Paul Sracic: Don't count out Sarah Palin

What is most Reaganesque about Palin is her optimism about America appears natural.
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Political science professor Paul Sracic, in a commentary published by CNN.com, admits that until just a few days ago, he did not consider Sarah Palin to be a "serious" candidate. But now he says that if she gets into the presidential race, she'll be "a formidable candidate" - not just in the GOP primary, but in the general election should she win her party's presidential nomination. What changed his mind? Something in SarahPAC's "Iowa Passion" video:

In the video, the initial scenes of bright sunlight shining over Iowa cornfields lead into uplifting images of young people and young couples with children smiling and enjoying the day at the Iowa State Fair. In a phrase, it is "Morning in America." Those of us of a certain age remember the Reagan campaign's seminal commercial of that name, an advertisement that helped to secure his crushing landslide re-election in 1984.

Of course, since Reagan was already completing his first term in office, his commercial referred to what he claimed to have already done. Palin, on the other hand, is speaking to the future. In quasi-religious terms, she criticizes the lack of "faith" that Washington has in the American people, while confidently championing the coming "great awakening." What this shows more than anything else is that Palin understands what Reagan always knew: Americans want to be optimists. More important, she is media savvy enough to know how to deliver that message in a captivating fashion.

My point is not that Palin is Reagan. They differ in many obvious and substantial ways.

[...]

Palin, however, has risen to prominence in a different age. Twenty-four-hour news stations provide much more exposure in a shorter period. Compared to Bachmann and Perry, at least, Palin is a veteran on the political scene. More significant, however, is the fact that, like Reagan, Palin has the correct media skills for the age.

[...]

What is most Reaganesque about Sarah Palin, however, is that on camera, her optimism about America appears natural. This is a quality that should not be underestimated, since it allows her the leeway to be negative without turning off voters by appearing mean-spirited. This offers at least the possibility that, despite her current low standing in the polls, she will be able to leap-frog over the more negative sounding Bachmann and Perry, and compete head-to-head with Romney.

Even more than they did in 2008, Americans want hope. What Palin's handlers have in the former governor is a candidate they can cast in a pitch-perfect media campaign that blends a criticism of the Obama administration with a positive message about the future.

Prof. Stracic takes pains to point out that he is predicting neither a Palin presidency nor her nomination by the 2012 RNC convention. What he does make clear, however, is that Gov. Palin should not be counted out "before she has had a chance to campaign." The political scientist concludes his opinion piece with a reminder that an ABC news poll in January 1980 showed Ronald Reagan far behind sitting President Jimmy Carter, down 30 points. And this was eight full months before Reagan had even won his party's nomination.

- JP

Gov. Palin: Visiting Reagan's Humble and Inspiring Beginnings

As posted at SarahPAC:
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Ronald Reagan once said, “While I take inspiration from the past, like most Americans, I live for the future.” It’s because I believe in America's future that I take such inspiration from our past. We just visited Ronald Reagan’s childhood home in Dixon, Illinois. This beautiful small town along the Rock River is where Reagan learned the values that shaped him – the same values that have historically made America strong – thrift, hard work, fortitude, optimism, and courage in the face of adversity.

As a nation, we must reconnect with those values if we’re to truly restore all that is good and strong about the USA. Meeting the fine Americans in this small town on the river where Reagan saved 77 lives brought all this home for me.

Thanks to the wonderful volunteers who keep Reagan's memory alive. The restoration and tours of our beloved President's home are significant. Thank you, Dixon!

- Sarah Palin

P.S.: Allow me to share below the piece I wrote for USA Today’s special commemorative edition on President Reagan’s Centennial:

I had the privilege of coming of age during the era of Ronald Reagan. I like to think of him as America's lifeguard. As a teenager, Ronald Reagan saved 77 lives as a lifeguard on the Rock River, which ran through his hometown of Dixon, Ill. The day he was inaugurated in 1981, a local radio announcer famously declared, "The Rock River flows for you tonight, Mr. President."

The image of the lifeguard seems to represent what Reagan was to America and to the freedom-loving people of the world. He lifted our country up at a time when we were in the depths of economic, cultural and spiritual malaise. We were told that we must accept that the era of American greatness was over; but with his optimism and common sense, President Reagan held up a mirror to the American soul to remind us of our exceptionalism.

