Well, it's Saturday, and not much is going on. Now, let me tell you a real life story that I've been mulling over for days, but haven't had the drive to write it down here...until now. This is about the Republican Party's views on affirmative action and their hypocrisy in the issue. Now, I'm not accusing all Republicans of being this way...just their candidate recruiting teams.
Read more below the fold.
One of the biggest story-tellers in my family is my own mother. Some months ago, over the summer, I was musing with her about why the heck the GOP would recruit the mayor of a town in Alaska to run for governor and then throw her into the ring for national office, despite her incompetence and divisiveness. My mom immediately started explaining how it should not be a surprise as the GOP tries in many elections to run an un-vetted woman just to increase their appeal to the female demographic. When I asked if she could name another example other than Sarah Palin, she told me this story....
When she worked at an office job in Pennsylvania, a new woman got a job at the same level job as she did. My mom described this woman as being ditsy, unintelligent, and irresponsible at work. Due to the fact that they were coworkers, my mother asked this woman about what she did before this job. The woman then said that she was a soccer mom [sound familiar? * winks *] before she was confronted by the recruiting arm of the local chapter of the GOP. The recruiters had seen her at a number of soccer games and decided that she had the looks and personality to run for minor office. They drafted her to run for the Republican ticket for the upcoming Board of Freeholders elections. She lost the election and decided upon getting an office job for some reason.
My mom told me that she was surprised that she had run for elected office since this woman was a total self-absorbed airhead who knew little about politics, let alone being capable of running for office.
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Well, after hearing that story, the Sarah Palin debacle makes some sense now. Before the 2006 election, Alaska had a corrupt Republican in charge, Frank Murkowski (Senator Lisa Murkowski is his daughter). Governor Murkowski had rock-bottom approval ratings and the state's GOP was scared of losing to a Democrat in the next gubernatorial election. So, in 2006, they ran Sarah Palin against him in the GOP primary. They most likely were looking for someone who was simple and could appeal to the outdoorsy, folksy nature of a fair number of the voters. They did a search of GOP politicians in the state and then settled on Sarah Palin, whom they interviewed a few times before deciding she was perfect for the job. She was simple, she was conservative, she spoke in a folksy way, and she would (presumably) appeal to women. She beat Frank Murkowksi and won the governorship.
Then when the GOP was searching for a good vice presidential candidate, they looked over the men first (Romney, Sanford, Jindal) and then probably decided that since Hilary Clinton had been defeated in the Democratic primaries, they could capitalize on what they saw as a potential schism (PUMAs anyone?). Therefore, they did a search of women politicians and finally decided to select Sarah Palin (I guess Christine Todd Whitman's phone number wasn't working) in hopes that she would attract the woman voters. Yep, they readily promote a not as experienced candidate over a more capable one based on gender. What's that called again? Oh yeah...affirmative action. But wait, the GOP is against that sort of thing...right?
Update: Here's a good comment that someone left below that is complementary to what I have written above:
You are right... (2+ / 0-)
but you did forget something. The Religious Right recruited her also because she would say things that would fire-up those Wingnuts as well. Ever wonder why even before she made it onto the national stage, the James Dobsons and Family Research Council were talking her up? It is because she was one of those gullible pretty faces that was a stepford wife that they could pull the strings on.
What Would Jesus Do? Obviously get Jack Bauer to torture someone!
by Dahankster on Sat Oct 10, 2009 at 06:05:43 PM PDT
Now, I leave you all with some fun stuff: