Palintology

We’re gearing up for another Friday happy hour at Ishmael’s, the seedy yet cozy bar right around the corner from the global headquarters of RW Enterprises, LLC. Alaska is on the menu at Ishmael’s today, because barkeep Peter Coffin has decided to capitalize on the whole Sarah Palin phenomenon in hopes of bringing in a more up-scale clientele. The bloggers, profs, and grad students who tend to hang out here drink the cheap stuff and seem to think “tipping” is a city in China, if you’ll pardon a little bartender’s humor. Anyway, today’s half-price drink is the Alaska Martini, a potent mix of gin, chartreuse, and orange bitters guaranteed to take the chill off a cold northern night. Appetizer specials include Bering Sea Shrimp, Alaskan King Crab Tempura, and – Mark Twain’s personal favorite – Mexican Moose Dip, a hearty concoction of moose burger, Velveeta cheese, onions, and salsa.

So grab a stool, place your order, and join in the fun as the denizens of Ishmael’s launch a brand new bar game aimed at gauging the cosmic significance of Alaska Governor Sarah Palin’s stratospheric rise to the top of the American political scene. What are the cultural, literary, and linguistic consequences of such a sudden emergence? The game is called Palintology, and our crack team of lit critters and assorted other readers of the zeitgeist is ready to play. Object of the game? To amuse ourselves until we’re too drunk to care that Democrats seem poised, once again, to steal defeat from the jaws of victory in a presidential election. The game begins, appropriately, with the sound of a high-powered rifle shot that qta downloaded to his laptop. BOOM! And away we go!

Something new in the culture of course requires a new lexicon. Roxie's World has already added "palin-dromes" to the new word order, and with this post we offer up "palintology" for your consideration as well. Additionally, however, Moose and Mark Twain have labored hard this week, as reports of shifting poll numbers and hysteria among Dems mounted, to come up with a word that conveys the full-on freak-out unleashed by the rise of Sister Sarah. Here's the word they came up with:

palination: N. paroxysms of indignation, befuddlement, and wounded vanity as the faux-gressive bloggerboyz, Dem strategists, and liberal media whores (see, for example, big-shouldered Donna Brazile on CNN Wednesday night) absorb the shock of seeing Senator Barack Obama’s lead disappear as Republican vice-presidential nominee Sarah Palin transforms the landscape of the 2008 presidential campaign. Symptoms include gnashing of teeth, anxious second-guessing of vaunted Obama team's wisdom and strategy, and vicious denunciation of any vagina-equipped voter who utters the name "Sarah Pailin" without immediately denouncing her as an anti-feminist cretin who will destroy everything Hillary Clinton stood for. See also cross-palination: the process by which Republicans who saw no sexism in media treatments of Senator Hillary Clinton during her presidential campaign suddenly see it everywhere in the treatment of Gov. Palin. Palin herself, who accused Clinton of whining during the primary battle and now benefits from the GOP assault on the media, is a fine example of cross-palination in action.

A new cultural phenomenon also produces new literary forms -- or revitalized versions of old forms. Or that's what the English profs 'round here say. And thus we have the palin-ode. (Click on that link if you don't know what a palinode is. Trust us -- It will heighten the pleasure of what you're about to read.) (H/T to Candy Man, the official prosody consultant to Roxie's World.) Two examples will illustrate the form:

Palin-ode I, by John McCain

How do you beat the bitch? Some asked
I answered them with laughter
And now the bitch the Dems can’t beat
Is mine forever after!

Palin-ode II, by Barack Obama

Sarah Palin’s not a pig
And I did not imply it
But if I had I guarantee
I’d hasten to deny it.

Jokes and other forms of humor also always accompany the emergence of a new cultural force, and Sarah Pailin has earned deserved praise for her skill with a quip. Roxie's World has some pretty decent quippers on staff, though, and we think we've come up with a better joke than the one that has earned the chick gov such acclaim. We offer it up to all those Dems whose cages have been rattling ever since Palin came on the scene:

Q: What’s the difference between a hockey mom and a pit bull?
A: If a pit bull scares you, you can have it killed.

Pass it on, kids. We don't get paid for this stuff, so the least you can do is help us to achieve some fleeting glory on the internets.

We'll end with a couple of funny cartoons, passed along to us by a newly naturalized citizen of Roxie's World who shall be known in these precincts as GlassPen until such time as we get to know her better and can come up with something of our very own. Thanks for adding to the collection of, um, Paliniana, GlassPen, and thanks for entering our world. There's a free drink waiting for you right here at Ishmael's. Happy weekend, everybody.

