The Wal-Mart Ticket

You had to drinking a special kind of Republican Kool-Aid to applaud Mitt Romney when he denounced the Roberts Court for being too "liberal," to join Mike Huckabee in blaming "liberals" for doubling the size of the federal government during 28 years in which Republicans have dominated it, or to believe, like so many RNC speakers, that the U.S. is being run by a "liberal elite." But Romney, Giuliani, Huckabee and the rest only seemed interested in preaching to the converted, tonight.

When it came her turn, Sarah Palin of course echoed previous speakers, singing the praises of John McCain's military service and his "judgment" on Iraq. She warned darkly of big government and higher taxes, and she joined the evening's chorus of voices calling for oil drilling anywhere and everywhere--all themes designed to appeal to the audience in the hall.

Significantly, however, Palin stayed far away from the culture war. She didn't trumpet her controversial positions on abortion or marriage or faith.

Instead, Palin presented herself as a working-class hero--standing up to elites, a champion of small-town America, family values, and "common sense," an "outsider" confidently demolishing pretensions everywhere. Moreover, she did so with infinitely more authority than a millionaire like Romney, a Northeastern pol like Giuliani (how bizarre was it to watch him trying to play "just plain folks," mocking Obama for being too "cosmopolitan"?), or even the sanctimonious Mike Huckabee. Palin just pointed to her biography, her working-class roots and the working man she married, how motherhood got her into politics, her triumphs over the old guard in state and local politics, her pride in the son about to ship out to Iraq, etc. Family. Country. And class.

( A New Conservative Style )

The Old Man has hitched himself to a conservative rising star. And Palin has just made a career for herself in the Lower Forty-Eight, regardless of the outcome of this election.

x-posted to ljdemocrats