some general conservative cache of principles, because they are in love with her.
Sarah Palin causes wingnut morons to masturbate, and everyone else hates her because she's a cretin with no interest in or aptitude for governance but yet she bitches incessantly about politics and for no clear reason this gets her media coverage even though she has not a clue about anything remotely connected to policy.
How likeable of her: despite all this, recall, she has tits that defy logic.
The brand of "liberal feminism" on display in the foregoing is of a class I confess to having been previously unacquainted with, but I am simply fascinated to have here encountered it -- speaking, as always, as a scientist.
There is, you know, more.
The Democrats are total morons for not finding their own hot mama before the Republicans did so first, or maybe I should have left off the qualifiers and called it straight: the Democrats are just plain morons, at least where women are concerned.
Yes, the Democrats are morons. Even where women are concerned! But perhaps not having sufficient know-nothing "hot mamas" is precisely the issue.
Let's pause a moment.
I suspect Wurtzel knows just how deep down she is, because as everyone knows, when you're stuck in a hole, maniacally flinging shovelsful of shit is way more tempting than the more dignified but less gut-level-satisfying "stop digging" option.
Let's un-pause now.
The right wing, for whatever weird reason, has been much more receptive to outrageous and attractive female commentators who are varying degrees of insane or inane, but in any case are given a platform on Fox News and at their conservative confabs. Look at how great life has been for Megyn Kelly and Laura Ingraham and the assorted lesser lights. But there are no Democratic blondes, no riot grrrls on the progressive side of politics, no fun and fabulous women in the liberal scene who could pave the way for a Palin. Yes, there are women who are successful in the Democratic party, but none of them are successful because of their feminine wiles, none of them have played up their sex appeal the way Palin has. MSNBC's female host is Rachel Maddow, who is completely good in all manner of ways that good can be good--but still I must ask: Where are the policy babes?
Where are they right now after having read that? Cringeing?
Because it's not (omigod) an argument about how to get women to be interested in anything. It's an argument about how to make idiot males want to rub themselves. Which they'd do anyway, but gosh if you can make them feel Rigtheous at the same time... why, maybe you could even quit your job and still get paid!
Anyone with a sense of humor, a sense of fun, and a sense that women should be taken on their own terms really ought to like Palin. I mean, of course, you should hate her at the same time, but you should hope she is the beginning of revolution, grrrl style.
There is something here worth addressing. Being able to put on a good show is of course an invaluable skill in politics, and from I suppose a game-for-the-game's sake perspective you can step back and say, yes, Sarah Palin sure does know how to play the game!
But then is this new? Is the "hot woman who espouses anti-feminist positions" some sort of... revolution?
Perhaps not. (!)
Maybe "women who are taken on their own terms" are women who don't accept men's terms as a baseline?
Anyhow it really is not the show that matters. Feminism, as I understand it, is not at all about the show. It's about the tangible. Wage equality. The right not to be raped. The control of your body. It's about the tangible on the most incredibly basic of levels.
The thing that I always have to remind myself of, is that this politics shit is not a game. It's about fundamental questions of how human beings should be treated. (Should we drop bombs on foreigners recklessly? Should we raise the temperature of the globe?)
Maybe the difference that matters is between those who believe in games and those who believe in causes and effects.
If so, we're of course fucked, but it's an interesting point to consider. I mean, we've fucked anyhow.