Reagan showed us that despite a deep recession, there could still be morning in America. He could speak to the economic troubles facing ordinary Americans because he understood what it was like to live through a Great Depression where families scraped to get by. And yet, he saw us recover from our Great Depression, and under his leadership we experienced the greatest peacetime economic boom in our history. He could speak to our fears that our years as a superpower were over, because he understood what it was like to see America at war and really fear that we might lose. And yet, he saw us win two world wars, and under his leadership we won the Cold War without firing a single shot. Reagan's belief in American greatness was rooted in historic fact, not blind optimism. He was a sunny optimist because he knew that our best days are yet to come.

Today, when we hear the worry in the voices of Americans wondering where the jobs will be for our children and grandchildren and wondering if the world will be safe and prosperous in the years to come, we should remember Reagan's faith in our inherent heroism and greatness. When we see people around the globe looking to the White House for leadership, we should remember Reagan's steel spine. He understood America's purpose in this world and what we need to do to secure liberty. As Margaret Thatcher said of him, "He sought to mend America's wounded spirit, to restore the strength of the free world, and to free the slaves of communism." He sought those things and he succeeded.

This year, as we celebrate the centennial of Reagan's birth, let's remember the lifeguard from the Rock River who rescued us with his optimism and common sense. We need more lifeguards like him.

Photos:

Ronald Reagan Boyhood Home & Lowell Park

The Ronald Reagan Museum and Eureka College

- JP

Quote of the Day (July 19, 2011)

Sarah Palin Is Not Ronald Reagan
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Jeremy Buchanan, at Red County:

“Sarah Palin may not be Ronald Wilson Reagan but when did Sarah Palin ever say or think she was? I think Reagan would be proud of Sarah Palin and the conservative grassroots Tea Party movement that Sarah Palin [is] a big part of. Reagan loved the American people. Reagan believed in the American people. Sarah Palin shares this love and belief in the American people. America could do a lot worse than have Sarah Palin as our president.”

- JP

Jack Kelly: The real Sarah Palin

She's not the snowbilly of media caricature.
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Pittsburgh Post-Gazette columnist Jack Kelly quotes a number of lamestream media journalists who were forced to admit that the Sarah Plain revealed by the last week's massive email release turned out to be a different person entirely from the caricature of her that they themselves had labored so hard to burn into the American psyche for the better part of three long years. Among the usual suspects cited by Kelly is Politico's Molly Ball:

Ms. Ball described her as "the long-lost Palin." But the real Sarah Palin wasn't "lost." The news media hid her. Journalists were too busy scouring her personal life for hints of scandal to report on Ms. Palin's accomplishments in public office.

"When my co-host, Mika Brzezinski and I arrived at the Republican National Convention (in 2008), we were met by excited network chiefs and newspaper reporters who were chasing down a sleazy Internet rumor that Trig Palin was not Palin's child," said MSNBC talk show host Joe Scarborough. "Mika received a number of calls from her friends at the major networks gleefully passing along the Internet lie before cheering for Palin's demise."

Some pundits declare Ms. Palin won't run for president and couldn't win if she did. Is this what they really think? Or is it what they hope Republicans will believe if they say it often enough?

Nonstop criticism has hurt Sarah Palin in the polls. It would be difficult to overcome the false picture painted of her. But the emails, and a forthcoming documentary, are steps in that direction. Furthermore, their now naked -- and increasingly comical -- partisanship has hurt the credibility of her adversaries in journalism.

Back when the reputation of the "mainstream" media was better and its monopoly near total, another conservative derided as stupid and extreme prevailed when he emerged on center stage and dispelled the media caricature of him. Republicans already think Sarah Palin is more like Ronald Reagan than is any other presidential aspirant. If she chooses to run, she may resemble the Gipper in yet another way.

[More]

The left's standard response when anyone makes comparisons between Reagan and Palin is, "She's no Ronald Reagan." But they miss the salient point that she has never claimed to be what elder Reagan son once described as the reincarnation of his dad. Even most die hard Palin supporters don't go that far. Instead, we make the case that she is something much more threatening to the leftist agenda than Reagan's ghost wearing a dress. gov. Palin is a true Reagan believer, one who is dedicated to putting his principles, too long ignored by his own political party, back into practice to save this Republic. That's the real Sarah Palin, and she's as real as Reagan conservatism gets.

