Sarah Palin’s New Clothes

Hopefully this will be the first, last, and only time I
write about Clothinggate. But strangely, this latest episode
in the continuing "As Alaska Turns" soap opera has made me
feel a surprising twinge of maternal instinct for Sarah
Palin. She's so miserably out of her league that her pathetic
rant against McCain-Palin campaign operatives who spilled
the beans about her profligate clothing expenditures and
other bizarre behavior--whether accurate reports or not--
filled me with an unusual desire to help her out with a
little advice from Mom.





Sarah back in Alaska with her old clothes

So, first of all, Sarah, Honey, you gotta understand that
when you lie down with dogs, you'll get up with fleas. And
those particular political dogs in the party of your
choice don't care a whit about you. 

They didn't allow you to speak when McCain conceded? 

Why would you have expected otherwise? Silencing women has
been part of your party's platform for years now, since they
banished Mary Crisp and jettisoned their groundbreaking
support for the Equal Rights Amendment. Just like the expensive
clothes they bought you, you were window dressing for the
Republicans' desperate atempt to hold onto their
power, Joe or Jane the Plumber and all the rest of us, including you,
be damned.

Second, realize that the mouths that roared about you are
one of three types:

**Those who thought putting you on the ticket was a mistake 
  from the start
**Those who have their own political future to promote and
    don't want you in the way
**Those who are just the run of the mill embittered,
   angry losers and lash out at you because you're convenient: the most
   obvious of many wrong decisions John McCain made, the best media-bait,
   and frankly because you've made yourself a highly visible target.
Or maybe it's all of the above--and also as you would say in your
imitable way of sucking up airtime when you have no idea what the
answer to the question is. 

Perhaps now that you have time, Alaska being a fairly small
state to govern, you'll read the many comments of feminists
and former Clinton supporters here on Heartfeldt. Talk to them.
Learn why your future will be better served by
becoming aligned with the more progressive and pro-woman
part of your own party, or perhaps even the Democrats.
Because just possibly you can see now all that drivel you've
been fed about how women have full equality and equal treatment
already wasn't exactly true. 

Face it. You've hitched your political wagon to the wrong horse.
Those guys just wanted you when it was useful to them to have
a fresh faced red-meat anti-choice woman
shilling to and for their patriarchal base.
Do you get that now?

I hope you've learned a few other lessons from the experience too.
Like maybe greater empathy for all us other women whose rights
and choices you've opposed. 

You're young, smart, and power hungry. You'll do fine in the future
either as a politician or talk show host.

Katha Pollitt has written this "sayonara" that will
really annoy you, but you and I know this isn't good-bye.

But, listen to me, Sarah. Think about it. And don't let yourself
get caught again up on your high horse like the emperor,
with or without your towel.  

INTENTIONING

Sex, Power, Pandemics, and How Women
Will Take The Lead for (Everyone’s) Good

The new book from Gloria Feldt about the future, taking the leadership lessons learned from this disruption and creating a better world for all through the power of intention.

2 Comments

  1. Deborah Siegel on November 11, 2008 at 12:09 am

    HA! This is some of the best advice I’ve heard for SP yet. GO GLORIA – YOU TELL HER!

  2. Gloria Feldt on November 11, 2008 at 12:09 am

    Debbie-
    Palin’s Today Show interview and aggressive positioning of herself at the Republican Governors’ conference signals that she isn’t going to back off. MY guess is part of it is that she’s so angry about the damage done to her reputation and wants revenge, but the other part is simply she is a politically ambitious woman. I wonder about the source of her ambition, and what she wants to accomplish.
    What do you or others think?

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