Sarah Palin-Rhodes

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Sarah Palin is trying to springboard her mostly meaningless self into the presidency from her new 'reality show' which uses Alaska and her family as a prop. She claims it isn't a really a political gambit, and, if you watch it, there's certainly nothing especially profound, compelling, or even interesting in bearing witness to the minutia of her staged life. The instant you take a virtual step inside her home, you know you've made a mistake in coming. It's embarrassing watching her running around in her short-shorts policing the baby-gate she's put on the stairs - "it's not just for Trig" - it was put there, she says, to ward off dangers like the young man she just caught sneaking upstairs to court her 16-year old daughter.

Is she just like the rest of us? That's what she's getting at here, right? She wants to be seen as everywoman. I dunno, we've all got our own reality at home that we'd probably rather keep to ourselves. And, it's either brave or stupid for Palin to open her family to this kind of scrutiny. Her reality circus is much more exploitative than just some Good Housekeeping special. So, even though there might just be something redeemable baring her dysfunctional family for all of us to measure our own dysfunctional clans against, this effort of hers is meant to tell us something about herself that we supposedly don't already know from the years she's been in the public spotlight.

Thing is, Palin has dragged her family around the country for most of their lives (much of that travel at the expense of Alaska and, recently, the national republican party). The last round of exploitation was a result of the predictable and understandable fish-eye lens surrounding her Vice-Presidential bid. But this round is supposed to be part of the opening debut of the presidential run in 2012 that she's all but announced.

It may well have been familiar and bonding for most Americans to watch the Palins scrambling to maintain their eventful lives; she having been caught off guard and exposed by McCain's offbeat choice of the short-term Alaska governor/short-term mayor to be his running mate. This time around, though, the view inside the Palin household just looks forced and desperate. The verdict is already in on her brood. They're an awful mess who appear to be lacking enough quality time from the matriarch of that family; quality time and attention which has been deflected by her perpetual campaign for political beauty queen; time and attention that her family desperately needs to balance and maintain themselves through all of the public exposure and her self-imposed pressures.

No matter. Many women and men struggle to balance the demands of family and work, with varying levels of success. But, do we put all that on public display for the world to ogle? Probably not; but Palin is on a mission . . . from God.

It was God who pre-ordained that Palin would become governor, according to her wacky former pastor. Despite the McCain/Palin's campaign effort to smear Barack Obama for his 'associations' with 'terrorists', there was a noticeable ban on criticisms from their campaign of Mr. Obama's Rev.Wright. Part of that reluctance to highlight Obama's pastor certainly had to do with their campaign's own problem with demagogic spiritual leaders.

Sarah Palin's church acually had their own 'witch hunter' who she credited for praying her into the governorship and was videotaped praying directly behind Palin, as she bowed her head, for Jesus to eradicate witchcraft and elevate her political career. "In the name of Jesus, in the name of Jesus, every form of witchcraft is what you rebuke. In the name of Jesus, in the name of Jesus, father make away now," her Pastor Muthee said in the video.

"Come on, talk to God about this woman. We declare, save her from Satan," Pastor Muthee continued. "Make her way, my God. Bring finances her way even for the campaign in the name of Jesus. Use her to turn this nation the other way around." Palin's Pastor Muthee had once run a woman out of a Kenyan town after he convinced residents that the source and cause of the crime and poverty rampant in their community was a woman he picked out at random to scapegoat. “We prayed, we fasted, the Lord showed us a spirit of witchcraft resting over the place,” Pastor Muthee had said.

Accounts of Palin's pastor's witchhunt circulated on evangelical websites such as Prayer Links Ministries, after Pastor Muthee declared Mama Jane a witch, the townspeople became suspicious and began to turn on her, demanding that she be stoned . . . Public outrage eventually led the police to raid her home, where they fired gunshots, killing a pet python which they believed to be a demon."

McCain and Palin apparently decided that the country's problems they were promising to take responsibility for were beyond their earthly power to solve. So, they took their supporters on an old-fashioned witchhunt, stirring up 'suspicions' about their rival's character; casting aspersion on his 'associations'; and casting him as the pernicious source of all of that ails the nation. Their witchhunt was oblivious to their own messianic zeal as they stirred up their republican rabble to reject the infidels. All that was left for them was the snakehandling and the stoning.

Palin still believes she's on a mission from God, even though American voters thoroughly rejected her; even more than they rejected the duo's sniping, pretentious campaign. Palin told FOX News in a Nov. 10, 2008 interview that there was still a divine light shining on her future plans for the presidency: "I'm like, OK, God, if there is an open door for me somewhere, this is what I always pray," she told them. "I'm like, don't let me miss the open door. Show me where the open door is," she said.

Opening the door to a Palin presidency is what the Wasilla sage hopes her recent Kardashian-inspired series inspires among viewers (Is anyone except for critics and looky-loos actually watching?) It's a curious foray into the unreality of reality-television for Palin and her clan. It's like they're competing to be the nation's most prominent ne'er-do-wells. Palin and family are shown playing with their boats, snowmobiles, cars and other excesses of American life that their viewers just might not be in the economic position to personally identify with.

Where did all of that money come from? She quit her day job as Alaska's governor long time ago and she's made a small fortune running her mouth to the select few looky-loos and reporters who show up to listen. That's her legacy, so far. It's certainly not the governorship, where she ran Alaska into hundreds of millions of dollars in debt and then just walked away. It's can't be the failed presidential campaign where she was polling in the low 20's. Palin's legacy and claim to notoriety and importance resides in the cult of personality she's invented around her hapless family. It's a wonder that she'd actually be willing to put aside all the recreation and leisure time she's embraced to actually hold anything resembling a real job again. There's nothing more substantive she can think of doing right now, other than slumping around the country at her conservative benefactors' expense telling everyone else struggling to get by out here how to live.