- JP

Republicans: Palin is prospective GOP candidate most like Reagan

"Palin's big advantage is the perception that she is not a typical politician."
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Although Gov. Palin has not announced her candidacy, her poll numbers are improving, and not just among Republicans. Her numbers are also ticking up with Americans overall. According to a new CNN/Opinion Research poll, more Republicans see Sarah Palin as being more like Ronald Reagan than any other potential candidates for the 2012 GOP presidential nomination.

From the PDF document containing the survey's findings:

30. Thinking about the complete list of candidates who may be running for the Republican nomination, please tell me whether you would describe any of them as another Ronald Reagan –- that is, someone who inspires in you the same amount of confidence and enthusiasm that you feel when you think about how Reagan handled his job while he was president?

31. (IF YES) Who do you feel that way about?

QUESTIONS 30 AND 31 COMBINED

June 3-7 2011
No GOP candidate (from Q.30) 43%
Sarah Palin 16%
Rudy Giuliani 15%
Mitt Romney 13%
Herman Cain 7%
Michele Bachmann 5%
Newt Gingrich 5%
Ron Paul 5%
Tim Pawlenty 2%
Jon Huntsman 1%
Rick Santorum 1%
Someone else (vol.) *
No opinion 2%

Other findings from the survey:

The poll also indicates that the two best-known potential GOP presidential hopefuls - Sarah Palin and Rudy Giuliani - are also the ones with the highest favorable rating among Republicans.

"That may explain why they feel they can wait before throwing their hats in the ring," says CNN Polling Director Keating Holland.

[...]

Palin's big advantage is the perception that she is not a typical politician. Seven in 10 Republicans feel that way about the former Alaska governor and 2008 GOP vice presidential nominee. Most of those questioned see Romney as a typical politician.

Eight in 10 say that Palin agrees with them on issues that they care about the most. A respectable 64 percent feel the same way about Romney, but that still gives Palin an advantage on issues, and on values as well - nearly eight in 10 say that she represent the values of Republicans like themselves.

Gov. Palin's favorable ratings are up 4 points since CNN last polled on the question April 29-May 1, 2011, while her unfavorables have improved, down 7 percentage points.

h/t: Henry D'Andrea

- JP

George Will, Republagogue (Updated)

Levin: "The contempt for Palin does, in fact, remind me of the contempt some had for Reagan"
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A demagogue is defined as a person, especially an orator or political leader, who gains power and popularity by arousing people's emotions, passions, and prejudices. Which is exactly what George Will did this morning, as Doug Powers observes:

George Will seems to think American voters are concerned that our nuclear arsenal could fall into the hands of… Sarah Palin:

“The threshold question, not usually asked, but it’s in everyone’s mind in a presidential election. ‘Should we give this person nuclear weapons?’ And the answer [in Palin's case], answers itself.”

“You know how chicks are… she’ll probably get upset with a Real Housewives of Atlanta episode and hit ‘the button’…”

Doug recalls that Will's soft-spoken hysteria reminds him of how the elitists demagogued Ronald Reagan, either as “a doddering old fool” without sufficient mental capacity or as a warmongering Hitler salivating at the prospect of starting a nuclear exchange with the Soviet Union. But Reagan, as it turned out, negotiated with Gorbochev and signed the INF Treaty, which was the first nuclear arms control agreement to actually reduce nuclear arms, rather than establish ceilings that could not be exceeded.

And speaking of George Will and Ronald Reagan, Mark Levin has pointed out in defense of Sarah Palin:

George Will missed the Reagan Revolution not only in 1976 but as late as 1980. In the 1979 Republican Presidential Primary, his first choice was Howard Baker, his second choice was George H. W. Bush, and his third choice was Reagan. Not until days before the 1980 general election did he write on November 3, 1980 that Reagan deserved election. For all his wonderful columns, the Republican electorate better understood the needs of the nation and the excellence of a potential Reagan presidency than Will. It is hard to believe he was so wrong about a matter of such great import, despite Reagan's presence on the national scene for many years.

Lest you think Levin was just posturing to promote Gov. Palin, he worked in the Reagan White House, served as advisor to several members of Ronald Reagan's cabinet, then as Associate Director of Presidential Personnel and finally as Attorney General Edwin Meese's Chief of Staff.

