Op-Ed
Sarah Palin: Mama Beats Obama?
September 8, 2008 - 12:00amIt seems ages ago that I was dressing like a Spice Girl and hopping around my room to the tune of “Wannabe” screaming “girl power!” with a British accent to imitate four of my personal heroes (I never really liked “Sporty”). Or maybe it was just last week. Either way, the age of “girl power” is upon us as the Republican Party runs this November with a woman — Governor Sarah Palin — on the ticket for the first time.
But this is a movement that hasn’t just begun. Before the age of Sarah Palin, before the Spice Girl phenomenon, and even before Barbie had more careers than there are majors at Cornell, another woman paved the way for our current vice presidential nominee: Geraldine Ferrarro.
Lost in the vicious headlines, dubious blog posts, and relentless attacks is the fact that when Ferraro was tapped to run with Walter Mondale on the Democratic ticket in 1984, the same thing happened to her. After an initial wave of excitement that a woman was finally on a major party ticket, the media quickly turned to questions about her experience, her ability to be vice president and a mother, and of course, her family’s personal business. The media’s attention towards Palin has been biased to say the least, and even Ferraro has called for more equitable treatment of Palin’s candidacy.
As everyone is so quick to point out this election cycle, times have changed. But for the better?
Almost 150 years ago the first Republican was elected to our country’s highest office. Abraham Lincoln won the presidency on a platform of positions made familiar to the public by newspapers. But beyond his home state of Illinois, few Americans were aware of what he looked like. Many, who had never seen a photograph or the man in person, were shocked to learn that he was six-foot three inches tall or more.
Today, everybody knows what Sarah Palin looks like, but too often, that's all they know. The liberal media can’t stop talking about personal issues that should not be part of the debate: her daughter’s pregnancy (no one cares), her child with Down Syndrome (who Governor Palin, and not her daughter, gave birth to), or her husband’s DUI from 20 years ago (he’s a Democrat anyway).
Instead of getting bogged down in the superficial, let’s unpack the real issues — a task Obama’s campaign seems to struggle with. The Left has tried to define Sarah Palin as a state governor with no experience, just as the media pegged Ferraro, then a member of Congress. Since Barack Obama seems to be the Left’s benchmark for perfection, allow me to indulge in a brief comparison of the candidates:
Sarah Louise Heath Palin (“Sarah Barracuda”) currently serves as Governor of Alaska. Previously, she spent ten years as the mayor of Wasilla and president of the Alaska Conference of Mayors, and is a former city council member. Barack Hussein Obama II (“The One”) is currently a junior senator from Illinois, having spent time as a state senator and community organizer. In terms of executive experience, Palin’s years outnumber Obama’s 12-0.
In the past two years, while Senator Obama was busy running for president, Governor Palin was running the largest state in the Union. She opposed a federal earmark for the $400 million “bridge to nowhere” and cut nearly $2 billion from the state budget. She also took on ethics reform, often exposing members of her own party. While pushing to develop more energy resources, she increased taxes on oil production, revealing that in the past, the companies had bribed legislators to keep taxes low. This decision enabled her to deliver a rebate of $1,200 to each state resident. That’s like two semesters worth of textbooks from the Cornell Store.
By contrast, Obama has virtually no accomplishments beyond getting himself elected and avoiding any controversial decisions while voting “present” 100 times in the state senate. He often mentions his role as a “community organizer.” What he doesn’t point out is that he failed to achieve his one goal in the position — eliminating asbestos from a single Chicago housing project.
When it comes to “change,” Palin has actually done it; Obama has merely mentioned it in speeches.
The theme of “change” seems inescapable this election season. Embodying that theme, Palin replaced the entire Board of Agriculture and Conservation because of a conflict of interest, and also resigned from her position of Ethics Commissioner of the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission in order to reveal corruption.
To illustrate his idea of “change,” Barack Obama selected a 36-year incumbent senator as his running mate.
But that said, there is no candidate who brings to the table all the pluses and no minuses. Perhaps the ticket could be even stronger if Palin had more foreign policy experience, or if she had cured cancer, while spending summers doing research on the moon and training for the NFL. But she is someone who represents the values and worldview of the American people.
Last week in Denver, the Left praised their nomination as “historic.” As Fred Thompson has pointed out, the only thing historic about the nomination of Barack Obama is that he is the most inexperienced and unqualified person to ever run for president.
McCain’s choice of Sarah Palin as his running mate turns this into another kind of historic race. A self-proclaimed “hockey mom” from ordinary circumstances in rural Alaska now has the chance to claim one of our country’s highest offices. She is a role model for women everywhere as a wife, a working mother, a businesswoman, and a public servant. But women won’t flock to her just because we share a common chromosome. We’ll flock to her is because of her strong conservative principles and character.
