Sarah Palin is communicating these days on Facebook. Yesterday, she weighed in on Obamacare–worrying about its rationing implications, certainly a legitimate concern. But she used incendiary and frankly, amateur-sounding terms like “death boards” and “evil”–that are both over the top and unlikely to convince anyone but the already converted to oppose the current legislation. It seems to me that if she hopes to become an influential national leader, she needs to professionalize her approach. That doesn’t mean becoming bland. But it does mean elevating the discourse and exhibiting a more deliberate and substantive brand of leadership.
Saturday, August 8, 2009, 12:57 PM
August 8th, 2009 | 1:41 pm
I would tend to disagree with your assessment insofar as I don’t think Sarah Palin’s choice of words is anymore “over the top” and “amateurish” than when Reagan called the former Soviet Union an “evil” empire.
August 8th, 2009 | 2:18 pm
I agree with Roger. Obama’s “healthcare” plan is pure evil. Why mince words?
August 8th, 2009 | 3:28 pm
“But it does mean elevating the discourse and exhibiting a more deliberate and substantive brand of leadership.”
Ok, let’s play devil’s advocate here. We have a president in office who got there largely because of his elevated discourse. And since he’s been in office, we’ve learned the elevated discourse was merely a pack of sophisticated lies.
Then we have V.P Joe Biden who has never been accused of possessing elevated discourse.
Then there is the example as noted above of Reagan calling the Soviet Union and evil empire.
George Bush –thanks to the words put in his mouth be Mr. Elevated Discourse and Despiser of Sarah Palin, David Frum– Iran and NKorea the “axis of evil”.
Obama’s heealth care plan which is not even his plan but the House’s is treading on very dangerous ground with very grave matters. Sarah Palin is a lightning rod. If she says something it goes around the world. She understands this better than anyone.
Look at how her young son has been treated by the Dems, the Left, the media and even some Republicans. Has any other infant/toddler been as notorious and that was for far different reasons. Only the Lindbergh baby comes close. Now, Sarah is looking at what Obamacare might do to her son. Perhaps her fears are more well-grounded than we think.
I honestly can not agree she’s been unprofessional.
August 8th, 2009 | 3:34 pm
That should read; Has any other infant/toddler been as notorious? Only the Lindbergh baby comes close and that was for far different reasons.
One last thing. Peggy Noonan, who thank goodness is not a substantive leader made some very unprofessional remarks during the camera both on the mic and in her columns. most of them were regarding Sarah Palin. Now’s she’s trying to crawl back underneath the big Republican tent without us noticing.
La!
Evelyn Waugh would’ve had a field day with her book on the need for more grace in political discourse and then her being exposed as, among more unattractive things, a potty mouth.
August 8th, 2009 | 5:26 pm
I agree, Wesley. Roger, read the “evil empire” quote in its context. It is a part of an amazing speech that Reagan gave the National Association of Evangelicals. It is carefully crafted, and historically informed. It consists of narrative that includes our nation’s own faults.
Comparing Sarah Palin to Ronald Reagan is like comparing the Partridge Family to the Beatles.
August 8th, 2009 | 6:31 pm
She’s an “amateur”? Well, help me here. What professional words you would have used. Good? Sorta good? Sorta bad? Bad? Really bad? Really, really bad?
August 8th, 2009 | 6:56 pm
“Well,” as Reagan would say, “There you go again.” The only comment agreeing with the original post comes from within the organization itself. We don’t need this kind of Noonanesque elitism poisoning a great publication like First Things. The Left didn’t care about the context of Reagan’s “evil empire” speech. They excoriated him for making such “intemperate” remarks, regardless. But his remarks about the Soviet Union were just as appropriate then as Palin’s remarks about Obama’s “healthcare” plan are now. “I Want to Hold Your Hand” and “I Think I Love You” are a pretty nice twin spin.
August 8th, 2009 | 7:05 pm
I think Sarah Palin has been treated abominably by the press. I think she is hated, in part, because she gave birth to Trig, as I wrote often over at Secondhand Smoke.
But she is in a different league now. What works in sandlot baseball gets you clobberedin the Big Leagues. She needs to be exhibit more gravitas, for want of a better word, and more nuance. This isn’t to say that she should change her views. But she needs to express them in ways that attract, rather than repel, the currently unconvinced.
August 8th, 2009 | 9:08 pm
This is an interesting read :
An Inconvenient Truth About The “Death Panel”
Sarah Palin has kicked off (another) firestorm of criticism because of the statement she released on her Facebook page:
The Democrats promise that a government health care system will reduce the cost of health care, but as the economist Thomas Sowell has pointed out, government health care will not reduce the cost; it will simply refuse to pay the cost. And who will suffer the most when they ration care? The sick, the elderly, and the disabled, of course. The America I know and love is not one in which my parents or my baby with Down Syndrome will have to stand in front of Obama’s “death panel” so his bureaucrats can decide, based on a subjective judgment of their “level of productivity in society,” whether they are worthy of health care. Such a system is downright evil.
The incoming fire has been withering, as usual. Palin is accused of becoming the “Zombie Queen,” certifiably insane, “clinically wrong,” and espousing a “gruesome mix of camp and high farce.”