Dan Riehl has a screen cap of a George Will column in which Mr. Bowtie admits that he preferred the two country club Republicans, one after the other, over Reagan. Dan commented:

If we had taken George Will's advice in 1979 and 1980, there would have been no Reagan Revolution. I don't mean to attack him. But it's a fact.

I wonder, where is it Will gets his impressions of, say, a Sarah Palin, a Herman Cain, a Michelle Bachmann, or whomever today? Perhaps it's some of the same people and media outlets he was paying attention to in 1979?

Doug has the likely answer to that question:

George Will is a conservative (usually), but he’s an Ivy League conservative, and as such he might have a tendency to think that anybody who didn’t go to Princeton, Harvard or Yale shouldn’t be trusted with anything more powerful than a Bic lighter.

Did George Will mention a similar concern in 2008 when a community organizer from Chicago was about to be handed the launch codes and subsequently disclose the size of the US nuke arsenal? No, because Obama’s smart — he went to Columbia and all.

Will's demagoguery of Gov. Palin does indeed sound reminiscent of the attacks on Reagan from the political left back in the day. Victor Davis Hanson recalls:

Liberals once slurred Reagan on every occasion. They screamed that he was unhinged, a reactionary nut who would take us to nuclear war (remember the last days of Jimmy Carter's 1980 campaign?).

So Will, the conservative columnist, has a thing or two in common with his elitist counterparts over on the left. And he has demonstrated beyond any doubt that he is a demagogue. Since Will is a Republican, albeit one with his left foot planted firmly on the country club's grounds, and he frequently disses good conservative Republicans, can we call him a republagogue? Whatever we call him, Dan is right on target with his suggestion that when it comes to choosing presidential candidates, conservatives would be better served by trusting our own instincts than letting elitists like George Will pick our candidates for us.

Related: Whitney Pitcher has more on misogynist Will's "unsubstantiated and disparaging remarks" here.

- JP

Douglas MacKinnon: Sarah Palin Speaks the Ultimate Truth

With liberty comes responsibility.
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Douglas MacKinnon, who served in the Reagan and Bush41 administrations, argues in a Townhall.com op-ed that if conservatives allow politicians, professors and journalists to persuade us to settle for the lesser of two evils, we not only betray our ideals, but we advance the left's agenda. If we ignore our common sense, all that remains is leftist nonsense:

If you are a conservative or one who does espouse traditional values, then take a good look around. View the decay of compromise which is rotting our cities, our states, our republic, our educational system, and our entertainment community. As you ascertain that which threatens to implode our very way of life, ask yourself a question: What role, if any, did such compromise play in my electoral decisions?

While still mercilessly vilified by the corrupt and themselves compromised members of the mainstream media, former Governor Sarah Palin continues to do her best to speak a very plain truth. A truth and a wake-up call aimed this time squarely at those who would run in the upcoming Republican primaries for President and those who would vote for those candidates.

During a recent interview with Sean Hannity on the Fox News Channel, Governor Palin wisely stressed:

"…in this process of assessing, once the lineup is set and the debates begin…we need to look at every one of these potential candidates and declared candidates records. See if they've had opportunity to veto overspending in their city or their state and some governing body. See if they've seized the opportunity to save other people's money and not squander it. See if they've had opportunity to go to the mat in protecting second amendment rights and every constitutional rights. See if they have in their own personal lives lived a physically and socially conservative life and really walked the walk not just talk the talk…We have to do our homework. Don't let the media define who these candidates are. Let us, as constituents, as voters, as potential candidates…do our homework."

Indeed. Governor Palin has just spoken arguably the most important truth. With liberty comes responsibility. All too often, too many of us are content to let someone else do the "homework" for us and then profess shock when the wheels very predictably fly off and our favorite politician, program, or entitlement ends up in a ditch.

[More]

AS MacKinnon's former boss Ronald Reagan advised those gathered for the 1975 edition of CPAC:

"I am impatient with those Republicans who after the last election rushed into print saying, “We must broaden the base of our party”—when what they meant was to fuzz up and blur even more the differences between ourselves and our opponents.