Like John McCain and Abraham Lincoln, Sarah Palin is a maverick and a reformer. She and McCain are well equipped to bring the kind of change that Washington desperately needs and that Americans are demanding.
Rudy Guiliani last week noted in his speech to the RNC that “change is not a destination and hope is not a strategy." But there’s one destination where all women should hope to see some change — in the White House. And on November 4, the glass ceiling, cracked but never before broken, will finally be shattered by someone who really can bring change to our government — Sarah Palin.
Rachel Quigley is a senior in the School of Hotel Administration. She can be reached at req3@cornell.edu. Guest Room appears periodically.
Nice going, Rachel. It's
Nice going, Rachel. It's nice to see that there is still some common sense among Cornell students when it comes to the presidential election and that not everyone is mesmerized by the empty suit from Illinois
areUkiddin
I find it curious that an Ivy League female would sing the praises of Palin. Palin is not a breakthrough for women. She is just a gimmick. Start with her education. She holds nothing but a bachelor's degree in communications from the Univeristy of Idaho. She attended six different colleges in six years to end up with that degree.
There's a reason she's not known as a "real" thinker and a further reason she's not talking to the media. I sure the GOP has "tested" her in mock interviews and debates.
Palin is more of a Jerry Springer Show celebrity- quick with the one-liners like "pit bull in lipstick." She is style over substance and on her best day, she couldn't even get admitted into Cornell.
Palin cannot interpet policy and she will not be respected around the world- she just doesn't have the intellect. She's McCain's eye candy. He could have picked a woman even from Cornell if he took the position seriously.
Hillary was Ivy league educated, like yourself. Obama is out of Harvard Law School. Palin has got jokes.
As many women have worked hard their entire careers with the hopes of being role models, working in school, climbing the corporate ladder, Palin represents that an undereducated short-term governor in a wilderness state with a bubbly personality- trumps them all.
She wasn't selected for her brains.
Thank you!
Thank you for this reality check. Rachel clearly has no clue about politics. It is an absolute INSULT to women, that Palin would be chosen for the VP. In these difficult economic times, we need an unquestionably brilliant and insightful person in the White House-- not someone like Palin who has a laughable education. Both Obama and Biden hold JDs and have even taught law school courses (Obama was a professor at U. Chicago). How could anyone possibly think Palin's intellect rivals Obama's or Biden's?
It would be absolutely frightening if McCain was elected and died in office, because we would have someone with no economic training running a country in dire financial straits. Who knows, with her fiscal conservatism, she would probably go cut funding for the US unemployment program just as job losses hit an all time high.
If McCain wanted to pick a woman with socially conservative values, there were many more qualified choices who had much better educational backgrounds.
P.S.
P.S. Cornell has nearly three times as many students (20,000) as there were people in Wasilla when Palin was Mayor (7,000). Your student body president presides over a population much larger and better educated than anything Palin has ever encountered.
IVY LEAGUE?
And is Ivy League educated all that matters??? I am sure you dislike Bush 100x more then Palin and Bush went to Yale, so in your analogy, Bush should be a great leader?
By your account, McCain, who
By your account, McCain, who has spent his entire career in Congress, also has no executive experience (nor does Hillary). Palin has 20 months of executive experience of a sparsely populated state. In that time, among her executive decisions was to choose the grizzly bear over the polar bear for the state's commemorative coin. Yep, she's more qualified than everyone else. Let's send her broker peace in the middle east.
Rachel: Well written Op Ed.
Rachel: Well written Op Ed. It is refreshing to see a young woman who can think on her own and plow through all the media slant. I applaud you for stating your thoughts knowing that they might be unpopular. Clearly you share the strength of Sarah Palin. Kudos to you!
Racial overtones?
Does anyone else see the racial overtones used in this article? Rachel makes sure to use Obama's middle name, which is rarely used in articles by the media. When his middle name is used, it is usually used by those seeking to discredit Obama and falsely imply that he has Muslim or Arab connections. And she also refers to him as "The One," which was a moniker devised solely by Republicans in order to mock Obama, and also has racial implications.
In the spirit of full disclosure, Rachel is a staffer on the Cornell Review, which has allegedly published racist articles.
Queen of Earmarks
"She opposed a federal earmark for the $400 million 'bridge to nowhere'"
After she was for it. She opposed the bridge late in the game, when it became a political liability.
Your statement is blatantly deceptive. Palin is the poster child for running a state on earmarks.
We're not electing Obama so he can be the first black president, and we're not electing Palin so she can be the first female VP. We're electing candidates based on their policies and temperament. Like McCain, Palin stands for 8 more years of broken Bush policies and national humiliation.
