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The Spectacle Blog
I’m curious as to what readers make of Sarah Palin’s new TV show on TLC. Do people think it will make her seem less presidential? Or will it enhance her personal appeal? To my mind, the comparison with Ronald Reagan’s acting career doesn’t really hold up. Reagan was an actor who left Hollywood and went into politics. For the analogy to work, Reagan would have had to have resigned the California governorship, then appeared in Bedtime for Bonzo, and then run for president.
View all comments (77) | Leave a comment
More Blog Posts by W. James Antle, III
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Minuteman| 11.15.10 @ 3:04PM
That is not a correct comparison. Palin is not acting, she is narrating on the State that she has knowledge about. She's not playing a part as an actor, she's narrating a perspective on life from where she comes from.
By this standard would Fred Thompson's work in the time between him being a senator and then running for president have disqualified him ?
Alan Brooks| 11.15.10 @ 11:38PM
In other words, why raise the journalistic bar? it is low enough to do a limbo.
IN limbo.
Alan Brooks| 11.15.10 @ 11:52PM
... but not Limbaugh! he is a Master entertainer/wit even if his politics are same-old same-old.
Rush makes Will Rogers look like Howdy Doody.
ggoblue| 11.16.10 @ 6:46AM
alan, i am more interested in your take on minority leader pelosi and her flying monkey rebellion. how's that working for ya?
as for rush, he is a master at shoving your bs right back up your ass, and the majority of this country loves it. hahaahahahahahaha its fun to watch you creeps squirm.
Andrew Keirns| 11.15.10 @ 3:08PM
It's not what we make OF it; it's what she makes FROM it ($$ !!)
Margie| 11.15.10 @ 3:12PM
Right on, Minuteman.
And Andrew Keirns, you're just jealous! It's called The American Dream.
Sam| 11.15.10 @ 11:39PM
Indeed Margie and I will do all that I can to keep her living the American Dream and out of public office.
grant1863| 11.15.10 @ 3:24PM
Is the show worth watching?
LarryK| 11.15.10 @ 4:05PM
5 million people think so and in Hi-Def Alaska is beautiful!
Mikecampbelly2k| 11.15.10 @ 3:31PM
It didn't make her seem less presidential at all! She seemed very at ease, truly enjoying showing off her state to the rest of us. No acting, no handlers, no vacuous political rhetoric. I thought she came across as a personable middle American middle class mainstream every-woman. More power to her and here's hoping many people watch!
Nate Jones| 11.15.10 @ 3:48PM
How could anything she does make her appear less presidential? Her acute ignorance of the issues only enhances her appeal. She is a folksy mama grizzly who can't be stopped by those fancy elites with their big words and fact based arguments. You betcha!
kingsmill| 11.15.10 @ 4:41PM
"How could anything she does make her appear less presidential?"
If, God forbid, she followed your example and became a ritualistic Leftist.
alanstorm| 11.15.10 @ 4:23PM
Nate, if you could name a liberal - any liberal - with any actual facts at their command, your insipid snippet would mean something. However, it has become apparent over the last few decades that facts are something liberals want nothing to do with. There is nothing in liberals' arguments but appeal to emotion.
Nate Smith| 11.15.10 @ 5:42PM
I could give you quite a few liberals, as well as conservatives like Paul Ryan, that can play around with complete sentences. At the very least a good many of them could read an entire Wall Street Journal article before attempting to use it against the writer to prove phantom inflation ...
Tim*| 11.15.10 @ 6:17PM
Do Your Homework ObamaBoy.
"There might not have been a second round of quantitative easing, if Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke shopped at Walmart.
A new pricing survey of products sold at the world’s largest retailer [WMT Loading... () ] showed a 0.6 percent price increase in just the last two months, according to MKM Partners. At that rate, prices would be close to four percent higher a year from now, double the Fed’s mandate."
http://www.cnbc.com/id/40123509
victor| 11.17.10 @ 2:09AM
*XXXXX:
"A new pricing survey of products sold at the world’s largest retailer [WMT Loading... () ] showed a 0.6 percent price increase in just the last two months,"
.6%? WoW!!
For those in Rio Linda, that amounts to six whole cents on a Ten Dollar item in TWO months and 36 CENTS after one year if those increases hold steady over the course of 12 months.
By the way, who are those guys at MKM Partners?
One of them your notorious brother-in-law?
