About the Author:  Terry has a diverse background in entrepreneurial business, first as an employee, then as a principal. He has owned or co-owned a Mexican food stand, a craft manufacturing company, and an insurance agency. He also spent 4 years teaching at the college level, and 11 years in ministry, reviving two struggling mainline Protestant churches. He holds a BS in Sociology, and a Masters in Divinity. He has completed most of the work required for a Doctor of Divinity. Read more from this author

For months now the Democrats, aided by their liberal fellow-travelers in the media, have been conducting a subtle campaign to undermine public confidence in John McCain. In the last 10 days it has taken on an additional twist as the same parties have levelled their sites on Republican Vice Presidential nominee Sarah Palin. However, their excess “piling on” may be backfiring. Here are the details.

1: SIDELINE McCAIN

Liberal columnists like Sally Quinn (who seems to be a ring leader), along with legacy media ‘news’ reporters, have introduced and subtly sustained the idea that John McCain is too old to be President. Never mind the blunt claims that he’s becoming senile, or is too old to relate to modern society - those are obvious, politically-motivated arguments that are easily dismissed by most people. However, they serve to instill and keep alive a deeper message: that John is likely to die in office.

 The argument runs along these lines:

(1) He’ll be the oldest President beginning a first term in US history.

(2) He’s had several bouts of cancer. Sure, they’ve been benign, but who knows how the next episode could metamorphose?

(3) Despite the longevity and strong health of his mother, John McCain has had a hard life, and in his Vietnam experience (for which we salute him) suffered grievous insult to his core vitality.

(4) There is no way we can be confident he will survive his first Presidential term.

(5) Why take the risk, when there is a young, attractive, vibrant, and energetic alternative?

That suggestion has been planted so deeply in the American psyche that it’s practically assumed that to vote for McCain is to vote for a dead man walking.

2: TREAT PALIN AS THE DE-FACTO PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE

McCain’s addition of Sarah Palin to his ticket threw a wrench into the narrative. On the face of it, the vibrant, accomplished former beauty queen stands directly opposite the youth and handsome vitality of Barak Obama. Worse, a little deeper gaze reveals a resume of Palin accomplishments that throws an uncomfortably bright spotlight on Obama’s rather thin list of achievements. Therefore, the Democrats and their accomplices in the legacy media have had to broaden and sharpen their message in order to discount her experience and discredit her as a personality.

What I’ve found interesting in the opposition narrative that has coalesced over the first week of her candidacy is the assumption that she will become the President during the first term. In other words, the subtle message that McCain will die in office has gained enough currency in the public subconscious that it now functions as an acknowledged fact. The Democrats don’t have to make the case for questioning Palin’s qualifications to serve as President; they can proceed to directly questioning those qualifications.

For that reason, the left-leaners have concentrated on comparing Palin’s record and accomplishments to those of Obama. They are suggesting, in the subtle campaign, that McCain’s record and achievments don’t even belong on the table.

In effect, the Democrat’s have campaigned against Palin for the past 5 days or so as if she were the Presidential contender. And there’s a narrative to accompany it, too. Again, it’s not the obvious stuff that matters. It’s not the controversy about her daughter’s out-of-wedlock pregnancy, or the question of how her Down’s Syndrome infant will be properly cared for - those are issues many American women face, and will be dismissed by most.

However, those issues are raised in order to plant and sustain a more subtle argument that runs something like this:

(1) Sarah Palin is a lightweight; here’s the evidence: (a) she was a beauty queen and, as we all know, beauty queens are light in the mental department; (b) by her own admission she’s just a PTA mom who got involved in local politics - she’s strictly a small time, provincial politician; (c) combined, these two facts mean she lacks the big picture and national-level interest necessary to run the country and face the world.

(2) Her only real experience is as mayor of a small town of maybe 9,000, but probably only 5,000 or 6,000 residents. Making that claim stick requires negating her governorship - which is why two phenomena persist: (a) legacy media commentators and reporters refer to her as mayor Palin, not governor Palin; and, (b) the public is constantly reminded that she was governor for barely more than 18 months, which (it is explained) is no experience at all.

(3) Even though she got to the office of governor, it’s Alaska we’re talking about. That means: (a) the state’s population is so small it’s fair to say she governed more moose than people; and, (b) Alaska is so far removed from the ‘real’ United States that any experience she might have gained as short-term governor is no preparation for leading the country. Only in Alaska, a state out of touch with the rest of the country, could a hockey mom beauty queen be elected to highest office; the state and the woman are hardly worth taking seriously.

(4) Brainless beauty queen Palin doesn’t know when she’s in over her head. She seriously thinks she can simultaneously run the country, guide her unwed pregnant teen, and provide adequate care for her special needs child. Clearly she has no concept of what’s involved in being President of the most important country in the world.

(5) This hockey mom has the wrong priorities. The problems in her own family suggest she’s been neglecting her primary duties; she is not the right woman for either accomplished professional women or dedicated mothers to support.

(6) Conclusion: we need to send her back to her family and her small town PTA, where she belongs.

3: TAKE PALIN OUT

Never the less, despite portraying her as not worthy of note, the Democrats and liberal media are taking her seriously because, in the face of their belittlement campaign, Sarah Palin is striking a positive chord with the general public. She currently has greater popularity than any of the three other contenders for President and Vice President. And she has garnered fierce support from both moms and professional women, who relate to her as the woman next door - the can-do member of their own local PTA - the first woman about to ascend to the White House who really and truly understands their complex, multi-faceted commitments and concerns. For the first time, real women see the chance to put one of their own into high national office.

