What makes Sarah Palin the Zamboni of this campaign
BOSTON — Who would have dreamed that a hockey mom could produce such a bounce? I didn't even think the puck was supposed to get off the ice.
But now that so many women have skated over to her side, allow me another metaphor. Sarah Palin is the Zamboni of this campaign.
This hockey mom rolled onto the ice, did a couple of turns around the rink and managed to clear off all the nasty old Republican detritus. She gave the Grand Old (Boy) Party a new image, or at least a new surface.
Let us remember that Republicans had long targeted working mothers as the centerpiece of the culture wars. They ran an entire convention on Marilyn Quayle's line that "Most women do not wish to be liberated from their essential natures as women."
Now their heroine is the in-your-face governor who once said: "To any critics who say a woman can't think and work and carry a baby at the same time, I'd just like to escort that Neanderthal back to the cave."
Hey, wasn't that our line? Weren't the Neanderthals who wanted women to stay in their traditional roles these same conservatives? Suddenly, we are watching the parade of the flip-floppers, patriarchs with pedicures.
Who can forget James Dobson, who blamed the decline and fall of morality on "working mothers and permissiveness," and told us that real women "are merely waiting for their husbands to assume leadership." He now says "I believe Sarah Palin is God's answer. "
Who can forget Phyllis Schlafly who said the "flight from home is a flight from yourself, from responsibility, from the nature of woman." She now says that "I think a hardworking, well-organized CEO type can handle it very well."
Who can forget Pat Buchanan, scriptwriter of the culture wars? He now says, "For heaven's sakes, I mean, can't you have a traditional woman who is also a—you know, a beauty queen and is a governor? What's the matter?"
Who can forget all this? I'll tell you who can forget: Everyone! Sarah the Zamboni has cleared the ice of this pesky historical memory.
Mind you, sexism is still alive and well, although it is enchanting to watch the same folks who criticized Hillary supporters for whining take off after the media for vetting. Back when a Hillary hater asked McCain "How do we stop the bitch?" John responded "Excellent question!" Now his campaign says it's "offensive and disgraceful" of Obama to use the word "lipstick."
How do you spell chutzpah?
Nevertheless the good news for this cockeyed optimist is that Sarah Palin has made it politically incorrect to criticize working mothers. The mommy wars wage on in playgrounds and the blogosphere, but among candidates and in politics, working moms are the demilitarized zone of the cultural battleground.
There is, however, another divide between left and right that has reappeared with the governor's star turn. It's the difference between those who think a woman can have it all as long as she can do it all ... by herself. And those who think that it is neither wimpish nor whiny to push for some help.
The Emergence of Sarah Palin is actually the Return of Supermom. Mother of five, moose killer and marathoner, she was back at work three days after her son's birth, juggling a Blackberry and a breast pump while making Helen Reddy look like a slacker. Call her a role model or a parody, but the fresh face of 2008 looks like the exhausted face of the 1980s.
The conservative virtue of Sarah Palin's life is that she doesn't need anything from anyone outside the family. She isn't lobbying for, say, maternity leave, equal pay or universal pre-K. Let alone universal health insurance. Or college tuition breaks, especially for that soon-to-be-teen-mom and her soon-to-be husband. Compare this to the actual Wal-Mart mom juggling day care fees and gas bills, fantasizing about a job with benefits and the flexibility to be home when the kids are sick.
Somehow the original women's movement slogan, the personal is political, has been turned on its head. It's more fun to talk about the candidate's family and eyeglasses than Iraq and the recession. If Bush was the guy you wanted to have a beer with, Palin is the gal you want to go to aerobics with. The political is waaay too personal.
So let us applaud the way Sarah Palin has pushed the working mother out of the firing line of the culture wars. But what about those family issues flattened by Sarah Zamboni?
Ellen Goodman is a columnist for the Boston Globe. Her e-mail address is ellengoodman@globe.com.
Sep 12, 2008 at 5:43 a.m.