Do your Homework GroverNyquistBoy!
You're going gaga over 6 Cents?
Occam's Tool| 11.15.10 @ 9:13PM
Complete sentence lefties: Paul Krugman, although on every topic except economics he's an idiot, and on our current predicament, he's an idiot.
Otherwise: Nancy Pelosi---no. Joe Biden---hell, no. Harry Reid---no. Charlie Rangel---no. Even Hillary "duhs' a lot. And the Messiah---he corpses, man.
KDW| 11.16.10 @ 8:58AM
"I could give you quite a few liberals".
Well then give us some. Include some of
their favorite policy ideas with their fact
based solutions.
While your at it, throw in a couple of policy
prescriptions Sarah Palin supports and how she gets her facts wrong.
We're all interested in your input.
wodiej| 11.16.10 @ 9:32AM
I'm not interested in the liberal dumbthink input.
nohype| 11.15.10 @ 4:30PM
Palin realizes that she will never be treated sympathetically or even fairly by the gatekeepers of traditional media. They use all their sympathetic treatment to protect Barack Obama--they are trying to keep people from realizing just how big a disaster his presidency is. Attacking Palin wins awards and praise (see Couric, Fey, Parker). Hence, she is bypassing the traditional media, and this series is part of that bypassing.
By the way, if you have not been to Alaska it is difficult to appreciate just how spectacular that state is, and how different it is from the lower 48. My bet is that the Alaskan tourist industry will be a big winner from this series.
Sam| 11.15.10 @ 11:42PM
All of you need to stop acting like Palin is the messiah and wake up to the fact that she could be a very dangerous cancer to the conservative movement.
We should support not only real conservatives, but INTELLIGENT conservatives. I really hope John Thune and/or Mitch Daniels run. We need real leaders, not fake ones like Palin.
thirteen28| 11.16.10 @ 12:03AM
Hi. My name is Sam. I am a concern troll.
we need balls| 11.16.10 @ 7:11AM
sarah had em when it counted. in 2009. all the 'mainstream' republicans were sporting bb's.
if mccain had manned up and actually ran against obama he would now be president.
JRD| 11.16.10 @ 10:21AM
Yes, troll, let's elect another cucumber and mayonnaise sandwich like John McLame who no one will vote for. You know Dumb-0 is toast so you have to get a loser candidate as an opponent.
American's are fed up with Ivy League "Sheeple" who have been spoon fed progressive pablum.
Dumb-0 is not intelligent. Dumb-0 is also very polarizing. Dumb-0 had the right skin color, right socialist politics and, funky sounding name. However, polarizing Dumb-0 had no executive experience, no diplomatic experience, no military experience and, no private sector experience. In other words, polarizing Dumb-0 had no experience at all. Polarizing Dumb-0 is just the perfect example of the Peter Principle who petered out!
Palin is Harry Reid in a skirt. Palin is intelligent. Palin is a marketing genius. And, Palin is a success story. Everything polarizing Dumb-0 is not. Go lick your wounds. Palin is so intelligent she found away around the media to get her message out. Palin is the perfect example of American "can do" attitude. Keep bashing her. Palin is teflon. She just keeps getting stronger. Even the PUMA's are Palinistas now. Bye-bye. You polarizing marxists came so close but no cigar thanks to good old American know how.
jRD| 11.16.10 @ 10:24AM
Correction: Harry Truman in a skirt.
victor| 11.17.10 @ 2:19AM
Yeah, the Press just hated Harry's folksy manner and high pitched voice.
He did a lot things that were right and still got no respect.
History has been very kind to Truman and will be much the same for GW as well.
JD| 11.15.10 @ 5:14PM
The show isn't "Bedtime for Bonzo" or "Keeping up with the Kardashians". It is an 8-part travelogue about Alaska, a tour hosted by a former Governor and her family. If Rudy Guiliani did an 8-part series for Discovery showing off "his" New York City, or Jeb Bush did something similar on Florida, nobody would bat an eye. Because this is Sarah Palin's show - and because she is is feared equally by the elites on the right and the left - it is being reflexively mocked and attacked by people who haven't seen a frame of it.
I just finished watching the first episode, and I liked it. Palin comes across as genuine, charming and completely unaffected. She also comes across as tough, competent and self-reliant. Not bad qualities in a leader. (She also has a wicked sense of humor that doesn't spare herself or her family.)