Nothing, except ask Americans to gift her with the highest office in the land. Politico pointed recently to a 2008 “Fox News Sunday” interview with Chris Wallace where he told Palin he didn’t think she would make a serious run in two years because she was “having too much fun” and “making too much money” as a national political figure.

"If the country needed me — and I'm not saying that the country does and that the country would ever necessarily want to choose me over anyone else — but I would be willing to make the sacrifices, if need be, for America,” Palin had said.

I can just see it now . . . (cue dream sequence)

***Speaking to reporters today, Sarah Palin announced her own separate campaign for the presidency. Running as the head of her new 'Barracuda Party,' Palin rejected the tired, old politics of McCain and Bush and named God as her running-mate, campaign manager, and master strategist.

"He's the real Maverick!" she exclaimed at her first campaign news conference. "I know at the end of the day putting this in God’s hands, the right thing for America will be done, at the end of the day on Nov. 4*," she said.

Acknowledging that God, himself, wouldn't be making any appearances beside Palin on the campaign trail, Palin insisted, nonetheless, that “It is that intercession that is so needed,” she said. “And so greatly appreciated. And I can feel it too.*"

Going rogue and busting loose from her old co-hort McCain's reluctance to highlight religiosity, Palin challenged President Obama's old pastor Wright to appear in a last-minute, no-holds barred debate with her witch-hunting minister Muthee. Minister Muthee, she said, would lead an new army of "prayer warriors" along with Focus on the Family Dobson to carry out the "task from Godhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/09/02/palins-church-may-have-sh_n_123205.html">* " in Iraq. Asked if God would be presenting any plan for that task, Palin balked.

"That's what we have to make sure that we're praying for, that there is a plan and that that plan is God's planhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/09/02/palins-church-may-have-sh_n_123205.html">*," she insisted. "God has so richly blessed this land, not just with the generals and the politicians, but with witch-hunters and evangelists," Palin said. 'We'll tap into those.'"

One more flurry of questions from reporters about the ability of Palin to actually produce God as a supporter, much less a running mate, brought a sharp rebuke from the wonder of Wassila: "From the time that dinosaurs and humans walked the Earth at the same time, God has been mocked," Palin said.

"I think the saddest part of that is that faith, not just my faith, faith and God in general has been mocked through this campaignhttp://www.cbn.com/cbnnews/467138.aspx">*, and that breaks my heart."

Palin then abruptly ended the news conference, fell to the floor and started convulsing and speaking in tongues as she allowed a rattlesnake she had hidden under the podium to bite her repeatedly . . .

Who knows? Maybe the dysfunctional republican party is ready for another dysfunctional nominee in 2012. I personally think she's though - washed-up, done - but, for Sarah Palin-Rhodes, the show is never really over . . . Remember Andy Griffith's portrayal of the southern cracker, Lonesome Rhodes - turned national politician? That's what Palin is aiming for. A national campaign based on her own ability to spin her ne'er-do-well life into some American success story. Never mind that she's either quit or been rejected from similar attempts to reign supreme over Americans in the past. But, God's not finished with her yet . . .


Lonesome Rhodes (at the end of his own corrupt, failed campaign): Listen, I'm not through yet. You know what's gonna to happen to me?

Mel Miller: Suppose I tell you exactly what's gonna happen to you. You're gonna be back in television. Only it won't be quite the same as it was before. There'll be a reasonable cooling-off period and then somebody will say: Why don't we try him again in a inexpensive format. People's memories aren't too long. And you know, in a way, he'll be right. Some of the people will forget, and some of them won't. Oh, you'll have a show. Maybe not the best hour or, you know, top 10. Maybe not even in the top 35. But you'll have a show. It just won't be quite the same as it was before. Then a couple of new fellas will come along. And pretty soon, a lot of your fans will be flocking around them. And then one day, somebody'll ask: Whatever happened to, a, whatshisname? You know, the one who was so big. The number-one fella a couple of years ago. He was famous. How can we forget a name like that? Oh by the way, have you seen, a, Barry Mills? I think he's the greatest thing since Will Rogers.

Lonesome Rhodes: I'm not just an entertainer. I'm an influence, a wielder of opinion, a force... a force!

Yep, you betcha!

[herbm]

1. What an insightful comparison. Nice job.

[happygoluckytoyou]

2. avacadaciously speaking.... holy guaquamole!!!

i will register republican
i will vote for palin in the primary

it will be worth the entertainment value alone--- especially when she sends all the illegal alians back to new mexico, where they came from

[RayStar]

3. Thanks

I loved this article. I wish she would just go away.

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4. kick

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5. kick

[Bucky]

6. I quit reading when you wrote "in her short shorts". I now want to watch her show.

In the meantime, I'm going to waste time googling for "Palin crush videos."

[Mosaic]

7. No thanks

If I wanted to be titillated there would be thousands of web sites that would provide that with much more beautiful women. The more corporate media dumbs down America with her, the less and less I watch the boob tube. I will not be made a fool of. We need to take a stand.

[rtassi]

8. Definitely not in a league with Andy .. n/t

[Raschel]

9. Why are they hiding their oldest son? He's not on the show, and not in the news.

There's something going on there, because Palin would exploit his service every chance she could get.