Palin Derangement Syndrome

Palin Derangement Syndrome should hit the DSM IV any day now. It refers to the chronic delusion among liberals and left wingers that former Alaska governor Sarah Palin is both irrelevant and a major threat. It is closely related to Bush Derangment Syndrome, symptoms of which included the beliefs that George W. Bush was dumber than a box of boxes, but also capable of altering the world's weather for his own evil purposes.

Newsweek's now infamous cover of Ms. Palin in tight running clothes turns out to have violated the law. The magazine, in its zeal to somehow harm Palin's image, used an image still under copyright protection from Runner's World. This rises almost to the obsession of Dan Rather, who tried to find any shred of a story that might compromise the presidency of George W. Bush. To President Bush's credit, this resourceful and experienced reporter never found anything worthy of reporting.

Next came the Washington Post's blogger Ana Marie Cox who sullied her own reputation as a book reviewer by claiming with smug satisfaction that, although she agreed to review Palin's bestseller Going Rogue, she actually did not read it. Then she claimed Palin didn't write it!

If I edited anything connected with one of America's more prestigious papers and my writer failed to do as assigned, she or he would be reprimanded or gone, simple as that. Why sign up for the review if you have no intention of reading the book?

A couple of years ago I read Tip O'Neill's autobiography Man of the House. I could not find much to agree with politically. much as when I read Raymond Chafin's autobiography several years before. However, I learned a great deal about politics at different levels from both men. There is not a lot that you would want to emulate from Chafin's, but it does tell you how some people think. I am not sure where the Post digs up its book review bloggers and writers, but I could send them quite a few college freshmen who could do better.

The level of hatred Palin inspires correlates strongly to the left and liberal media establishment's dislike of middle America. Palin comes from the same mindset that produced many of our greatest leaders. That mindset always strikes the more cultivated as too country, too unrefined, too close to the real American people for their comfort. People like Ana Marie Cox would like to pretend that regular folks didn't exist. That is something that even liberals like O'Neill and Chafin understood, that at the end of the day regular folks had their say and you as a politically minded person had to understand that. That is the gap between old time American liberalism and what passes for ideology among left wingers today.

Smart Republicans filled that vacuum and have fought hard to protect American jobs from false climate theories. New faces like Palin understand the connection that must exist between a political figure and the people. Her popularity comes from the fact that she is more like one of use than the Ana Marie Coxes of the world will ever be. And that is why they hate her so.

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I'll admit when I am wrong. I did not think that Palin made a good move when she resigned as governor of Alaska. I will say that I probably would not have done the same in her shoes, but she definitely exploded onto the national scene in the past few months. She joins a very large and worthy group of Republicans who will contend for the presidency in 2012.