Both in her strengths and in the qualities that make the snobs hate her (and underestimate her) she reminds me of George W. Bush. Both possess sharp minds that are rendered completely invisible to some people by their accents and folksy delivery.
Palin helped run a successful family business as well as working her way up from small town mayor to governor of a large and complex state.
Bush learned to fly fighter jets - not something many dumb people are capable of - and earned degrees at Yale and Harvard before likewise becoming a successful governor.
Yet these two are stupid, while a man never did an honest day's work in his life, hardly ever showed up for work during his brief stints as a legislature and can't put together two coherent sentences unless someone else has written then out and put them up on a teleprompter is held up as the smartest man in the world. He's so smart that by virture of his intellect he's entitled to tell us how to live our lives and we're supposed to shut up and do as we're told. And his utter lack of GOVERNING experience was supposed to make him perfectly qualified to be leader of the free world.
After 22 months of failed policies and a consistent refusal to listen to critics or the American people, Barack Obama is still held up as some kind of genius while Sarah Palin is supposed to be an idiot. You know what? Sarah Palin is capable of learning, considering new ideas and absorbing them. When she tries something and it doesn't work, she tries something else. She doesn't stamp her little foot and hold her breath and insist that she is right and tell all those stupid people who disagree with her to shut up and listen to her explain it all to them again, more slowly, until they get it.
I think the show helps her in the long run, because it works against the Tina Fey caricature. Ronald Reagan won the 1980 election the moment he appeared in a debate and didn't have horns and cloven hooves. The Democrats had so completely demonized him as an insane war-monger that as soon as the American people got a look at the real Reagan, the propaganda collapsed under the weight of its own ridiculousness.
Later,
Joe
P.S.
Favorite Sarah catchphrase, from the promo for the rest of the season:
"Don't retreat. Reload."
Margie| 11.15.10 @ 7:22PM
Wow JD, that was wonderful, thank you.
I too have learned that when someone is terrorizing you or trying to destroy you, the best thing to do is to keep on being who you really are, and screw them all!
Sarah's my hero.
Hank| 11.16.10 @ 1:10AM
Who is terrorizing Palin?
butterfly| 11.16.10 @ 6:52AM
People like you?
mickeymat| 11.16.10 @ 7:41AM
Agreed and great comment. Describing this show as a reality program is disingenuous. It is a travelogue. To characterize it differently demonstrates hostility poorly masked.
O'Riley| 11.16.10 @ 8:58AM
Well said, Joe.
wodiej| 11.16.10 @ 9:35AM
Yowsa....well said Joe!
B. Lindstrom| 11.16.10 @ 10:38AM
It is an 8-part travelogue about Alaska, a tour hosted by a former Governor
And why is she a "former" governor? Oh that's right - because she QUIT her job serving her fellow citizens in order to bask in the limelight and seek fame and fortune on the celebrity circuit.
Pathetic.
Mike W| 11.15.10 @ 5:35PM
I'm no liberal but I also think she is a folksy mama grizzly. I don't think she is as dumb as she sometimes acts, which makes her a master manipulator.
The Palinistas remind me of the Obama nuts from two years ago. Any insult of their man was met with an hysterical outrage that was disproportional for the situation. I see it as a deep insecurity in the skills and knowledge of their candidate and they realize that a thorough probing will show their candidate to be an empty suit (skirt).
To you Palin freaks, my Republican Party will not be so foolish to nominate this person and consign the USA to 4 more years of Obama.
Simon Templar| 11.15.10 @ 8:08PM
No, the hysterics seem to come out of the mouth of your ilk which seem to be inflicted with some kind of mental disorder that we could call Palin Derangement Psychosis. He usually begins with some hypocritical, illogical comparison and ends with a thinly veiled sexist or classist slur. As a Palinsta, I am hoping that the people choose the nominee through primary elections and not through the opinions of some smart ass harvard graduate or smug RINO columnist. If that does not include Palin because there are better candidates then so be it. The woman will never pass the mustard because you and your ilk hate what she stands for..so own up to it..and then we can at least have an honest conversation. Those who support her defend her not because we think that she MUST be the next president but rather because we are tired of your lame, unjust, and harsh slander. She gives voice to conservatism and has the guts to stand up to the BS that often is served out there as the standard fair of politics. You and your ilk are the nuts that need a good cracking.
Margie| 11.15.10 @ 10:35PM
And even if Sarah doesn't... pass the mustard... I'm sure she will do so with relish.