Seven Years Later

(Photo Credit: Bill O'leary, The Washington Post; the recently completed memorial to the 184 people killed at the Pentagon on Sept. 11, 2001 is the nation's first 9/11 memorial.)

For Moose, Sept. 11, 2001 was a flurry of phone calls, the first of which came in from the Mother of All Moosians at around 9:15, as Moose lingered over the morning paper and a second cup of coffee. (She had been on campus late the night before, teaching a grad seminar.) "Well, I guess you know what happened," her mom said when she picked up the phone. "Apparently I don't," Moose replied. "What are you talking about?" The MoAM told her to turn on the television. She did and watched in horror as smoke filled the cerulean skies of Manhattan. She and her mom were still on the phone when reports of a jet plowing into the Pentagon were first broadcast. "Mom, I have to go," Moose said abruptly, seized by a sudden panic. "I have to find Goose." Goose had gone to campus for an 8 a.m. meeting that day. Moose's first impulse when she realized something terrible was unfolding so close to home was to find her, reach her, get her back safe to the house.

Moose spent the next 16 hours in her bathrobe, glued to the television and the telephone. A neighbor who worked downtown called in worried about her daughter at school in the suburbs. And to report that she could see the Pentagon in flames from her office. A friend from Oslo called, her usually restrained Nordic voice filled with emotion. "Europe is with you," she told Moose. "We are watching, and we are with you." Something about that call -- those words, that small, intimate acknowledgment of the global significance of what was happening, got to Moose, momentarily unhinging her. When her younger sister phoned in from Michigan a few minutes later, all she could do was cry and say, "What am I supposed to do? I feel like World War III is breaking out, and it's already five miles from my house." "I know," her sister comfortingly replied, "I know." It was all that could have been said.

Goose didn't get home until late in the afternoon, ordered to stay on campus by the authorities at Queer the Turtle U., who sensibly decided it wouldn't be wise to send all the grown-ups home and leave the students alone on campus. She and Moose were on the phone when office workers were leaping out of windows in the World Trade Center. They were still talking when the first of the towers fell. "What do you mean, the tower is falling?" Goose said, unable to imagine such a thing could happen.

But it did. Seven years later, Roxie's World pauses to remember that the unimaginable can happen on an achingly beautiful autumn morning. The world can change in an instant. Individual lives can be lost, shattered, or merely transformed. And all you can say is, "I know."

Be safe, beloveds. Remember that dog is with you, today and every day. Peace out.

What Goes Around Comes Around

Lambert said it, not us, so if it upsets you, don't shoot the messenger, 'kay? Just think about it, as you ponder all those new polls released today and continue to gnash your teeth over what Dems should do between now and Nov. 4:

[I]f it’s legitimate to vote for Obama as a blow against racism, regardless of his policies, then it’s equally legitimate to vote for Palin as a blow against sexism, regardless of her policies. And if it’s legitimate to vote for Obama because of his compelling life story, then it’s equally legitimate to vote for Palin because of her compelling life story. And if it’s legitimate to vote for Obama because he’s charismatic and gives a good speech, then it’s equally legitimate to vote for Palin because she’s charismatic and gives a good speech. And if it’s legitimate to vote for Obama because he’s a media darling, then it’s equally legitimate to vote for Palin if she becomes a media darling. And since the post-partisan schtick can only mean that there’s no intrinsic difference between D and R, that means all the candidates are equally legitimate, so why vote for one as opposed to the other? Eh?

All back to the original sins of the primary, I’d say.

Hm-m-m. Funny, that's what we'd say, too. And the former comp teachers in the house give Lambert an A+ for arguing a point through extremely effective use of the material conditional. Oh, and a 5-point bonus for the nifty bit of recursion there at the end. Well done.

(Image Credit: Real Clear Politics)

Sarah Palin's FUNdamentalism

(Photo Credit: Al Grillo, Associated Press, via Washington Post, 9/7/08; Alaska Governor Sarah Palin rides with her husband, Todd, to the starting line of the Iron Dog snowmobile race in February 2007.)

Could you in your wildest dreams have imagined that anyone or anything could come along and suck the political oxygen away from Barack Obama in the 2008 presidential campaign? Be honest. Could you? Did you? Do you? If you are a Democrat and you're still answering no to those questions, then you'd better wake up. De-nial, as they say, is not just a river, but you'd better hope somebody in the party of Dukakis, Gore, and Kerry has a strong paddle to help navigate the suddenly roiling waters of campaign '08.

