My Sarah Palin Problem

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McCain posted three excellent articles on The Daily Beast. I still don’t know if this is a progressive, conservative blog, or [is it possible?] perhaps an unbiased source. Whatever the case, there are two excellent posts on The Daily Beast by Meghan McCain.

  • My Sarah Palin Problem;
  • “Stop the Gay-Bashing GOP”[Carl Palladino]; and
  • My Feud with O’Donnell”

    I did not wake up Sunday morning expecting to create any kind of uproar and I am even more confused that people seem to be so angry. Leading up to my appearance, the more research I did on Christine O’Donnell, the more worrisome her being elected to the Senate seemed to me. It wasn’t even all of her bizarre comments, which have been getting endless media attention—on witchcraft, anti-masturbation platforms, and her testament that she had secret information about China plotting to take over America—that bothered me. No, what really stood out for me was the Federal Elections Commissions allegations against her pertaining to misuse of campaign funds, her alleged history of failing to pay taxes, the allegations that she lied on multiple occasions about which colleges she attended.

Nice.

These posts from a [heaven forbid] bona fide Republican? Which begs the question: Is the tide turning in the GOP to deride ignorant, knee-jerk bigots?

Well, here’s hoping.

I hope you read the McDonnell and Pallidino posts. This post encapsulates McCain’s antipathy regarding the media obsession with Sarah Palin and its failure to give voice to other, more intelligent women. Damn time someone spoke out. Maybe this post will force the media to broadcast progressive views, also.

Seems at least some more moderate Republicans are fed up with the tea party shouting them down. The tea party and the media seem to have an impossible time shutting up Meghan McCain. Whether some ghost writer published these posts is anyone’s guess: but she’s adding her support to a more moderate perspective. It’s a start… I hope…


As my book tour for Dirty Sexy Politics comes to an end, there are a few things that have surprised me about its publication. I expected some backlash from former campaign staffers (check) and a complicated conversation with my father (double check, he didn’t read it until two weeks before it hit stores). What I didn’t expect, however, was that instead of the media concentrating on my admission of almost overdosing on Xanax the day before the election, or my goal for a new “big tent” direction for the Republican Party, or any of the other racier confessions in my book, they only focused on Sarah Palin. In every interview and review it was all Sarah all the time.

Now, I will give you that there is the obvious curiosity about my father’s running mate. And yes, I was there when she was picked, which is documented clearly in my book. But I was on the road for 18 months as opposed to Sarah Palin’s 60 days, which is why more than three quarters of my book is about the part of the campaign before she joined. Only a small portion of the time dealt with Sarah Palin, mainly because I thought that story had already been told and what I added was the small portion of my perspective, which I had been asked about repeatedly over the past year. But none of this seemed to matter, and it surprised me because by all accounts the recent election was one of the most historic in recent memory.

Palin started haunting my book tour from day one when on Good Morning America I interrupted my interview with George Stephanopoulos to tell him, “My book isn’t just about Sarah Palin.” It was a domino effect from there. Backstage at most shows, I would beg producers to keep the Sarah Palin questions to only a portion of the interview, instead of dominating the whole conversation. I found myself fighting to convince people interviewing me that my book was about things other than Palin and interesting for many reasons. All authors have to convince the viewer of an interview that their book is worth reading—but I found myself more than anything just trying to separate myself and my story as far away from her as possible.

Everyone knows there is a media obsession with Sarah Palin, but I don’t know if everyone has quite realized that the obsession has become a fetishization. The further I got into my book tour last month, the more paranoia set in as I started questioning the idea that the only thing that made me interesting to some people was my association with Sarah Palin. Sarah Palin, not my father John McCain. And for that fact, it seems that the only thing that gets any kind of major media attention when it comes to women in politics is either Sarah Palin or her numerous impersonators. These are the people that are creating and dominating the political narrative for women in this country. In the Nashville airport in the midst of my book tour, I picked up the recent “Mama Grizzlies” cover of Newsweek, which asks this very question. Why are only women like Sarah Palin getting nominated for elected office and receiving all of the media attention? This is the question that has been plaguing me since the release of my book.

Are women only interesting in today’s political discourse if they are Sarah Palin or Sarah Palin impersonators (no matter how bad or poorly knocked off the impersonation is)? Is this it? Is this it for my generation of women for all foreseeable election cycles in the upcoming years? The media has become so obsessed with all things Sarah Palin-related—even dare I say, eclipsing the obsession with President Obama—that they seem more concerned with her versus anything or anyone else. Maybe this isn’t a surprise to everyone in the media, but for me on my book tour it was.

