The McCain bounce #2: Sarah Palin

Sarah Palin

Media Matters

We've just finished discussing the media and how Barack has been sidelined in the last few weeks. Sarah Palin was the most important factor in setting McCain up for a bump in the polls. Palin was brutally, unfairly and ridiculously attacked by the left-leaning Media.

These media folks were not attacking her because they hate her. They know that sensationalism gets good ratings! Hate or Love Palin, but it moves product to talk about her... the more personal the better. The Media surely was spurred by their preference for Obama but their first motivation was selling copy. This motivation was misunderstood by the folks. When people saw Palin being attacked they assumed it was primarily because the media was 'in the tank' for Obama. Starting with that miss-perception the dichotomy of the Media vs. McCain was reinforced, further sidelining Obama and costing him in the polls.

Victim Politics

Unfortunately for Obama these attacks turned Palin into a victim around which the vast political middle rallied. Hate is really ugly and that's what the response to Palin looked like. Coupled with the fact that nothing that has come to light is really significant enough to make people who weren't going to vote against her anyway question Palin herself. Some of the things that have come up have even helped her. The attacks on her family and the fact that those attacks came before attacks on her record offended the very demographics where Obama was weakest: white women and working class white men. The charges that Obama was out of touch with real American folks were reinforced by the assumption that the Media=Obama in combination with it's shameless smearing of a character with which people identified.

To Obama's credit he's tried to fight this off. He knows that the Media is hurting him, and as I reported on this blog, he's condemned the mean-spirited attacks. He has stuck to the more reasonable (if slightly ironic) attack that she's not ready to be president should McCain die. That's a valid point, she's not ready. Thankfully, she's also not running for President.

The feminist factor

I'm also convinced that the tension between identity and ideology within the feminist movement has helped Palin. Too many of those middle American white women who otherwise support Democrats for economic reasons are turned off by the extreme leftist social agenda championed by 'feminists.' E.G. to be feminists do women really have to philosophically support abortion? The backlash against 'type 1' feminism was already a well documented phenomena. Those women who are happy to see women advance and have the opportunity to earn equal wages for equal work etc. do not necessarily embrace the entire leftist agenda that was adopted by feminists in the 60's. Don't forget that Dr. Laura's audience is mostly women and that it is remarkably shallow to dismiss this big group of women who are proud to embrace some of the traditional female roles as stupid. So Palin's a woman, and she's advancing. That alone will get her some votes from women who will vote their identity. Because they're disenchanted with the ideology of feminism and are being offered an alternative the leftist attacks on Palin feed into a pre-existing gripe that especially lower-middle class traditional white women have with a Democrat party with which they would otherwise support.

Conclusions

So Palin moved the dial on her own and she reinforced some of the factors that were already hurting Barack Obama. That still wasn't enough though, when people went to check out John McCain's speech, watch his commercials and read his website they still had to like what they saw... or at least consider him a safe alternative to Obama. More on McCain tomorrow.