Sarah Palin

Ron Paul thanks one of his supporters at CPAC 2010.

Ron Paul won the straw poll at CPAC 2010 on who the most attendees wanted to see win the Republican nomination in 2010.

And I have lost all respect for Jar Jar Binks.

A few thoughts on Sarah Palin’s speech this past Saturday at the Tea Party convention in Nashville.

The ridicule from the left over her having some notes written on her hand while ignoring how President Obama can’t string three words together without a teleprompter is meaningless. The left will always criticize her regardless. It matters not. Instead, let’s focus on the whining coming from elements of the right.

Before getting into that, an observation. It’s human nature, when one dislikes their reflection, to blame the mirror. That can’t possibly be me I’m staring at with all those shortcomings! Or so we kid ourselves. We want to believe we are who we believe we are, evidence to the contrary be damned.

Ofttimes this mindset originates in good intentions. We strive to do that which we are convinced is right. However, danger lurks in this scenario. It’s very easy to inflate our genuine value in the midst of doing good works. This manifests itself in two ways: believing our personal conduct is immaterial because of our good works, or believing we personally are of far greater importance and influence than is actually the case. In both these scenarios, pride is the root cause for what started as doing the right thing but ended with our doing that which on the surface is the right thing yet when examined is anything but.

Back to Palin. The amount of friendly fire she has had thrown in her direction is at first glance astounding. Yet when examined in light of the above, its reason becomes clear. There are a lot of evil queens and kings out there who on the surface are quite beautiful, asking the mirror who’s the fairest of them all. When the reply is “not you,” they reveal their inner ugliness by throwing a hissy, followed by hissing venom at a housewife from Wasilla.

Sarah Palin is the mirror in which the wannabes see their insignificance. She doesn’t need the blogger prattlers or the Twitter twits or puffed-up pundits. She blows right past them, communicating directly with the people. The genuine media high fliers, the true high rollers — Limbaugh, Levin, Beck, Hannity — have both the intelligence to give her free reign and the humility to know her star shines far brighter than even theirs, wisely yielding the stage to her whenever possible. They understand the concept of serving the greater good, and act accordingly.

Certainly it’s a hit to the ego when we work toward a goal only to see our efforts not only far outstripped by another but overshadowed to the point where we are unnecessary. This is the point where we need to ask ourselves what’s more important. Is it the cause? Or our having our names in bold print on the playbill?

No, I am not comparing Sarah Palin to Jesus Christ. However, there is a parallel to the proper attitude we who espouse conservative philosophies and practices should embrace in John the Baptist’s comment to his followers about Him: “He must increase; I must decrease.”

Palin doesn’t need the insiders unknown to one and all on the outside. She doesn’t need our blogrolls, Twitter followers or mutual admiration societies masquerading as political action movements. It’s not that she’s actively spurning us, doesn’t appreciate us and doesn’t acknowledge us. She doesn’t need us. If that’s interpreted as a slam, it’s not her fault. It lies within those whose response to the mirror is “you lie!”

No, no it doesn’t.

ADDENDUM: On the same subject, a most highly recommended dissertation by Enoch Root at Piece Of Work In Progress.

As you’re hopefully aware, I published a book last year detailing the lives, then and now, of Christian alternative rock’s pioneers. (No, it didn’t start with Switchfoot.)

It helps when writing such a book to have some knowledge of the business side of things, specifically how the music industry works.

I do have said knowledge.

From this comes the following information.

When an artist goes on tour, and as part of their on-site merchandise for sale includes CDs and/or DVDs, and the artist is on a record label not directly owned and/or controlled by them, the artist buys the CDs and/or DVDs from their record company at wholesale or variation thereof. Ofttimes, if not all the time, the artist agrees to forgo any royalties normally owed to them by the record company for each copy it sells, thus bringing the price down even further. The artist then sells the CDs and/or DVDs at their concerts, keeping all or a good portion of the money. Some venues and/or promoters take a cut of merchandise sales, hence the note about good portion.

Let’s go through that again. In brief, the artist doesn’t get product for free to sell. They buy it and then resell it.

Now, sometimes artists buy their product from the record label to use as a promotional tool. They might give it away in some type of fan contest, send copies to other people in the business — radio stations, music journalists — or do whatever with it. Again, the artist doesn’t get the physical product for free. They buy it and then distribute it as they see fit.

In both of these scenarios, every single copy of the CD and/or DVD is not counted as a unit sold through regular retail channels. They are not eligible for counting when it comes time to calculate best seller lists and the like. Only copies sold through regular retail channels are counted.

No exceptions.

Ever.

Period.

Now, some more information.

When it comes to copies of a book sold directly by the author or used by the author for promotional purposes, the book industry works the same way.

Indulge me as I repeat this so no one misses it.

The book industry works the same way.

So…

Why, oh why, oh why are people getting riled up over Sarah Palin using money from her PAC to buy copies of Going Rogue to use for promotional purposes, such as sending a signed copy to people who donated a certain amount of money to her PAC?

Why?

Why?

Do you think she bought the copies at full retail so she’d get royalties for them? No. She bought them at the author’s price, whatever that is for HarperCollins.

Do you think she bought the copies at full retail to pad the number of books reported as sold? No. The copies are not eligible for such.

The books were a promotional item.

Promotional.

She doesn’t get royalties for them.

They’re not counted for the best sellers lists.

They were used as a promotion by the PAC for the purpose of encouraging people to donate to her PAC.

It’s not illegal.

It’s not unethical.

It’s not immoral.

It’s standard promotional procedure.

But, since it involves Sarah Palin, naturally people want to make it An Issue.

It’s not.

It never was.

It never will be.

Period.

End of story.

Thank you and enjoy the rest of the day/afternoon/evening/night.

Pardon the play on the old adage “the dogs bark but the caravan moves on” in the title.

Anyway, a couple of clips from Sarah Palin’s debut on FOX News this week. First, on Bill O’Reilly’s show:

And the next day on Glenn Beck’s program:

Side note before launching into the main topic. The two appearances make for an interesting comparison. Faced with O’Reilly’s rapid-fire abrupt style, Palin leans toward a more stock issue politician being interviewed mode: quick and cautious, not unwilling to steer the answer toward more comfortable territory rather than directly face inquiries she’s either already answered or wishes to not so much avoid as quickly dismiss With Beck’s more pastoral tone, Palin is at ease chatting as with an understanding friend. She also communicates far more information with Beck than O’Reilly, even though the latter asked more questions. A good lesson for interviewers. Beck’s approach allows him to approach difficult subjects and get answers about them far better than O’Reilly’s. But I digress.

There are few hot topics hotter than the former mayor of Wasilla, Alaska and governor of said state (“hot” pun unintentional, although Palin is gorgeous). Currently, Palin is the subject of fierce debate in conservative pundit circles over declining to appear at this year’s CPAC soirée while agreeing to speak at a Tea Party convention/gathering. Much wailing and gnashing of teeth has resulted, absolutely none of which is of the slightest interest to anyone save online political junkies who when generously counted constitute 0.44% of the general populace. Indulge me whilst I endeavor to make this conundrum a bit more relevant to the remaining 99.56% of humanity.

One of the main points of contention is Palin’s speaking fee for the Tea Party event. CPAC, a yearly gathering of assorted and by the definition of some sordid conservative movers and shakers, offers little save room and board for the weekend to its plethora of speakers. The organizers of the Tea Party event are dropping some serious coin to have Palin as their main speaker. This has riled the CPAC crew, it being of the firm opinion that all parties concerned should graciously donate their time in exchange for the glory of, uh, being there. Which is vitally important, given the tremendous opportunities it provides for posting snapshots on Twitter of yourself next to other conservatives. Woo-hoo look at me squee.

Okay, being a tad snarky there. There is the potential of tremendous benefit in a gathering of like-minded individuals devoted to a common cause. Good things happen when there’s networking. We’re seeing the benefits of using social media for political causes in examples such as the upcoming special election in Massachusetts, where in a state considered bluer than blue Scott Brown, the Republican candidate, has a very real shot at making the local Democrats sadder than sad by winning. Much of  Brown’s support has come from followers on Twitter who have been putting their money where their tweet is; an appeal for campaign donations a few days ago which hoped to reach $500,000 instead brought in $1.3 million. It’s worth noting Palin has stated she’s going to be donating her speaking fee from the Tea Party event to support candidates in assorted races this year.

Back to dissecting the discontent. A recurring theme is CPAC attendees/devotees (same difference) feeling personally rejected by Palin declining to attend. Two words: what the…? Given the stunts CPAC’s organizers has pulled in general and on Palin in particular — announcing she would be at last year’s bash when she had not yet agreed to this and did not attend; publicly dissing her; allowing instant controversy by having a gay Republican group which advocates gay marriage as a sponsor, thus alienating more than a few conservative religious groups (not taking sides here, just stating facts) and allowing the conspiracy cuckoos otherwise known as the John Birch Society to be a sponsor — is this really a name you want to hang your hat on?