It was a feeling that there was not a sufficient difference now between the parties that kept a majority of the voters away from the polls. When have we ever advocated a closed-door policy? Who has ever been barred from participating?

Our people look for a cause to believe in. Is it a third party we need, or is it a new and revitalized second party, raising a banner of no pale pastels, but bold colors which make it unmistakably clear where we stand on all of the issues troubling the people?

[...]

A political party cannot be all things to all people. It must represent certain fundamental beliefs which must not be compromised to political expediency, or simply to swell its numbers.

I do not believe I have proposed anything that is contrary to what has been considered Republican principle. It is at the same time the very basis of conservatism. It is time to reassert that principle and raise it to full view. And if there are those who cannot subscribe to these principles, then let them go their way."

That banner President Reagan spoke of has survived the years. It is not tattered and worn from excessive waving, just neglected and forgotten in some circles within Reagan's political party of choice. Too few have been willing and determined to hold it high in recent years. Sarah Palin is one of the few. Though many so-called Republicans would like to drag the standard through the mud, she will not allow that banner to fall.

- JP

Levin Rewind: George Will, Charles K arrogant to tell us how to vote

"From my perspective, Sarah Palin is the real deal..."
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h/t: @JedediahBila

- JP

Benyamin Korn: A Foreign Policy Doctrine Echoing Reagan’s

"Allies should be supported, dictators reviled, terrorists hunted down and enemies defeated"
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From Benyamin Korn at JewsForSarah.com, more on the Palin Doctrine, a foreign policy philosophy much like that of President Ronald Reagan, except updated to fit the current world's template. The director of Jewish Americans for Sarah Palin coined the term "Palin Doctrine" (and wrote about its sharp contrast to the Obama Administration's ad hoc, ad lib method of conducting foreign relations) in a New York Sun op-ed last week:

It’s based on the principles that allies should be supported, dictators reviled, terrorists hunted down and enemies defeated. It also means the western world will not stand by at the bloody repression of a democratic revolution.

These notions might be self-evident to some, but they’re not to President Obama, who cannot bring himself even to utter the words “Islamist” and “terrorist” in the same sentence. One of his top intelligence officials actually told Congress last month that the Muslim Brotherhood is a “largely secular” organization. Ms. Palin, by contrast, denounced as a “shame” the administration’s offer to the Brotherhood of a seat at the table of power in Egypt’s newly evolving system.

Last week Governor and Mr. Palin were in New Delhi where she delivered the keynote address at a high-level political conclave. As the first visit to south Asia by a potential 2012 GOP contender, her attention was welcomed in a democracy justifiably concerned about the unstable behavior of Pakistan, its nuclear-armed neighbor to the northwest, and a China rapidly arming, under a regime where state capitalism and rigid control of political power go hand-in-hand.

The Palins’ stopover in Israel likewise came at a critical moment. In the wake of the Itamar massacre and the renewed rocket attacks on Israel from Gaza, Gov. Palin expressed only solidarity, even wearing a Star of David during her tours. She promised to return soon for a longer visit.

Contrast that with the behavior of Mr. Obama, who has yet, as President, even to visit the Jewish state, pays only lip service to the threat of ceaseless Palestinian incitement, and has returned to carping about the “illegitimacy” of Jews building houses where they already live.

[More]

- JP

Lance Thompson: Hindsight and Blindsight

Reagan, Palin, and the “she can’t win” fallacy
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At LowDownCentral.com, contributor Lance Thompson observes that the same pundits who claim that Ronald Reagan’s 1980 election victory was preordained desperately want their readers to believe that Sarah Palin is unelectable in 2012. Thompson calls such revisionist spin "mutually refuting":

Ronald Reagan challenged Republican President Gerald Ford for the GOP nomination in 1976 and lost. Ford subsequently lost to Carter, who was the Democrat in the oval office in 1980. Reagan was a favorite of conservatives, but his nomination was far from certain.

The mainstream media, which operated in 1980 without the counterbalancing conservative views of Fox News and talk radio, portrayed Reagan as too simplistic and too extreme for the presidency. New Republic called him "an ignoramus, a conscious and persistent falsifier of fact, a deceiver of the electorate." Atlantic Monthly dismissed him as a "casting office Goldwater." The New Yorker predicted that if "Reagan is the Republican nominee, the election of a Democrat is certain." These same condemnations have been applied to Palin since her debut on the national scene.