Gary| 11.15.10 @ 11:36PM
Hey Mike W. You mean your republican party isnt smart enough to nominate Sarah Palin.
Sam| 11.15.10 @ 11:46PM
Well said, Mike. But we have to be careful. The people on this site will work hard to get Palin the nomination and if the liberals are smart, they will too. The 2012 election is too crucial and I will not sit by as the "real conservatives" drive us off a cliff and ensure more Obama.
if the libs were smart| 11.16.10 @ 6:57AM
they would have kicked queen nancy into the pacific ocean on nov 3rd.
the libs are a bunch of flying monkeys.
Gary| 11.15.10 @ 11:47PM
Mike W. Its your republican party that is the reason Obama is in the white house to start with.
JRD| 11.16.10 @ 10:30AM
Palin will be just like Reagan in any debates. And MikeW, you are not a conservative. You are an Axelrod troll. Sorry, but you are just not believable. Suggest you go back for an Axelrod refresher course. Republicans are allowed to not agree with Palin's politics but you sir are just not believable.
Mike W| 11.15.10 @ 5:36PM
The show is really cheesy also. Don't waste your time.
simon templar| 11.15.10 @ 8:11PM
Well, five million viewers seem to think otherwise. You could always change the channel and see if Ms. Deggenerate is on or maybe what Oprah is up to....
victor| 11.17.10 @ 2:23AM
Hey, how many people are watching that new comedy show starring Kathleen Parker House Roll and Eliot Spritzer, eh?
Please, not to be mentioning that Ellen D'Lesbian while I'm eating, eh what?
Smurry| 11.15.10 @ 5:39PM
Dear JD,
I love you. Your comments are brilliant!
Love, #1 Fan
Ken (Old Texican)| 11.15.10 @ 7:09PM
I really like travelogues...(sp?)
How many of you have toured Texas?
About a third of our State is heavily forested.
Heh, I can just picture our governor riding horseback over a hill and stumbling over our down-town Houston... the most beautiful "skyline" in our country.
I hope Sarah makes zillions of dollars... then accepts a "stuffy ole' oval office" for eight years.
She is the type of person I could enjoy being a pen-pal with...and her/me.
if she were President.
Occam's Tool| 11.15.10 @ 9:17PM
Yup, it's a beautiful state---even the rest stops on the highways are nicer than other states. And speaking of Texas---
Imagine an attack on America's energy industry by state sponsored terrorists. Then imagine a President who is a panderer to Islamists, and who takes himself more seriously than the Constitution. Then imagine a white knuckle ride that never lets up!
We know the second statement is true, and the third statement is a book describing the first, called Texas Said No!.
Texas Said No! grabs you by the throat by page 6, and then is LITERALLY unputdownable through the last page, where it ends all too soon. To tell any more would be to give away too much stuff, but if you liked The Last Centurion by John Ringo, you'll love this one, as it is very similar to Ringo's book, only stripped down without any padding, slamming through its talking points like the TCU defense on a roll. If you care about your country and the course it's taking, buy this book and put it next to America Alone on your shelf. It's that good, and that important.
It is published as an E-book. Check it out at www.texassaidno.com
Gary| 11.15.10 @ 7:16PM
I watched the show and really enjoyed it. To all you Palin haters, get a life. To all you Rinos your times comming.
Sam| 11.15.10 @ 11:49PM
Gary,
You can like her and her show without putting her in the Oval Office. I think the show 'Jackass' is entertaining, but I'd never elect one of those clowns to office.
JRD| 11.16.10 @ 10:32AM
Yes, you did Sam. You voted for the Jackass-in-Chief, Barack 0bama.
Daniel from Michigan| 11.15.10 @ 8:28PM
Really?!? How about Bob Dole, John McCain and Rudy Guiliani appearing on Saturday Night Live - and for decorum Guiliani getting in drag for his appearance? How our current Commander in Chief appearing with John Stewart and being called 'dude'? And these examples are just off the top of my head - I know there has been more politians if I took the time to think about it. I typically enjoy your posts, but this one was beneath you as it reveals a bias and a double standard. You owe Sarah Palin a break - if not an apology.
Spicy Joker| 11.15.10 @ 8:34PM
The show is OK, but I'm not sure how her outdoor activities will be enough to sustain 8 one-hour episodes.
bluecollarbytes| 11.15.10 @ 8:59PM
The Left hates anything that makes Palin look good. Actually I think there are a number on 'the right' who think the same.