Former San Francisco mayor Willie Brown (by way of Anglachel) gets what has happened to the race since John McCain selected Alaska Governor Sarah Palin to be his running-mate, and he is sounding the alarms for Democrats:

Palin's speech to the GOP National Convention on Wednesday has set it up so that the Republicans are now on offense and Democrats are on defense. And we don't do well on defense.

Suddenly, Palin and John McCain are the mavericks and Barack Obama and Joe Biden are the status quo, in a year when you don't want to be seen as defending the status quo.

From taxes to oil drilling, Democrats are now going to have to start explaining their positions.

Whenever you start having to explain things, you're on defense.

I actually went back and watched Palin's speech a second time. I didn't go to sleep until 1:30 a.m. I had to make sure I got the lines right.

Her timing was exquisite. She didn't linger with applause, but instead launched into line after line of attack, slipping the knives in with every smile and joke.

And she delivered it like she was just BS-ing on the street with the meter maid.

She didn't have to prove she was "of the people." She really is the people.

It's true that not everyone in Roxie's World appreciated how effective Palin's convention speech was while we were watching it Wednesday night (okay, Goose, you were right and we were wrong), but we felt all along that Palin was a cagey pick whose political skills and value to the McCain campaign should not be underestimated. We also felt that the "progressive" blogosphere and the media's ganging up on the candidate and her family over the pregnancy of 17-year-old Bristol was a mistake that would end up generating sympathy for the Palins and do damage to Obama, no matter how much he tried to distance himself from the stone-throwers. As of today, Obama's post-convention bounce has disappeared, and polls show the race pretty much dead even. We rest our case.

Sarah Palin is a problem for Democrats for all kinds of reasons. Her presence on the ticket is a constant reminder of the proven vote-getter whom Barack Obama passed over for the second spot on his ticket, Senator Hillary Clinton. McCain's surprise pick also, as many observers have noted, gives him an opening to voters hungry for change in this election. Suddenly, the old geezer in the race offers his own version of the iPhone: a fresh and undeniably pretty face, a promise of bipartisan reform, an opportunity for voters to make history by putting a woman into the executive branch. The Republican brand, which five minutes ago seemed as stale as month-old bread, now seems new again, almost even hip. (Note that we said seems, people, not is. This is a game of appearances and perceptions, not realities.)

But here is something we think Dems are missing about Sarah Palin and a sizable chunk of voters to whom she is likely to appeal. Secular Democrats have a caricature of evangelical Christians in their heads as grim, repressive naysayers who spend their lives tuning out the obscenities of the modern world and working frantically to assure that nobody anywhere ever has any fun. They are mean, punitive, ignorant, intolerant. They homeschool their kids, wear drab clothes, and imagine that dinosaurs and Jesus roamed the earth together. Such pinched, sober individuals and faith communities no doubt exist, but the hip, sunny face of postmodern fundamentalism presented by the Palin family is clearly not anomalous. The chick gov and her hunky first dude are the cool Christians next door -- the attractive, fun couple who look like they are ready and waiting for Annie Leibovitz to show up and take their photo for the cover of Vanity Fair and who likely won't show up at the neighborhood potluck with a Pyrex dish full of day-glo Jello. They may go to prayer meetings on Wednesday night, but it's easy to imagine they race home to be on the couch in time for Project Runway. Their faith is not an oppressive force that keeps them remote from the world but a source of deep pleasure and consolation that helps them make their way through it. "Shit happens," we say in secular-ville. "Sin happens," say many contemporary fundies. Either way, it's not that big a deal. Smile. Carry on. Stand up for and with your family. No scarlet letters necessary, thank you.

George Lakoff has written brilliantly on the Palin selection because he understands what many Dems still do not -- that Gov. Palin and her large, telegenic, imperfect yet seemingly happy family are the embodiment of what Lakoff has termed "bi-conceptualism." (The concept is mapped out in detail in an excerpt from Lakoff's 2006 book, Thinking Points: Communicating Our American Values and Vision.) The concept gets at the mixture of conservative and progressive modes of thought and systems of value that are at the heart of conservative populism the Republican party has been successfully deploying since Ronald Reagan to win over especially working-class voters. As Lakoff puts it in his piece on Palin:

A great many working-class folks are what I call "bi-conceptual," that is, they are split between conservative and progressive modes of thought. Conservative on patriotism and certain social and family issues, which they have been led to see as "moral," progressive in loving the land, living in communities of care, and practical kitchen table issues like mortgages, health care, wages, retirement, and so on.