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Obama has links to terrorists at home and abroad. Quite a feat to find home grown terrorists but he managed. His church supports and admires Louis Farrakhan. He campaigned for a Muslim extremist in Kenya in 2006. His education at Harvard was bank rolled by another extremist supporter. Nobody in media is talking about his worst ties to extremism. N-O-B-O-D-Y The man still has not been vetted. Tony Rezko and Bill Ayers and Rev. Wright should be enough on their own but there is much, much more. Currently a suit has been filed to stop the Democrat nomination for his falsified birth certificate, currently there is a case pending to allow investigators to look into his public records which have been unofficially sealed. Here are a few more names to look into: Philip Berg, Khalid Abdullah Tariq al-Mansour, Rashid Khalidi, Fr. Phleger, Raila Amollo Odinga, and Rev. Otis Moss III. What remains undiscovered? Why do we need any more?
Sep 11, 2008 at 4:53 p.m.
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Another disgruntled nut case ranting on the left. I LOVE articles like this. Every time the left spins out attacks on Palin McCain gets another vote! I posted on this blog and many others to just unload on McCain when he was +170 on the exchanges during the DNC convention. Today for the 1st time, he has moved to the FAVORITE on the markets (-110 now). This was so plain as day to see. You just knew the left would fall into the trap here, and articles like this just prove it! I can start hedging out my trade now. Should cash in a minimum of $5K by the time this is all over with. God I LOVE the left, they are so predictable!!
Sep 11, 2008 at 4:08 p.m.
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Hatch; "Caribou Barbie" - hilarious!
Thanks for the great laugh this afternoon.
Sep 11, 2008 at 3:39 p.m.
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If we are actually going to discuss this article and not just repost the same old junk from other posts, I liken Sarah to the old testament judge, Deborah. Yes, it is a man's role to take leadership. But there are cases when men aren't going to step up to the plate and do what needs to be done. Then God will use those who are willing. Thus God is using Sarah.
Sep 11, 2008 at 3:18 p.m.
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Spanky: Figures you would love her.
Sep 11, 2008 at 3:08 p.m.
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A little raw meat for the Palinivores. Woof, woof.....
Sep 11, 2008 at 3:05 p.m.
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I love this chick she brought the republican party back to respect and true conservatism.
Sep 11, 2008 at 3:04 p.m.
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Who was fired?
Sep 11, 2008 at 2:35 p.m.
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hatch, if you'd leave out the derogatory "Caribou Barbie", I'd say you've summed her up pretty well! All except her pattern of firing people who don't agree with her to hire her friends or to get vengeance.
Sep 11, 2008 at 2:33 p.m.
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There is a glimmer of victory when someone steals your thunder!
Sep 11, 2008 at 2:12 p.m.
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Sara has some baggage. Lets not forget Troopergate. McCain is doing everything to delay its out come. So lets say Mc Cain gets elected. I believe he will then do everything to pursue this Troopergate thing to get rid of her. He called her crowd the Evangelicals intolerable. I don't think he has changed his mind. Can teach an old dog new tricks. I believe that Palin is McCains Agnew. He will jump at the chance to replace her with Liberman. Until then he will use her to get elected. Smart political men are not dummies. McCain knows he will only have one term because of his age. He is not going to waste his time with the Evangelical bagage.
Sep 11, 2008 at 1:16 a.m.
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Not to forget that Caribou Barbie wanted to charge the victim of a rape for the rape kit, belongs to a way wackier church than Obama. One where you can pray the gay away and believes the war is "Gods plan". Oh....God also want's Sarah to build a gas line through to Cananda. Say's she is against pork barrel projects yet has taken more pork per capita than any other state. Was for the bridge to nowhere before she was against it and then kept the money. She attended the Alaskan Independence party convention earlier this year. She lied about selling the jet on e-bay. She sold it to an oil company friend at a loss of $500million plus. She did not sell it for a profit like both her and grampy say when on the campaign trail. She may come from a "small town" yet she and her 5 best friends are known as "elitist". They are proud of the fact that their noses are stuck up in the air back in Wasilla. When she was mayor of wasilla, she hired a lobbiest and got Wasilla over $25 million. Did she build infrastructure such as sewer,new roads or schools? Nope...she built a Hockey rink. She left Wasilla $25 mil in debt so her kid could play hockey for two years. Her 80% approal rating?....Ya think maybe the fact that she got every Alaskan an extra $12 hundred ontop of the $3 grand they get every year just for living up there. That is EVERY Alaskan. Not every family or every household. EVERY ALASKAN. Good incentive to have lot's of kid's. Where and who do you think pays that bill every year? Look in your pocketbook or wallet folks.
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