By the way, we're not going to elect a 'living monument', but an imperfect human being.
Occam's Tool| 11.15.10 @ 9:19PM
What no one has ever stated is what decisions Sarah will make incorrectly from a Conservative (TAS and NR) standpoint. I can't think of any, off hand. She will fight terror, cut spending, and keep taxes down. What's wrong with that?
Sam| 11.15.10 @ 11:55PM
What's wrong with that is that it is what every conservative is supposed to do and SAYS they will do. If it were that easy and painless, it would have already been done. She has no specifics...although most politicians don't. She had no answer for Bill O'Reilly, who asked her how she'd deal with the 12 million illegals here. And if you guys thing deporting 12 million people in an efficient manner is easy, remember that the most effective people mover (Hitler) could only move 6 million and that was with totalitarian control.
I'M IN NO WAY comparing deportation supporters to Hitler. It's just useful to remember how much power he had and how many people that power allowed him to move and kill. We are proposing to find, process and move twice the number of people that Hitler did with a government infamous for its fragmented power structure. Get real
JD| 11.16.10 @ 1:15AM
"She had no answer for Bill O'Reilly, who asked her how she'd deal with the 12 million illegals here. "
Strawman alert! The reason Palin didn't have a ready made answer for O'Reilly's (idiotic) question is simple: Nobody with a brain has even PROPOSED deporting the 12 million illegals already here. It is not and has never been a part of the discussion, except when raised as a distraction by the open-borders crowd.
Opponents of illegal immigration and proponents of border control don't talk about mass deportation of the illegals.
Why should they?
We're not under any obligation to "do" ANYTHING with these people. We should enforce our immigration laws and control our borders. The illegals already here can continue "living in the shadows" until and unless they're caught, in which case they get deported. If they find that uncongenial they can deport THEMSELVES. They managed to get into this country illegally without our help, when they had the right incentives, and they can manage to find their way back OUT by themselves when the incentives change. Between the economic downturn and the mere DISCUSSION of increased state-level enforcement, there is evidence that this process has already started.
We don't need a mechanism for rounding all these folks up and deporting them because it is a non-issue. The point is determining what happens going forward. We've lived with the 12 million this long, and they've been happy enough living here with their current status, so why rock the boat. Those who are only here waiting for the next amnesty that will let them jump the line over legal immigrants and get a "path to citizenship" will be disappointed and either have to accept life in the shadows or go elsewhere, but that's their problem, not mine. I'm not the one who snuck into someone else's country.
Regards,
Joe
Hank| 11.16.10 @ 1:22AM
Actually, Sam, not to get persnickety, but Hitler moved way more than 6 million. In all, about 12 million died in the camps -- 6 million Jews, 6 million people of other groups. Many more were moved to camps but not killed. I've never seen an actual number of all the people the Germans deported. I'd be interested to know it, but it was at least 12 million. -- And yeah, the videos of cops bashing through doors, dragging women and children out of their beds, day in, day out, in the tens of thousands, the inevitable abuses, assaults, the hostility of legal immigrants from the same communities, the criminality and corruption it would breed -- that's not sounding like the best of all possible solutions.
Hank| 11.16.10 @ 1:15AM
Those aren't the only thing she'll have to deal with. Those are important things. But, what do you mean, "fight terror." I get you in spirit. But when it comes right down to it, "fight terror" is sort of a complicated issue. You don't "fight terror" the way -- say -- Ali decided to fight Frazier. There isn't even such a thing as a "terror" out there in the world to go fight. It's no big deal that you don't take the time to spell this out. The problem with Palin is, I don't think she understands there's more to it than going out to "fight terror." Same with "keep taxes down." Down where? What's too low? What's too high? I think you need to have some knowledge about things and know how to ask tough, good questions of experts -- or just become their tool. Reagan was never any expert's tool. I'm afraid Bush was, and I'm afraid Palin would be too.
JD| 11.16.10 @ 7:26AM
"The problem with Palin is, I don't think she understands there's more to it than going out to 'fight terror.' Same with 'keep taxes down.' Down where? What's too low? What's too high? I think you need to have some knowledge about things and know how to ask tough, good questions of experts -- or just become their tool. Reagan was never any expert's tool. I'm afraid Bush was, and I'm afraid Palin would be too."
