Don't confuse Republicans' thrill over the Palin nomination with the Dems' worship of Obama: A reply to Paul Mirengoff

My blogospheric friends over at Power Line are still struggling to get their minds, individually and collectively, around what has just happened in the Grand Old Party. Paul Mirengoff writes:

We conservatives have had a good time ridiculing the Obama phenomenon, especially its messianic feel — the willingness of its adherents to pour so much hope and belief into such an empty, or at least incomplete, vessel — and its elevation of "narrative" over substance.

It turns out that we were dying to have basically the same experience.

That was posted late at night, and I hope Paul didn't intend to call Gov. Palin an empty or incomplete vessel. Maybe he didn't re-read the post; maybe he didn't think through the comparison. If that is truly his considered opinion after having thoroughly investigated Gov. Palin, he's entitled of course to that opinion, but I think it is a profoundly wrong one, more wrong than anything I've ever seen published on that blog (of which I've been a regular reader for about five years).

This will be my 43rd post on Gov. Palin, dating back to June 8th of this year. I will let the previous 42 posts stand on their own as refutation of the "vessel" comment.

But Paul misunderstands — in a way that surprises me a great deal — the nature of the GOP faithful's reaction to Gov. Palin.

Relief: Prior to the Palin nomination, Paul and his co-bloggers have been among the most articulate conservatives who've voiced reservations and doubts about Sen. John McCain. He was not their first choice from among the GOP presidential candidates, and neither was he mine; at best, he was the leading plurality candidate in a primary system deliberately weighted (contrary to the Democrats' system) to winnow the field rapidly. Moreover, although the McCain campaign's secrecy was impressive (especially in retrospect), press reports had suggested that Sen. McCain was considering selecting a VP nominee who would have amplified, rather than dampened, conservatives' reservations and doubts.

That being the case, it's inexcusable that Paul fails to recognize a major component of the current emotional wave: Simple relief. It wasn't Michael Bloomberg. It wasn't Joe Lieberman. It wasn't Tom Ridge. It wasn't Lindsey Graham. Instead, it was someone who has a career-long commitment to, and record of upholding, conservative principles. On one of them in particular — reverence for the sanctity of human life — the VP nominee has unassailable credentials unmatched by any other national political candidate in history.

Reform: The Power Line bloggers have also blogged a good game in attacking government waste and pork-barrel politics, and I believe they have been sincere in that. The fact that Barack Obama has built his campaign around the word "change," however, seems to have blinded Paul to the incredible hunger in the GOP's rank and file — and in a lot of Americans who don't consider themselves to be GOP rank-and-filers! — for genuine reform. John McCain's own record on that is pretty good. But objectively, Sarah Palin has not just campaigned on, but actually accomplished more meaningful fiscal and ethical reform in the last three years than any other GOP politician in the country. So combined with the sheer relief it brought to us, the choice of Sarah Palin brought to the GOP ticket a prominent symbol of fiscal and ethical reform, and that explains another good-sized chunk of our current enthusiasm.

Renewed hope that we can win: And with that, and in part because of it, suddenly there came optimism. As Paul himself admitted in his immediately preceding post, "the phrase 'energizing the base' hardly does justice to Palin's impact on conservatives," and so far "the evidence is that independents and swing-voters are intrigued by the pick and are more likely as a result of it to give the ticket serious consideration." Thus, just from a purely political standpoint, he admits that "the Palin pick looks like a clear political plus." Indeed, the Palin nomination was a game-changer that has simultaneously thrown our opponents for a loop and helped us believe things are possible — including capturing the electoral votes of some previously not-in-play states — that three weeks ago we would have thought were impossible. No longer do we feel like we're sleepwalking through a repeat of the 1996 election season, with a grumpy old war-hero candidate doomed to put up a good fight, lose badly, and then go off to make Viagra commercials.

Balance: McCain is, as he himself jokes, old as dirt. Everything he says, we've heard him say before. He is a man's man and a war hero and has decades of experience and proven expertise as a legislator, but other than running a naval air squadron (which ain't bad, but ain't running a government), he has no executive experience, and he knows less about the economy than he admits he should. Sarah Palin is young and fresh. Almost everything she says, none of us have heard before, at least not from her, and not from someone from her background. She is a woman who has made it in politics without the benefit of being the wife or daughter of anyone important or rich or powerful. She's got more executive experience than either Democrat on their ticket, including executive experience at the local level and in an important state agency, and she has executive accomplishments that are disproportionately large compared to her years of service. And she knows about, and is a symbol for, new energy, literally and figuratively — an articulate proponent to make the case on the GOP's single best economic issue. She completes the ticket; she complements McCain's weaknesses, and their overlap — as "maverick reformers" — exactly corresponds to this most effective campaign theme McCain can run, and it's the one he wants to run on anyway! With Palin on the ticket, it no longer limps.

Narrative: The word's overused this political season, but the fact is, Americans of all stripes enjoy a good romantic tale. Barack Obama's saga is kind of weird to most of us, and indeed, that's a large portion of his appeal. When he says, "My story could have only happened in America," that's one of the truest things he's ever let slip through his lips, and besides it being true, it's an implied compliment to us, and we don't mind a little flattery. Lots of us would also take satisfaction in the symbolism and historic significance of a black man becoming president. And athough John McCain's story — as a war hero and POW — is also compelling, it's a story that's no longer new and exciting to us. But suddenly, here's a new character on the dramatic stage of national politics! She whips the corrupt insiders and forces them to flee town, then (quite literally) bakes cookies to take the the press who were covering the slaughter. She's got a gorgeous husband who's a champion snow-machine driver, a fisherman, and an oil worker; she has five adorable kids. And she takes the stage at the RNC and before a TV audience of 37 million, she delivers the best-received political speech of the 21st century (eclipsing the one given four years ago by Barack Obama, which he couldn't nearly match this time around at the DNC). Boy, howdy, that is a story! And we're caught up in it! We want to see what happens in Chapter Two!

Now, some of that will fade. And a lot of that is shallow. But it won't all fade, and it's not all shallow. Sarah Palin is easily the most gifted natural politician the GOP has seen since Ronald Reagan, and that's not something that can be faked, nor even contained. She has changed national politics already, even if the McCain-Palin ticket loses. Bill Whittle aptly called her acceptance speech "a tectonic event."

Salvation? When Paul wrote of Democrats pouring hope and belief into an empty vessel, Barack Obama, and referenced the Obama campaign's "messianic feel," he implied that we, too, feel like we need a savior. The Democrats are frustrated: They've been out of the White House for 20 of the last 28 years, and they're completely invested in the notion that the guy who's beaten them in the last two elections is an incompetent fool (a meme that ends up adding to their own self-hatred and feelings of impotence). So yes, they do want to be "saved." They want a Moses to lead them from the wilderness and lay down the law. They want a Jesus to multiply the loaves and fishes, and redistribute them (along with the contents of all the money-purses of the Philistines).

Conservatives aren't looking for a redeemer or a savior, although a new Reaganesque hero would be nice. If that hero can keep the Dems from taxing us into dust and surrendering to the terrorists — maybe lift some drilling prohibitions and let the markets work — we'll be content on our own, thank you.

So, Paul: Re-think that comparison, my friend. Give your fellow conservatives and Republicans a little more credit. And maybe hold off on those nasty comparisons until you've gotten to know Gov. Palin a little better. If you're not sold yet, that's okay. There's time. But be open to the possibility that what's going on right now with our team is quite a bit different — and ultimately, a whole lot more encouraging — than what's been going on with the other guys.