But the goal of the neoconservatives—who in those days were still principally focused on domestic rather than foreign policy—remained better government, more mindful of tradition, and respectful of the values of the people.Again with the Sarah Palin! What's wrong with these guys? You'd think they'd get a clue and stop bringing her up. It's becoming crystal clear that she was far more qualified than the lefties' darling, Barack Obama, to be president. He is just not an executive of any kind at all. He'd struggle if you put him in charge of a Dairy Queen. Meanwhile, Caribou Barbie's management credentials are pretty darn good.
How did this prudent outlook devolve into the spectacle of ostensibly intelligent people cheering on Sarah Palin? Through the 1980s, the neoconservatives became more focused on political power and less interested in policy. They developed their own corrupting welfare state, doling out sinecures and patronage subsidized by the Olin, Scaife, and Bradley foundations. Alliances with the religious right skewed their perspective on a range of topics.
As an aside, Jim Treacher has the Top Ten Reasons to Accept That Job Offer from David Letterman, with number one being "After the sex, he lets you keep the Palin wig." That pretty much typifies the left's spazoid reponse to the former governor of Alaska.
The rest of the Weisberg article goes pretty much along the standard lines, giving bland analysis and exemplars of the kind of corruption and dimwitted pandering that is the natural consequence of big government no matter who is in charge. His entire article could be rewritten, substituting liberal for conservative and it wouldn't miss a beat.
The premises upon which Jake's article is written - global warming is a monster problem, health care is a disaster, etc. are accepted without debate as if there is no position save the one he holds. If you start with such a beginning, then the rest of the article is extraneous. It's like writing an article wondering why people who dispute basic math are so intellectually bankrupt. You don't need to bother writing it at all.
In the end, Jake flounders because he fails to ask the real question, so enraptured is he with the famous and powerful figures of politics and media. That question is this: Why in the world did we ever think that we could get someone else to solve our problems for us?
4 comments:
Sarah Palin is like the jolt of current applied to an amputated frog leg - a stimulus guaranteed to get a response. The left can't help it.
To be clear (other than the fact I found this site thru Head Noises) I voted for Palin and not for McCain. The fact that the left are so intent on destroying an Alaskan woman who is far more experienced in government-type managerial duties than the current CiC is telling. The left is so afraid of the woman it has to spread as many lies as possible in the hopes something sticks in the minds of the "unwashed masses" who don't actually do any research whatsoever.
But that whole effort on the internet? You have got to be kidding me. People who do political reading on the internet are not nearly so "unwashed" as people who only think politically on the day before the first Tuesday following the first Monday in November.
I give the dude an "E" for effort, which turns into an "I" for incomplete at the end of the term. If no further work is done, he will get an "F" for failure (which is what I expect he'll get).
You know, it's all good fun (and accurate) to point out that Palin had more executive experience than Obama, but to imply that she actually had a *lot* of executive experience is, in my opinion, inaccurate (and rather spoils the joke on Obama, to boot. It's barely even significant to say, "Obama has less experience than this other person who is actually quite experienced", but it becomes quite a slam when you can say "Obama has less experience than this other person who has practically none themselves").
I mean, from what I see, her executive experience amounts to:
-four years as mayor of Wasilla. For comparison, Wasilla is about the size of Houghton, the town where I am. Mayor of Houghton is not even a full-time job, and right at the moment I don't even know who it is (I generally only am aware of who the current Mayor is when it is somebody I know personally, usually in connection with their day job). I find it hard to believe that Mayor of Wasilla is a major executive challenge.
-Two years (at the time McCain picked her) as governor of Alaska, a state with a population of about 600,000. There are 46 states, and about 25 cities, that have as many or more people than Alaska, and around 100 cities with populations that are at least a third that of Alaska. The governors of all of those states, and mayors of most of those cities, would be at least as much executive experience as running Alaska. Governing one of the three smallest (by population) states in the Union is certainly more than mayor of a small town, but it still isn't much, especially when it's only for a couple of years.
Aaand that's it. I'm not counting the Wasilla City Council or the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission as "executive experience", because from what I have seen, both city councils and comissions mainly just exist to give final approval on decisions already made, and not really to make in-depth executive decisions.
She may or may not be a good candidate for president. But in my opinion, claiming that she is good because of her "extensive executive experience" makes a mockery of the whole concept of meaningful experience. There are literally tens of thousands of people with more relevant executive experience than her.
Tim, she also ran the family business. So she's got public and private experience as a chief executive. At some point, size no longer matters. With her family business, she directly oversaw all employees. In Wasilla, she might have had one layer of management between her and the employees. Once you get to the governor of Alaska position, the scale of the job is about the same as that of any other mammoth enterprise. She had department heads, division heads, section heads and so on. That's a non-trivial experience and she seems to have executed it with competence.
Personally, having done management jobs at a couple of levels, I wouldn't distinguish between states. Once you hit the governor spot, even if it's Wyoming, that's the big time right there. Arnie's daily schedule in California wouldn't look much different from Sarah's days in Alaska.
At her age, the amount of chief executive experience she has, say 6-10 years, isn't insignificant. It's enough to get the measure of the person. Again, she seems to have discharged her duties with competence, if not a stellar performance.
Finally, we weren't picking from everyone in America. If we were, we might have elected Meg Whitman. (We still might!) We were picking from the ones running. When you compare Sarah to the other three, she blows them all away.
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