And how is the CURRENT occupant of the White House doing with any of this?
Read Sarah Palin's speech in which she told the Fed to "cease and desist" from its current "print money stimulus." Even the Wall Street Journal editors - not exactly a bunch of Tea Party types, and dead wrong on issues like immigration - admitted that she was a) right and b) had the most insightful reaction to the Fed's move of any of the potential 2012 candidates who commented on it.
Bush's problem isn't that he was a tool of experts, it was that he isn't - at heart - a conservative. Like John McCain Bush has some conservative instincts in SOME AREAS. (In Bush's case a lot more areas and a lot better instincts.) But he isn't a philosophical, consistent, and from-the-heart conservative, anymore than his father was. That's why he came up with that insulting label "compassionate conservative". Any true conservative knows the word doesn't need the modifier. Bush wasn't led astray by "experts", but by his own beliefs.
He thought he could work with Washington Democrats the way he had with the ones in Texax - and thus let Ted Kennedy write "No Child Left Behind". (And who gets the blame for that? Not the Dems.) He genuinely believes in a "path to citizenship" for illegal aliens - and also in Karl Rove's theory that pursuing amnesty would bring more Hispanics into the GOP. HE - not some mythical "expert" - thought that Harriet Miers was a good choice for the Supreme Court and that "Brownie" was the right choice for FEMA.
Palin would go to experts for advice and opinions like ALL presidents, but in the end she would be the "decider" and she'd decide based on her own unchanging principles and core beliefs. (Which, in fairness, Bush also did. But Palin has sounder core beliefs.)
Regards,
Joe
Hank| 11.16.10 @ 2:34PM
I'm going to go out on a limb here and assume you don't believe "She's no worse than Obama" is a good argument in favor of Palin. Palin's speech on the Fed did not persuade me that she knows about these topics. Go back and look at her answer to Couric's question about the bailouts -- a question that was appropriate, simple, and utterly flummoxing to the baffled Palin. Look: just because she's a decent woman doesn't mean she should be president. I'm sure half a dozen people will count even my mild questions and criticisms as personal attacks, but I can't help that. You say Palin is a pure conservative, but I don't get the sense that she understands conservatism. I think she knows the buzzwords and the sayings of conservatives, but not knowing anything about the Supreme Court? This is the heart of conservatism.
Alice Moore| 11.16.10 @ 8:42AM
You make a disingenuous argument. No one is advocating a round up. Actions that make self deportation viable can be done with the following:
1. Denying auxiliary social benefits to the illegal parents of children born in the US.
2. Denying right of abode to those born to illegals until their majority. If they want to bring in relatives it should be limited to a very few and/or high personal head tax per non citizen.
3. Deportation of unemployed non citizens.
4. Ruinous employer sanctions. Right now hiring an illegal brings a slap on the wrist. The present fines are simply factored as a cost to do business.
5. No social benefits for any non-US citizen.
Even if one of these were fully implemented; this would cause significant self deportation.
wodiej| 11.16.10 @ 9:40AM
Simple and effective. I agree.
manonthestreet| 11.16.10 @ 6:42AM
Sounds like a bunch of Obama voters above my comment.They are so smart,can't you see that?
Palin is so bad,she believes in the Constitution and loves America including Alaska and this is bad,right?
ggoblue| 11.16.10 @ 6:53AM
what the show does is humanize palin. it innoculates her from the demonization of the left. it shows her to be country, not ruling, class.
now that the entire tea party has been called racist [and worse] the mass of voters is onto the tactics of the left.
she might not look 'presidential' to the elitists but when the moment comes, and it will, to prove her smarts, she only needs to say "I KNOW RIGHT FROM WRONG AND MY OPPONENT DOES NOT".
FlaJim| 11.16.10 @ 8:08AM
I've only seen clips of the show, so I can't speak to the whole of it. It is not exactly like anything a previos president has done, but from what I have seen, there is a presidential parallel to Teddy Roosevelt's books on his hunting trips, which were popular, but not by themselves presedential. The difference was that TR had a considerable public presence beyond them, which Ms. Palin is still developing.
Alice Moore| 11.16.10 @ 8:48AM
Let's see we had Bill Clinton playing the Saxophone on Arsenio Hall as well as appearing on MTV.
There was Jimmy Carter in his dreadful yellow cardigan having a literal Fireside Chat.