[...]

The point is that at no time was the nomination of Ronald Reagan certain. In fact, a more common theme, even as Reagan won primary after primary, was the impossibility of a Reagan presidency. This view was held by the media, the opposition, and many in his own party.

Sarah Palin faces the same doubts and predictions of failure. Like Reagan, she is plainspoken and unapologetic in her beliefs–American exceptionalism, energy independence, traditional morals and individual freedom. She has also been called too simplistic and too extreme, and in terms much harsher than those applied to Ronald Reagan. But she has not wavered in her principles, and her positions which seemed extreme at first–opposing Obamacare, tapping America’s energy resources, keeping faith with our allies and standing up to our enemies–resonate with an increasing number of Americans.

[More]

Thompson reminds us that Ronald Reagan’s historic two-term presidency changed the direction of this nation "in profound ways no one could have predicted." We would expand on that point to say Reagan (together with Margaret Thatcher and Pope John Paul) changed the world in ways no one could have foreseen in 1980. We agree with lance Thompson's conclusion that Gov. Palin "has at least the potential to do the same." Those who underestimate her, he adds, "have either forgotten their history, or wish they could."

h/t: Phineas

- JP

Quote of the Day (March 1, 2011)

Using Facebook to reach out to the rank and file
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Seth Lipsky at The Wall Street Journal:

"So which Republican is reaching out to union labor today in the way that Reagan did? It turns out to be another union veteran, named—wait for it—Sarah Palin."

- JP

Gov. Palin on This Week's Brody File Show

Reagan was one of a kind, but there's an "Army of Davids" who believe in his ideas
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CBN's David Brody goes "in search of the next Ronald Reagan" this week on The Brody File. Broadcasting from the Reagan ranch near Santa Barbara, Brody has interviews with the Wall Street Journal's John Fund and Kate Obenshain of The Young America’s Foundation, goes on a tour of Ronald Reagan's ranch home, and presents a never-seen clip from his exclusive interview with Sarah Palin.

- JP

Ron Reagan slams Palin intelligence, then gets dad's record wrong

Hubris
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Ah, the arrogance...

At ABC's The Note on Wednesday, Rick Klein reported an interview with Ronald Prescott Reagan, where Klein and Jon Karl told him they were discussing whether Reagan was more like Barack Obama or Sarah Palin. This is a tough one? The president's son insisted his father more like Obama than that idiot Sarah Palin:

“Just on the basis of intelligence, you would have to say Barack Obama. I don’t think my father has anything in common with Sarah Palin whatsoever,” Ron Reagan told us on ABC’s “Top Line” today. “I'm a little offended that we even have to talk about Sarah Palin, who has nothing interesting to say.”

ABC's Klein and Karl laughed with him as he said that. At least Klein noted Reagan Junior is a "prominent liberal voice," or he's at least as prominent as the media's Reagan-haters desire to make him. Klein said "He feels as if his father’s memory has been misappropriated by some conservatives, who gloss over elements of his record that they don’t agree with." Klein didn't stop him from mangling his father's record on taxation:

“It's not surprising that Republicans revere him as an icon and want to use him in that way. He's almost a fetish object, as I've said, over on the right,” Reagan told us. “True enough, he was a lower-taxes-and-small-government kind of guy. But of course the top marginal rate when he was in office was 50 percent, so he might be pretty happy with things the way they are now. I don't know though -- I can't speak for him. A lot of other people do like to speak for him, though, but I think it's a mistake. Many of them have never even met him, of course.”

Is Reagan Junior really demonstrating his superior politically savvy over conservatives like Palin? The top marginal tax rate at Reagan's inauguration was 70 percent. The first round of Reagan tax cuts lowered that to 50 percent, and then the tax reform of 1986 dropped the top marginal rate to 28 percent in 1988. It's currently 35 percent, so Reaganites would prefer 1988 rates to 2011 rates.

[More]

One of the great man's quotes, it seems, applies to his lesser son: "Well, the trouble with our liberal friends is not that they're ignorant; it's just that they know so much that isn't so."