Are you serious?
If you're asking for a more equitable treatment among the candidates, you might want to try it yourself. It's not fair, Rachel, to use Abraham Lincoln as a touchstone of the American Presidency and then dismiss a candidate who, in all fairness, is just as qualified as our "first Republican." If I recall correctly, Lincoln grew from a humble background into a lawyer--then a state senator (from Illinois, no less!)--then a Congressman. That's it.
I know you want to love her, but Sarah Palin, however charming her speechwriters make her sound, is a conservative zealot who was chosen for her charm and zealotry and, yes, gender. If you want to encourage equitable treatment, Rachel, stop doing what the pundits do and use weasel terms like "largest state in the Union" (in area?) and "executive experience" to conjure qualifications that don't exist.
From now on, let's encourage a healthy, intelligent, critical debate here, Rachel, not publish pieces like this that sidestep everything that's important in this election. If you want to somehow defend Sarah Palin's decade as the mayor of a small town as proof that she can handle anchoring our entire democracy, go ahead. But you're not allowed to blame people for giving her inequitable treatment when you can't even resist mentioning that it is very, very important that she's a woman.
While I respect your right
While I respect your right to publish your opinion and support for Palin, I feel the need to clear a few points for you, Rachel:
1. Palin did oppose the bridge in the 11th hour but not the money for the bridge. She still accepted $233 million of the $400 million from Congress earmarked for the bridge. It's still unclear how it was used for Alaska. Perhaps it helped with that $1,200.00 refund.
2. Abraham Lincoln was not a maverick. He issued the Emancipation Proclamation as a "punishment" to the South for their refusal to accept his terms to end the war in 1863. If you actually read the document, it does not free anyone.
3. Lincoln's Republican Party of 1865 is not the same Republican Party today. His was actually the Republican-Democratic Party - comprised mostly of disgruntled Whig Party members. Today it goes by the Democratic Party. The Republican Party of today is a stemmed from the Whig Party from 1865. This was a neat and effective trick used in 2004.
4. I agree that Palin and McCain are a maverick ticket. They are the first ticket with publicly-known opposing views of a major issue, off-shore drilling. That should make debates and town hall meetings quite interesting. I’m curious who’ll fold to the others views first, McCain or Palin.
5. Palin's current advocacy for special needs children is quite questionable considering she cut state funding to special needs schools in Alaska by 62%. Of course this was before she and her sister both had Down syndrome children.
6. You left out a few words of “The One” in reference to Barack’s middle name. Hussein means “The Good One” or “The Handsome One” and is a royal name is Jordan – fitting considering his African heritage. Sarah means “Princess” which is fitting for a former beauty queen.
Are you seriously suggesting that the first African-American/minority to be nominated for President of the United States is not a historic event? Would you and Fred not consider it a historic event if Palin had been the first female nominated for President? I guess it wasn’t historic when women were granted the right to vote less than 100 years ago or when slaves were officially freed by the 13th Amendment – again not the Emancipation Proclamation? Maybe your definition of historic differs from mine but I studied History so perhaps I’m biased.
I vote on the issues dear to me which has resulted in me voting for both sides. However, I think it's interesting how many Republican hypocrisies exists and morals are only relevant when it's convenient. This is a party that preaches abstinence but also seeks protection for Sarah Palin's daughter's pregnancy under the theory of a private family affair. Yet when Bill Clinton's affair as governor of Arkansas was made public, after he was already president by the way, Republicans didn't hail that as private family matter. In fact, it was a catalyst for myriad attacks. Then a few months later, Newt Gringich's multi-year affair is made public and immediately labeled "a private family matter" by Republicans. Barack Obama is criticized for a lack of foreign policy experience. Where is Palin’s experience in her 12 years? Does anyone besides Cynthia McCain thinks the proximity of the Alaska and Russia gives Palin foreign policy credentials? If everyone would stop attacking each other and actually listen to each sides plans for America, this election would be much more tolerable.
Side Note: Did you really quote Rudy Guiliani? There were so many other available options from the RNC. Rudy? Really??????
Yes, I Agree
You have hit the nail on the head. Sarah Palin is the best choice for Vice President. She is smart and well represents my family. We are all in for Sarah...AND Girl Power!
Sara is sassy, fun-loving,
Sara is sassy, fun-loving, smart-as-a-whip, a real go-getter and she's just...well...neat. Go Sara! Go Sara! It's your Birthday!
Finally, an article that
Finally, an article that tells the truth. Sarah Palin may not be Harvard educated but she
has earned her spot on that ticket with EXPERIENCE. She is smart and she is not afraid to expose
the garbage. Go Sarah...We need you to clean up Washington. Obama is all talk ..no action...