Plus, she’s very likeable. Despite her professional accomplishments, Governor Palin likes to be called ‘Sarah,’ and she talks just like everyone’s neighbor. She is humble, not proud. She comes across as someone who genuinely likes other people, wants to serve not be served, and loves her husband. She is obviously passionately committed to making her sphere of influence a better place to raise a family, she champions traditional American values, and she shows that she understands what it means to be a mother, wife, daughter, neighbor, professional, and leader in today’s complex American society. She epitomizes the original notion of the citizen-legislator rather than the professional politician who seeks personal perks and who views the nation from an elevated, ‘inside-the-beltway’ perspective.

Obama positions himself as a populist, but Sarah is the populist - the only populist - in this race. And that makes her dangerous to the political establishment - especially the liberal political establishment.

As a result, the Obama-Biden machine has moved from hardball politics to the politics of personal destruction. They know that if they do not stop her rising popularity now, the campaign will go to McCain.

The Democrats have designed their recent campaigning so that, for the last week or so, Palin has been contending for office against two opposition candidates. The Democrats are challenging her competence for office on both the Presidential and the Vice Presidential level. Here’s that argument:

(1) Perhaps Obama lacks the full complement of experience needed for the position of President, but he’s got the very experienced Joe Biden backing him up.

(2) It’s okay - maybe even preferable - to have a ‘visionary’ in the top spot when he has a practical, grounded, and experienced politician watching his back. We need both a new vision and the experienced hand who can make it realizable. Obama-Biden offers that team.

(3) It’s true that McCain has all the experience Biden has, but Palin doesn’t. That means, when McCain dies the inexperienced Palin will become President, and she won’t have an experienced hand to act as her wing man.

(4) Even though she would seek someone to fill the Vice Presidential spot, we have no idea, today, who she’d pick or how well she’d pick. Given her lack of experience, we can hope for the best, but (in today’s uncertain times) we’d better plan for something less.

(5) Even if McCain lives through his term, what’s he got for a wing man? An inexperienced beauty queen PTA mom who’s in over her head and doesn’t know it.

(6) Conclusion: There’s no good reason to take the gamble on Palin when the alternative is the  known quantity of Obama-Biden.

In this way, Palin is being cast as the contender for both the number one and number two spots. She is not being compared only to Biden, her obvious opponent, but to both Biden and Obama, while McCain is being sidelined as a serious element in the contest. It’s a two-against-one piling on - with the collusion of the media gang, who stand around, hemming her in and alternately jeering at her and encouraging the two who are swinging at her.

4: UNEXPECTED CONSEQUENCES

Unfortunately for them, the piling on has been so fast, so furious, and has become so personal, that the underlying American value of ‘fair play’ has been deeply violated.

Americans don’t like bullies. I believe that it is that, as much as anything, that gets us involved in international politics. We have a hard time standing by while some tough guy nation wallops some little guy nation. It’s in our nature to want to step in and make the big guy pick on someone his own size.

Something like that is happening in regards to Palin. Middle Americans, those small-town, working-class, PTA-supporting soccer moms and dads, are not willing to stand by while one of their own is unmercifully and unjustly pounded into rubble by a couple of powerful political bullies and their media henchmen. They especially are not willing to stand by when the innocent children of a woman who reminds them of their neighbor are savaged and brutalized in an effort to break her. That’s taking things way too far, and American women, in particular, are saying, enough.

As an admitted conservative talk show junkie, I have been astounded by the number of angry women, most of them working mothers, who have been clogging the phone lines to voice their objections. Us Weekly Magazine is reported to be having the same problem: women have been calling to complain about the “Sex, Lies, and Scandal” issue cover; and as many as 10,000 have cancelled their subscriptions at the same time. Advertisers are being hit by complaints, too, and have responded by contacting the magazine’s editor. Then there’s Oprah, who was happy to ‘introduce’ Barak but has refused to have Sarah on her show. Under normal circumstances, Oprah would be a natural showcase for the woman so many of Oprah’s key consituents love. Oprah says she wants to keep the show politics-neutral, but that’s a goal she has already violated by interviewing the Democrat’s political star. The only way to get back to neutral is to include the Republican star. She’s hearing from her viewers, who have a better sense of fair play than she is demonstrating.

Sarah Palin’s approval numbers are climbing. The Obama machine is in a panic. Barak is now looking for women to speak out on his behalf, in an effort to (a) rehabilitate his image as a man who has the best intentions toward ordinary working women, and (b) to make his case against Palin in gentler woman-to-woman terms.

Meanwhile, he hasn’t muzzled his male proxies. On the Laura Ingraham radio talk show yesterday, Obama fundraiser Howard Gutman opined that while Obama is right that a candidate’s family should be off-limits, when Palin has the audacity to ‘parade’ her family onstage she makes them legitimate topics and targets. In effect, he’s saying that it’s her fault her daughter has been savaged by the press and pundits, and she’s to blame for the questions raised about her parenting priorities and abilities. His argument was tantamount to saying that pride in family is an invitation - not to fall, but to be knocked over and pushed down.

5: HOW THE ANTI-PALIN CAMPAIGN IS NOT WORKING

This ‘blame the victim,’ ‘blame the woman’ attitude did not sit well with Ingraham’s female listeners; it only served to add fuel to the conflagration.

The Democrat and legacy media strategy to take Sarah Palin out has done more than anything to show the country who Obama is behind his smiling mask, gentle demeanor and professorial speech; and to highlight how the legacy media not only picks sides, but piles on when their chosen candidate is in trouble. Their mask as impartial chroniclers has slipped half off their angry faces.

Furthermore, Sarah Palin is not the weakling Obama and the media want us to believe she is. In her own words, she is a pit bull with lipstick. (A self-description many American women relate to, by the way.) Too bad the liberal autocracy in politics and media have ‘misunderestimated’ yet another Republican leader. The Obama-Biden-legacy media axis is about to become McCain-Palin’s lunch.

Couldn’t happen to a more deserving bunch.

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