I thought two years after the election there would be something or someone more interesting. But there isn’t, and now the question remains will there ever be? Must we, as Republican women, clone ourselves in every way as Sarahbot’s to have a serious chance of running for office? And if so, what kind of dangerous message is this sending young women? It isn’t that there is anything wrong with Sarah Palin as a politician per se, it is that there apparently isn’t any room for anyone else in 2010 and beyond. The majority of the questions I was asked from the people I met during my book signings were not about Sarah Palin. And this is important to note because it seems that the media’s obsession doesn’t necessarily correlate to what Americans want to know.

Then just as I reached the point where I woke up and elected to stop focusing on the media’s obsession with Sarah and to continue my own one woman revolution (if you will), Sarah Palin made it known to me via an email to a third party that she was not pleased with me or what I wrote in my book. I found it surprising but I had to see the humor and, of course, appreciate the obvious irony. It seems the Sarah Palin media obsession goes both ways. They are both mutually obsessed with one another and the relationship is cyclical. It is the chicken or the egg conundrum. Every tweet of Sarah’s makes headlines and every network puts what she says on its newsfeed. This is the era that we live in, and I’m just hoping both Sarah and the media will at some point make room for other opinions. In the meantime, I won’t hold my breath, but I also won’t quit speaking out for the women who aren’t just imitating her.


Uplifting, huh?

Meghan McCain

About Post Author

Dorothy Anderson

I want to know what you think and why, especially if we disagree. Civil discourse is free speech: practice daily. Always question your perspective.
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13 years ago

Gee Stella, I been saying Meaghan McCain is the bee’s knees for being a really fine example of New Republican. Great post sweetie. Holding a good thought for Boxer and Brown. And that DA from San Fran. Alas, I, am leaning bloodied and blade broken against the S. FL wall.

Rusty Shackelford
13 years ago

Well,you certainly made my point for me.Thank you.

Rusty Shackelford
13 years ago

One Fly,are you off your meds?If not you may want to check with your doc about upping them.

Reply to  Rusty Shackelford
13 years ago

Glad you brought that up because this is a reason the dims can’t win sometimes. Dims will rip each others guts out to prove to others just how smart they are over minor issues. Happens all the time when there is disagreement.

I knew one other Shackelford in my life and he was a simple fuck as well. texan too.

I stand by what I wrote that one is better off not believing the shit hat comes from gopers.

Did I mention you can kiss my ass as well!

Your a repug aren’t you and probably masturbate yourself to sleep at night fantasizing about the imbecile from Wasilla who has not one idea of her own.

13 years ago

Meghan is the sexiest Republican alive.

13 years ago

Sorry guys I just do not trust these people not even a little bit. Now the gopers are saying they want to stop this women (Palin). I just have to call bull shit on that as I believe it’s a ploy by big whore media to give the gopers credibility where there is not a damn bit of it.

Palin and the baggers are the gop. Never once since Obama was elected did the gopers and panty leaders of the party say boo about the bat shit crazyness of this group of whackos who really are the Republicans of today.

It’s a pure lie just like everything else that comes out of these killer bastards mouths. Do not fall for it. When they get a chance they’ll cut our throats so fast you won’t know what happened.

Jess
13 years ago

Both her and her mother came out against prop h8 which was nice to see also. It’s too bad she can’t pull her dad in that direction he always says he is, the moderate direction.

Stella by Starlight
13 years ago

Her “Stop the Gay-Bashing GOP” [Carl Palladino] and “My Feud with O’Donnell” are also great reads. And, yes, Bro. both thumbnails are Meghan McCain. Smart women can be blonde and beautiful, too. (I know you aren’t being a dirty [deleted] man.. right Bro?)

More political compromise, less idealogical antagonism, will make this country a great nation again.

13 years ago

I’ve liked Ms. McCain ever since she pissed off Ann Coulter and Laura Ingraham. Anybody who can do that is A.O.K. in my book.

Reply to  Will "take no prisoners" Hart
13 years ago

I’m with you there Will!

Stella by Starlight
Reply to  Will "take no prisoners" Hart
13 years ago

…and she did a brilliant job, Will. I hope she’s an example of th new GOP.

Reply to  Stella by Starlight
13 years ago

This is probably not a fair and/or apt analogy (this, in that the woman is still quite young and inexperienced) but the way that Meghan McCain has taken on the right-wing of today’s Republican Party is at least somewhat reminiscent of the way that Margaret Chase Smith took on Joe McCarthy in the ’50s/Lowell Weicker took on the Nixon administration during Watergate. One can only hope that it’s a portent of things to come.

Admin
13 years ago

Sarah Palin is a complete idiot, at least on a global scale, and within the political paradigm, although there are others like Christine O’Donnell, and etc. I rather like Meghan McCain. I will read this book.

P.S. Is that thumbnail pic Meghan?

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