Conservative theorists won them over in two ways: inventing and promulgating the idea of "liberal elite" and focusing campaigns on social and family issues. They have been doing this for many years and have changed a lot of brains through repetition. Palin will appeal strongly to conservative populists, attacking Obama and Biden as pointy-headed, tax-and-spend, latte liberals. The tactic is to divert attention from difficult realities to powerful symbolism.

Lakoff's advice to Dems is to focus on realities without overlooking the important domain of the cognitive and the symbolic. They have to appeal to voters' sense of values, and to do that they need to understand the complex and seemingly contradictory admixture of values operating in voters' minds all across the political spectrum. In our judgment, the most damaging moment of Gov. Palin's speech the other night for Democrats was when she lambasted Obama for an April incident that has come to be known as "Bittergate":

in small towns, we don't quite know what to make of a candidate who lavishes praise on working people when they are listening, and then talks about how bitterly they cling to their religion and guns when those people aren't listening.

We tend to prefer candidates who don't talk about us one way in Scranton and another way in San Francisco.

Democrats may deplore the fact that large swaths of voters can be taken in by the crude antithesis of Scranton and San Francisco, but it remains a devastatingly effective way to portray Democratic candidates as elite, effete, and scornful of "mainstream" mores and values. Palin's populism appeals not only to Republican base voters who would probably never vote Democratic but also to more middle-of-the-road voters who distrust any whiff of hypocrisy and condescension. Such distrust is as American as apple pie, and Democrats can't ignore it or complain that it isn't fair. They have to dislodge the perception or counter it with another, more powerful perception aimed, perhaps, at pointing out the more consequential hypocrisy of a party that has repeatedly sold out working people through economic policies that have systematically redistributed wealth upwards. Palin's FUN-damentalism might then look a whole lot less fun to voters, but it remains to be seen if Barack Obama can change the game yet again and get his offense back out on the field. He better hurry, because, right now, Sarah-cuda is having the time of her life out there, and time is running out.

It's Five O'Clock Somewhere

. . .and we've had a long, interesting week in Roxie's World. Let's cut our afternoon classes and repair immediately to Ishmael's, the seedy yet cozy bar right around the corner from the global headquarters of RW Enterprises, LLC, and have ourselves a couple of tall ones. Mark Twain and Moose are already there, fighting over who gets the last of the fried mozzarella sticks. Goose will be over as soon as she finishes her latest scholarly article of earth-shattering importance. Historiann and Eitan are huddled together in a booth at the back, having a quiet conversation about communications strategy for the home stretch of the presidential campaign. I'm curled up on my special spot right by the fireplace, where an old dog goes to get warm on even the hottest afternoon.

C'mon now, kids -- Join us! We can talk about old times -- You remember -- the good old days before Dems were kicking the crap out of each other in the most bruising primary fight in recorded history, back when Republicans were the source of all pain and evil in the universe. We can dream together about the better world we are all trying to build -- You know, the one with universal health care, free tampons, a sane environmental policy, and peace everlasting. Oh, and dogs allowed in restaurants everywhere, not just in France.

Belly up to the bar, kids. Half-price specials on the deconstructed martini for grad students. What's that, you ask? A shot of vodka with a bowl of olives on the side, or, as the moms like to call it, "dinner."

Sit down here next to us, and tell us what's on your minds. You know dogs and bartenders are the greatest listeners in the world.

Oh, and if you can't join us right away, amuse yourself with this brilliant bit from Jon Stewart, who revels in the irony of Republicans having realized that their deck has a gender card in it after all:

Palin-dromes

This post has nothing to do with that title, though I suppose if we were clever and not so tired we could come up with three or four examples of palindromic rhetoric or logic in Alaska Governor Sarah Palin's big speech at the Republican convention. But the truth is it just popped into our minds and struck us as inordinately clever, so we decided to throw it up before anybody else had a chance to use it. We own it, okay? And here in the Ownership Society that means something, so don't use it or we'll shoot!