There’s another aspect to the “Palin’s personally insulting me by not going to CPAC” meme that’s more than a tad disturbing. In recent days a rather nasty fuss has been raised by those complaining about Palin’s perceived snub, centered on whining about Palin supporters being this lot of mindless drones who worship the ground she walks on, believe she gives infallibility lessons to the Pope and must be immediately defended to the death and beyond against any and all critiques. In fact, the kvetchers are the ones behaving like those who Jesus referenced with the illustration of children in the marketplace whining about people not following their song’s lead. Certainly there is an element, as is present with every public figure, within the Palin posse of those who believe she can do no wrong. However, dismissing her supporters en masse due to the excesses of a few is condescending and just plain rude. The vast majority of Palin supporters like her for both her personal traits and her political views as put into action during her turns in different offices. That’s like. Admire. Even adore. But not worship. She’s not God. We know that. She knows that. One of the reasons many of us like her is because not only does she know that, she acknowledges her belief in and dependence on the actual God. Whose initials are JC, not SP.

A final note about CPAC before wrapping up. Michele Bachmann, far more than a bit player in conservative politics, is also not appearing at CPAC this year but will be speaking at the Tea Party event. Yet not a peep is being spoken against her for this. Why? One suspects the primary reason is that mentioning Bachmann gets the notice of only the faithful who are more than likely already reading your stuff. Mention Palin, though… site visit gold. Nothing stirs it like the name of Sarah.

Yes, we of the Palin posse can be a touch defensive about her. When you have someone so viciously, undeservingly and unfairly attacked on all fronts as she has been and continues to be, the natural reaction is springing to her defense. That said, attacking her for refusing to attend CPAC is silliness and emotion while taking it personally is self-worship in motion. It’s not a slap at you. It’s a statement about CPAC’s ineptitude running alongside its importance being grotesquely overestimated. Along with that of the individuals currently riding in its waahmbulance.

Honest. Danica Patrick and Sarah Palin. There is a connection.

Before I get into that, bit of a personal note. I’m running on fumes at the moment: concern over family members’ health issues, at the office feeling like I’m trying to pull a full size fully loaded boxcar with a N scale engine. Not a lot left over for writing.

I’ll stop whining now.

Anyway, I didn’t want another day to pass without posting something here, but as outlined above don’t exactly have time or energy to cook up some new brew. What to do?

Earlier this morning when I was still fully caffeinated I put together a post for the NASCAR portion of my Examiner areas about — you guessed it — the connection between Danica Patrick and Sarah Palin. Deep thank you to a dear friend whose comment yesterday sparked the post.

Since the post has Sarah in it, though it’d be appropriate to run here. It’s either that or something from YouTube.

Why Danica Patrick is the Sarah Palin of NASCAR

IndyCar driver Danica Patrick, right, is joined by Go Daddy CEO and founder Bob Parsons, center, and Kelley Earnhardt, vice president and general manager of JR Motorsports, unveils the new GoDaddy.com No. 7 JR Motorsports stock car during an event announcing Patrick’s intention to make her NASCAR race debut next season Tuesday, Dec. 8, 2009, in Phoenix. Patrick has signed with JR Motorsports team, owned by Dale Earnhardt Jr. and Rick Hendrick, and intends to start in her first NASCAR Nationwide Series race on Feb. 6 at Daytona International Speedway. (AP Photo/Ross D. Franklin)

The announcement yesterday making what was commonly speculated the past couple of months official, that being Danica Patrick will be running a limited Nationwide schedule for JR Motorsports starting next year with her stock car debut being in the season opening ARCA race at Daytona in February, has been greeted with such a level of histrionics you’d think people in the motorsports world are lying when they express extreme disinterest in Mrs. Hospenthal’s activities. That couldn’t possibly be the case, now could it…

No driver in any series today is such a lightning rod as Danica. With the possible exception of Dale Earnhardt Jr., although in his case the lightning comes primarily in the form of lightning bolts hurled by the Junior Nation at any sportswriter speaking ill of he who drives the #88 Mountain Dew AMP/National Guard Chevrolet. Hell hath no fury like a Dale Jr. fan when their driver is scorned. But I digress; back to Danica.

There’s little in the way of middle ground when it comes to Danica. People either love her for her gumption in taking on the boys, dislike her for her sometimes surly persona and penchant for self-promotion, or really really REALLY can’t stand her. A large percentage of the latter devote an even larger amount of time to expressing this sentiment, be it in assorted sordid columns for various publication channels or in the comments area of same.

This is where the correlation between Danica Patrick and Sarah Palin comes into play. While the two have little in common personally or professionally aside from letting others dodge shards of glass resulting from their ceiling demolition work, there are at least three common threads between Mrs. Hospenthal and Mrs. Palin. First, very few people are neutral about them. Second, the media to put it mildly seldom befriends them. (We’ll get to the third one in a bit.)

