Miller: Palin critics suffer from fear factor

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The Bucks County Courier Times' Dennis Miller writes in a July 5 op-ed that most members of the national media took it upon themselves during the last presidential campaign to hide the negative and accentuate the positive about Barack Obama. But they didn't stop there. Mostly ignoring John McCain, the press shifted into full derangement mode, fully intent on destroying the GOP candidate's running mate, Sarah Palin:

The media launched a D-Day scale invasion of Alaska. Its mission was not to report, but to search and destroy. Every nook and cranny of Palin's life and anyone and everyone associated with her was scrutinized. Nothing was off limits: having five children was improper, her children's names were ridiculed, her fifth child was portrayed as her grandchild, and her everyday life was depicted as trailer trash. The universal talking point was the vice presidential candidate is not only barefoot and pregnant, Palin is dumb.

Let's examine Palin's "dumbness." She more than held her own in the vice-presidential debate with Joe Biden. While campaigning, even with the cheap shots from a left-wing media wrapped in straightjackets of unchangeable political ideology, Palin's message and demeanor won the hearts and minds of more and more Americans. With a stronger running mate, the results may have been different. Now as a leader of the tea party movement, the media now suffer from another bout of derangement syndrome. Tea party members are touted as dumb, and Palin is dumb.

Money or more precisely, lack of money is a major problem in all too many states. As governor, Palin had an opposite track record than her counterparts in bastions of liberalism such as New York, New Jersey, California and Massachusetts. These states are financially belly up and will be turning to Washington for, what else, a bailout. Yet Alaska is financially solvent. Its biggest concern is trying to keep Washington away. But the media spin is Alaska is a state of dummies and Palin is dumb.

Palin wrote a book that sold 2.2 million copies and, much to the New York Times' chagrin, was on its Bestseller List for 11 weeks. The Associated Press had eleven fact checkers dissect each word of her book and found nothing to stir up another personal assassination. Nancy Pelosi had a book published; it's sitting on the shelf of your local book store. Regardless of the incredible success of Palin's book, the media decision: Pelosi is smart, Palin's readers are dumb, and Palin is dumb.

Who is Sarah Palin? Wife, mother, grandmother, soldier's mom, soccer mom, working mom, who believes in God, the Constitution, American uniqueness, sanctity of life, family values, school choice and low taxes. And because of this she is dumb. Maybe there just happens to be a whole lot of moms who believe in the same things. Women, who from the time they get up to the time they go to bed, are constantly juggling the multiple roles and responsibilities that define them. How dumb they are? Or do they have to be a conservative, female politician to be dubbed dumb? Tea party moms, you're in the same boat.

Miller asks the question no one on the political left or any any of its media sycophants wants to answer. "If Sarah Palin is so dumb and inconsequential, why do they go out of their way to castigate her? Why waste the time?" It's simple, says Miller. They fear her.

Read Miller's full opinion piece here.

- JP