We already shot our wad on the speech in a comment we left over at Historiann's open thread. Moose thinks Todd Palin is a hot slice of sub-Arctic butch. Goose is smitten with 7-year-old Piper, though we think that's just some Fairness Doctrine thing -- a reaction to having gotten smitten with Sasha Obama last week. They respectfully disagree with Melissa McEwan's assertion that the Palin/Tina Fey comparison is an insult to both women. Watching Palin at the podium, doing the whole "Yeah, I'm sexy but I could whip your ass and I'm smarter than you are, too" thing, the resemblance was inescapable. We felt as if we were already watching the parody SNL will do on its season premier in a couple of weeks. The speech itself? Eh. A few good digs at the Precious, but our number crunchers estimate that the Hockey Mom for Veep meme has about four minutes of shelf life left. Goose had a more generous assessment, but Moose and the political division are now predicting an Obama landslide.

What did y'all think about the speech? You were so eloquent and, um, loquacious on the subject of the stoning of Bristol Palin that we figure we'll just open things up and let you rip.

While you're formulating your opening gambits, here's a pants-wetting vid from JibJab. It feels seasonally appropriate, and it performs the valuable public service of making fun of Obama in a way that we think will have even his most devoted fans giggling. Just so you know, we giggled at the part about Bill and the cigar, and you know how sensitive we Clintonistas are to cigar jokes. Enjoy, children:



(With thanks to a long-time friend of Roxie's World, who passed the vid along. We do hereby declare her the Purr-fect Medievalist. Meow, baby.)

Pistol-Whipping Bristol

(Photo Credit: The Scarlet Letter [1926], with Lillian Gish, via imdb.)

You have no idea how little business we have posting this evening. Classes start at Queer the Turtle U. tomorrow. Moose has an important meeting at 9 a.m. The syllabus still isn't done. The pencils are not sharpened and all lined up in the new cigar box. The bologna sandwiches have not been made. And we're reluctant to bump down the post about Basic Rights Montgomery, because we're still hoping a lot of you will step up to the plate and help save transgender protections here in our ridiculously large backyard. (Remember: Moose's fundraising deadline is Friday. Scroll down and read that post, 'kay? And let us know if you decide to contribute. Thanks!)

Anyway, so we shouldn't be posting, but we are, because in between working on their ten million unfinished tasks the moms couldn't help but tune in to what strikes them as the insane and in many places cruel reaction to the news that presumptive Republican vice-presidential nominee Sarah Palin's 17-year-old daughter Bristol is pregnant. We realize that the left is entitled to gloat when any of the self-appointed vice cops of the right is caught in some compromising sexual shenanigan, but are we comfortable exploiting the mistake (if that is what it was) of a 17-year-old kid whom none of us had heard of three days ago? Does that really feel fair? Does that make us feel good about our grown-up, sexually progressive selves? As we glanced around the blogosphere today and saw all the gleeful jokes made at the Palin family's expense, we had one thought, a thought no doubt inspired by the back-to-school moment in which we find ourselves:

What if Bristol Palin were your student?

What if she stumbled into your office late on a Tuesday afternoon, the day before a paper was due, and asked you for an extension? You might slip into stern, schoolteacher mode for a minute and ask her why, at this late date, you should afford her such munificence. You begin your speech about being fair to all the other students in the class -- and Bristol bursts into tears, right there, across the desk from you, when you are eager to pack up and go because you have to stop at the grocery store on the way home. Chicken or fish? you were thinking to yourself when the earnest brunette came to your door, and now, suddenly, you must contend with a weeping young woman who cannot finish her paper. What do you do?

Roxie's World has a hunch you would not mock her. You wouldn't make jokes about her dubious morals and the embarrassment she caused her family. You wouldn't berate her either or lecture her about the decision she had made or the pressure she was feeling. No, we think we know what you would do. You would do what good teachers from time immemorial have done. You would forget about the chicken and the fish, push aside the papers you had been trying to organize, hand Bristol a Kleenex -- and you would listen, kindly, patiently, and without judgment. You would show her empathy, treat her with compassion, and work with her to formulate a strategy for finishing her assignment. She would leave your office 30 minutes later with dry eyes, and you would order a pizza for dinner. Because, face to face with her, you would care about Bristol Palin.

Can you imagine that?

(For more on the Bristol brouhaha, see, as always, Melissa McEwan, in The Guardian, and Zuzu over at Shakesville. There's been a lot of other stuff on this today, but we honestly don't have time to do the linking. Oh, and this post isn't aimed at any particular person or piece we ran across. It is really aimed at a sort of general chortling on the left that made us profoundly uncomfortable. We think such carrying on is politically risky because of the likelihood that it will offend and alienate pretty much anyone who has ever parented, taught, known, or been a 17-year-old kid. Quite a few votes in that cohort, eh? And, for the record, Obama said exactly the right thing.)