- JP

Quote of the Day (February 9, 2011)

"The most awesome photo of Governor Sarah Palin you will see today"
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Kevin Dujan at Hillbuzz:

"The 40th and 45th Presidents of the United States"

- JP

Quote of the Day (February 8, 2011)

Still crazy after all these years...
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Tamara K. at View From The Porch:

"Reagan's 100th birthday has been an endless source of amusement for me, since the day's regularly scheduled Two-Minute's Hate against Sarah Palin was thrown off course by the grayer members of the audience suddenly distracted by their old bête noire. The very best of the counter-encomia thus far have managed to blame everything from Glenn Beck to homelessness on the Gipper, and even fairly mainstream CNN got in on the act with a piece of conspiranoia charging the GOP and conservatives with trying to steal Reagan's legacy from... well, from whom it's being stolen is never made very clear."

- JP

Quote of the Day (February 7, 2011)

Like the media, leftist Davis just makes things up
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Calvin Freiburger at NewsReal Blog:

“Wait a minute—Reagan was against hunting? If that sounds surprising, that’s because Davis simply made it up. In a May 1983 speech before the National Rifle Association, the president called 'America’s sportsmen, hunters, and fishermen' the nation’s 'foremost conservationists of our national resources,' and said he 'deeply appreciate[d]' the NRA’s efforts to teach children 'marksmanship, firearms safety, and some of the values and ethics of hunting and the outdoors.' In the same speech, Reagan also laments 'a kind of elitist attitude in Washington that vast natural resources must be locked up to save the planet from mankind.' Reagan would most likely say that, by hunting, Palin was participating in a proud, valuable American tradition; if he would find anything 'baffling,' it would more likely be how little his own daughter understands his views.”

- JP

Stupid Media Tricks: Obama is no Ronald Reagan

Every picture tells a story
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Of all the stupid media tricks we've seen from the state-controlled, lamestream media, the attenpt to equate Obama with Ronald Reagan is perhaps the stupidest. If anything, Obama is the anti-Reagan.

Every picture tells a story, as Rod Stewart used to sing. Is there any doubt which political figure below is Reaganesque and which is Kerryesque?


- JP

DBKP: The New Ronald Reagans, Obama and Sarah Palin?

The shameless hypocrisy of the Democrat/Media Complex
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A Sunday DBKP post recommends Robert Kline’s new Reagan documentary as a useful reference with which to compare and contrast Ronald Reagan to Barack Obama and Sarah Palin. The Democrat/Media Complex (DMC), which hated Reagan when he was in office and was actively engaged in a campaign to destroy him politically, is now, in a sick twist of irony, trying to use Reagan's greatness to build up Obama (who has absolutely nothing in common with Reagan beyond the fact that they were both elected president). The DMC is also now employing the same tactics it used against Reagan in an all-out attempt to destroy Gov. Palin:

Lately, there’s been what seems to be a push by some members of the press and political pundits to compare President Barack Obama to Ronald Reagan. A comparison which, if you lived through the Reagan years, is surreal but only if you put the comparison into the right context: Those who seek to somehow shape Barack Obama’s image into another Ronald Reagan must think, quite mistakenly, Americans who were adults during the Reagan years suffer from ‘senile dementia’. American voters too young to recall the Reagan years will believe this falsehood is true if it’s repeated often in the press and by political pundits, a soaking of the subconscious minds of the young masses.

Another politician frequently compared to Ronald Reagan–never, ever by members of the news media and political analysts and pundits except, perhaps, FOX News’ Sean Hannity–former governor of Alaska and Republican Vice-President candidate in 2008, Sarah Palin. Plain spoken–too plain for some–and unabashedly patriotic Palin was dubbed by the news media and political pundits during the election as an ignorant, backwoods hick without any ‘experience’ to lead America. Part of the case made against Palin, CNN’s Jack Cafferty’s infamous, ‘If Sarah Palin Being One Heartbeat Away “Doesn’t Scare The Hell Out Of You, It Should’, Cafferty’s response to Sarah Palin’s interview with CBS’ Katie Couric.

[...]

I often wondered why Jack Cafferty went on a rant about Palin when, at the same time, over on the Democrat ticket, was Joe Biden. The same Joe Biden, who, in 1987, when running for President, was exposed as a plagiarist.

[...]