The way Danica is slammed around you’d think she was responsible for all that ails auto racing. This will come as news to her new team owner Earnhardt Jr., since usually he’s the one blamed by the media for all that ails auto racing. Or at least the department where cars have roofs. This should make for some interesting competition at JR Motorsports as Danica and Dale Jr. scan the Internet to see which one has the greatest number of negative articles written about them that day. Whoever has the most buys lunch.

Once one gets past the personal animosity aimed Danica’s way, the charge most commonly leveled against her is she can’t drive. One would think her finishing fifth in the IRL points standings this past season during a year when any car not from the Ganassi or Penske stables was a rolling speed bump would answer this, but reality need not apply when it comes to pundits punting around verbiage volleys. While no one will know how she’ll do in stock cars until next year, the hunch is her aggressive style will mesh well with the chrome horn school of driving. Or as it’s commonly known, that which fans lament is no longer prevalent in NASCAR and lament even louder when someone actually employs the rubbin’ is racin’ philosophy.

Now, the third common thread. Both Danica Patrick and Sarah Palin have a lot of fans who adore them regardless of how media elements tell them otherwise. There are throngs of people waiting for Palin at every stop in her book promotion tour not to jeer but cheer, fueled by political and personal admiration. Patrick also has her group of followers, young girls invariably decked out in #7 gear in attendance at every IRL race. They’re there because their heroine is there, the girl who takes on, holds her own against and sometimes bests the boys. They’re there because of how she handles the curves at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, not how she displays them in Sports Illustrated or GoDaddy ads. Now, the young girls will be begging Mom and Dad to go to the Nationwide races in which Danica will participate. They’ll be cheering Danica on while Dad dreams of her and Mom does the same about Dale Jr. Fair is fair.

So, how will Danica do in NASCAR? Who knows. Is her presence good for the sport?

You betcha.

Well, this has taken me far longer to get to than it should have. My bad. Anyway, my take on the political side of Sarah Palin as outlined in Going Rogue, which I finished reading the other day.

One of the common tacks taken by the left in its never-ending effort to dismiss Palin is to completely ignore her political record. Bad mistake. Very, very bad.

First, a look at Palin’s philosophy. As she mentions several times in Going Rogue, Palin is an unabashed admirer of Ronald Reagan. His guiding principles of limited government and encouragement of economic growth through cutting taxes and a corresponding reduction in public spending have been adopted by Palin during both of her stints in elected office, first as mayor of Wasilla and later as governor of Alaska.

There is also more than a trace of the Alaskan spirit of rugged self-reliance coupled with communal responsibility in the face of a brutal environment woven throughout Palin’s political operative. She cannot abide indifference to duty nor inattentiveness to the genuine as opposed to self-inflicted needs of others.

These elements have manifested themselves in Palin’s actions during the times she has been in office. She has no problem trimming deadwood from the public payroll, doing so not out of heartless disconnect to the people let go through such actions but rather a belief that if the individuals have ability they will land on their feet and if not… well, they’re the ones who shoulder the blame for being out of work.

Palin embodies having the courage of ones convictions, going toe to toe with any individual or organization impeding the implementation of her vision. This includes those already in government regardless of party affiliation as well as big business. As governor she was relentless in hammering away at Big Oil to develop resources on which it was sitting, thus depriving not only the country of energy but also Alaskans of the financial benefits to be generated. Palin has zero tolerance for corruption in government, battling it through all available means including when need be stepping away from office in order to conduct her campaign through different channels.

The need for individual and communal effort in order to not only prosper but survive permeates Palin’s view of how citizens should view government. If a need arises that in her opinion is best handled through the private sector, she will actively withhold any form of government program to provide the service. Again this is done not out of a lack of empathy but rather as a natural reflection of Palin’s upbringing. Offering a hand up? Always. But a handout? Never.

It is little wonder Palin has made more than a few political enemies. She is anathema to those who see their role in government, and the role of government itself, as fostering the creation of public dependence on government programs, stifling the private sector as it seeks to hoard all available wealth without regard for its own inability to generate same. Palin believes government exists to serve the people; this along with the people being responsible, as much as lies within their ability, for taking care of themselves. It is not a philosophy designed to garner much support among the self-proclaimed repressed or those seeking power by feeding the lies people tell themselves about their lot in life.

It is a philosophy rooted in not only the Reagan vision of politics, but also an understanding of Scriptural teaching in regard to the nature of man.

Thoughts on the spiritual and personal aspects of Going Rogue tomorrow.

A most excellent take on the book, courtesy of KillTruck.

Finished it a short time ago. Quick impression: illuminating and honest.

Much more later, both here and at the Examiner.