Richard Nixon was on Laugh In and took a walk on the beach in his wing tips.
Sarah Palin's show seems at least a little more presidential than the above examples.
Andrew B| 11.16.10 @ 8:13AM
Alas, I don't think there is anything that Sarah Palin can do to appear "presidential" as it is currently understood. We would never again elect someone as reserved as George Washington nor as homely as Abraham Lincoln or Richard Nixon. Television has been our enemy in this.
Sarah Palin has the opposite problem from those listed above. She is too beautiful to be taken seriously. Whatever her merits, and whether or not she could truly be presidential, I don't believe we will ever discover. The liberals, with all the latent sexism and class-conciousness that inhibits their little minds, can write her off as a bimbo on looks alone. Liberals--liberal women, especially, enjoy tearing down other women for sport. They especially despise strong women. Not strong like Hillary "I'll Be Bill's Doormat For 35 Years, So Long As I Get My Turn" Clinton. No, real strong women.
12-String Infidel| 11.16.10 @ 8:45AM
A better comparison between Palin's TLC show and Reagan's screen resume would be "Death Valley Days". I loved that show as a child in the early 1960s, and found Reagan's narration to be a highlight...so much so that I'm sure it influenced me to vote for him in 1980...the FIRST time that I ever voted for a Republican candidate for office.
Alice Moore| 11.16.10 @ 8:51AM
Didn't Ronald Reagan serve as host for GE Theater? This show had high quality drama.
Irish Eyes| 11.16.10 @ 9:04AM
My husband was upset because we missed Saraah's first show and he wondered how it was received.
I just handed him a copy of JD's post above.
Thanks, Joe! You told us everything we needed to know.
wodiej| 11.16.10 @ 9:42AM
TLC is repeating this first episode all week. check it out.
JD| 11.16.10 @ 9:10AM
"Didn't Ronald Reagan serve as host for GE Theater?"
Yup. It was whle working for GE and travelling around the country from plant to plant that Reagan developed his basic political philosophy. The long train rides (Reagan hated flying) gave him plenty of time for reading, and the many speeches he gave (all of which he wrote himself, in long hand) allowed him to crystalize his beliefs and work them out on paper long before he went into politics.
Regards,
Joe
wodiej| 11.16.10 @ 9:48AM
The writer is making a comparison of Reagan and Palin based on their TV shows and political steps. What the hell does that have to do with anything? It's about having similar beliefs and policies popular with mainstream America.
The show was great. Alaska is beautiful and Sarah Palin was down to earth, real, confident and she has a great sense of humor. Our demise will be if she decides NOT to run, not that she will.
I admire her and she is a fine leader.
B. Lindstrom| 11.16.10 @ 10:36AM
I admire her and she is a fine leader.
She is not a leader, she is a celebrity. She was a leader, before she bailed on her fellow Alaskans for the limelight.
JD| 11.16.10 @ 1:19PM
"She was a leader, before she bailed on her fellow Alaskans for the limelight."
She DIDN'T "[bail] on her fellow Alaskans for the limelight". She was essentially forced out of office by SOME of her fellow Alaskans who made it impossible for her to do her job by filing one frivolous ethics complaint after another, distracting her from the job at hand and burdening her with the outrageous cost of defending herself. Throw in the multiplier effect of the tabloid and mainstream media - carrying water for her political foes, as usual - and it soon became clear that she couldn't afford to continue as governor, politically or financially.
So she stepped down for the sake of her fellow Alaskans (removing a distraction that was getting in the way of government operations), her family and her fellow conservatives. She found a new way to earn the money to pay her legal bills, speak out on the issues she cares about and support conservative candidates.
The woman who refused to back down from a rock-climbing challenge on Mt. McKinley when she could have - despite being afraid of heights - is no quitter. It might have taken her 45 minutes to Todd's 5, but she hung in there until she passed the test.
Meanwhile Barack Insane Obama is still in office after nearly two years, but is no closer to becoming a leader than he was when he was voting "present" in the U.S. Senate or working the levers of the Chicago political machine as a "community organizer." That's because he simply doesn't have the ability to lead as part of his make-up. Lecturing is not leadership. And that's all he's ever been good at.
Regards,
Joe
victor| 11.17.10 @ 2:29AM
Hey Joe, to paraphrase that old saying about teaching a pig to sing:
“Never try to teach a liberal to think; it wastes your time and it annoys the liberal.”