For those without senile dementia who still recall 1980 and the presidential election, the memories of the press and political pundits who brought up Reagan’s former acting career, ‘Good Lord, a actor in the White House’ and Reagan’s executive experience as a governor of the largest state in the U.S. as reasons why Americans should cast their vote for the incumbent, the ‘Misery Index’ President, Jimmy Carter. Another reason why Americans shouldn’t vote for Reagan, Ronald Reagan, unabashed Christian, was firmly unapologetic about America and Americans.

In 2008 news media and political pundits lauded the new Democrat candidate for President, one term Senator from Illinois Barack Obama. Two of the reasons why the public should cast their vote for Barack Obama, the guy really knew how to run a campaign, and, he gave great speeches. But, was/is Barack Obama, the ‘Great Communicator’, a term used to describe Ronald Reagan?

Another description of Ronald Reagan, often phrased in derogatory terms by political pundits, Ronald Reagan was a ‘Christian’.

[...]

Palin was back in the news after a lone gunmen attempted to assassinate Arizona Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords on January 8, 2011, in the parking lot of a Safeway store located in Tucson, Arizona. Jared Lee Loughner, age 23, wounded 19 and killed six people including a Federal Judge and a 9-yr-old girl. Twenty-four hours later the New York Daily News published Rep. Gabrielle Giffords’ blood is on Sarah Palin’s hands after putting cross hair over district. The article, an attempt to assassinate the character of Sarah Palin.

[...]

While it was Sarah Palin’s fault 23-yr-old Loughner shot 19 people, killing six, John Hinckley, Jr.’s attempt to assassinate President Ronald Reagan was labeled the action of a mentally ill individual who had a copy of Catcher in the Rye and was obsessed with actress Jodie Foster.

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- JP

Quote of the Day (February 5, 2011)

Metaphoric
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Tammy Bruce via Twitter:

Hope u caught this metaphor [Friday Night]- @SarahPalinUSA noting she enjoyed walking the trails Reagan cleared himself ;)

- JP

Tony Lee: The Mama Grizzly and the Gipper

She's not Ronald Reagan, but Sarah Palin can be Reaganesque
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As Gov. Palin said in her speech at the Reagan 100 Celebration Friday night, though people are looking for the next Ronald Reagan, they're not going to find him. He was one of a kind. But, she went on to say that there is an army of Davids unafraid to tell Goliath "Don’t tread on me!" That army of Davids are Reagan's political heirs, and Sarah Palin is one of its top generals. Though there are many similarities between Reagan and Palin, Human Events' Tony Lee explains that the two have practiced politics in very different surroundings:

In many ways, Reagan was the perfect leader for his time because he had a disposition that suited the non-fragmented media landscape that surrounded him, which consisted of a mix of the top-down three major broadcasting networks and the big national newspapers such as the New York Times and national newsweeklies such as Time.

The media landscape today is more fragmented than ever. Talk radio, blogs, social networking sites such as Twitter and Facebook, and cable television give conservatives not only loud and prominent outlets but also an ability to get and share information in real time without the filter of mainstream media reporters and editors. It has also made conservatives and conservatism more mainstream and much more a part of what Washingtonians call “the conversation.”

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To cut through in this media megalopolis, a candidate has to be fierce, in-your-face, asymmetrical, savvy, timely, provocative, and engaging and compelling.

And no candidate has navigated this new media terrain better than Palin.

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Palin often chooses to defend herself fiercely on Twitter, often unfiltered. She does this because she knows that in the media cycle we live in, defenses are often most effective when they are quick, fierce, and generate buzz to drown out the original criticism. In Palin’s case, she knows her words will get out to the mass audience faster if they come from her mouth—or her fingers.

Compared with 1980, the media today is a brave new world. In Iran and Egypt, social networking sites and new media outlets energized citizens fed up with their ruling classes. Such forces also fueled the Tea Party movement, especially by uniting moms and women across the country. And though not all of these women are Palin supporters, Palin would still probably refer to them all as “Mama grizzlies.”

Palin probably would not have been successful had she been a politician in Reagan’s era. And to be fair, Reagan probably would not have been the star politician he was had he come of age in the fragmented media era in which Palin lives.

Palin has mastered this landscape and run circles around her critics. In the future, Palin will have endless opportunities to harness her acumen to advance policies and lead a political movement. She may just become to her era what Reagan was to his.

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- JP