These critics, however, didn’t take the time to find out to what Palin was referring when she used the term “level of productivity in society” as being the basis for determining access to medical care. If the critics, who hold themselves in the highest of intellectual esteem, had bothered to do something other than react, they would have realized that the approach to health care to which Palin was referring was none other than that espoused by key Obama health care adviser Dr. Ezekial Emanuel (brother of Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel).
The article in which Dr. Emanuel puts forth his approach is “Principles for Allocation of Scarce Medical Interventions,” published on January 31, 2009. A full copy is embedded below. Read it, particularly the section beginning at page 6 of the embed (page 428 in the original) at which Dr. Emanuel sets forth the principles of “The Complete Lives System.”
While Emanuel does not use the term “death panel,” Palin put that term in quotation marks to signify the concept of medical decisions based on the perceived societal worth of an individual, not literally a “death panel.” And in so doing, Palin was true to Dr. Emanuel’s concept of a system which
considers prognosis, since its aim is to achieve complete lives. A young person with a poor prognosis has had a few life-years but lacks the potential to live a complete life. Considering prognosis forestalls the concern the disproportionately large amounts of resources will be directed to young people with poor prognoses. When the worst-off can benefit only slightly while better-off people could benefit greatly, allocating to the better-off is often justifiable….
When implemented, the complete lives system produces a priority curve on which individuals aged between roughly 15 and 40 years get the most chance, whereas the youngest and oldest people get chances that are attenuated.
Put together the concepts of prognosis and age, and Dr. Emanuel’s proposal reasonably could be construed as advocating the withholding of some level of medical treatment (probably not basic care, but likely expensive advanced care) to a baby born with Down Syndrome. You may not like this implication, but it is Dr. Emanuel’s implication not Palin’s.
The next question is, whether Dr. Emanuel’s proposal bears any connection to current Democratic proposals. There is no single Democratic proposal at this point, only a series of proposals and concepts. To that extent, Palin’s comments properly are viewed as a warning shot not to move to Dr. Emanuel’s concept of health care rationing based on societal worth, rather than a critique of a specific bill ready for vote.
Certainly, no Democrat is proposing a “death panel,” or withholding care to the young or infirm. To say such a thing would be political suicide.
But one interesting concept which is central to the concepts being discussed is the creation of a panel of “experts” to make the politically unpopular decisions on allocating health care resources. In a letter to the Senate, Barack Obama expressed support for such a commission:
I am committed to working with the Congress to fully offset the cost of health care reform by reducing Medicare and Medicaid spending by another $200 to $300 billion over the next 10 years, and by enacting appropriate proposals to generate additional revenues. These savings will come not only by adopting new technologies and addressing the vastly different costs of care, but from going after the key drivers of skyrocketing health care costs, including unmanaged chronic diseases, duplicated tests, and unnecessary hospital readmissions.
To identify and achieve additional savings, I am also open to your ideas about giving special consideration to the recommendations of the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission (MedPAC), a commission created by a Republican Congress. Under this approach, MedPAC’s recommendations on cost reductions would be adopted unless opposed by a joint resolution of the Congress. This is similar to a process that has been used effectively by a commission charged with closing military bases, and could be a valuable tool to help achieve health care reform in a fiscally responsible way.
Will such a commission decide to curtail allocation of resources to those who are not deemed capable of “complete lives” based on prognosis and age, as proposed by Dr. Emanuel? There is no way to tell at this point since we do not have a final Democratic proposal, or know who would be appointed to such a commission.
To exclude the issue of allocating resources away from the elderly and infirm from the debate over “cost cutting,” however, ignores the ethical elephant in the room. Let’s have the debate, and understand specifically how resources would be reallocated, before any vote on a health care restructuring bill.
And before we create a commission to make such decisions for us, let’s consider whether we should outsource these ethical issues or deal with them as part of the political process.
Principles for Allocation of Scarce Medical Interventions
—————–
The rest is here ; http://legalinsurrection.blogspot.com/2009/08/inconvenient-truth-about-death-panel.html
August 8th, 2009 | 9:36 pm
Let’s start at the bottom and work our way up.
Mr. Beckwith sneers at Sarah Palin’s Facebook entry – which I’m guessing was written by herself in a passionate few hours time – because it wasn’t Ronald Reagan’s “evil empire” speech which was drafted by a team of professional speech writers and researchers over a period of many weeks and then rewritten and reworked over and over again by Reagan and his advisors.
It was a great speech, greatly written and greatly delivered but it’s asinine to compare the craftsmanship involved in the two pieces. We might as well compare Mr. Beckwith’s screed with the Reagan speech.
And comparing Sarah Palin to the Partridge Family and Reagan to the Beatles is pathetic.
Anybody who knows anything at all about either American politics or American music would know that the more apt comparison would be comparing, say, Jimmie Rodgers to Frank Sinatra. Both were masters in their own style as are/were Palin and Reagan.
As for Mr. Smith’s criticism of Mrs. Palin – well, on the one hand, it seems to me to stink of classist spite and on the other hand be about as valid as Albert Jonsen’s critique of Mr. Smith when he wrote that Smith was willing “to bend the truth” or “turn a stomach” to make his point.
August 8th, 2009 | 9:37 pm
“I think Sarah Palin has been treated abominably by the press. I think she is hated, in part, because she gave birth to Trig”
I hear this a lot and I instinctively doubt it, but I’m ready to be convinced. I think she’s hated because she’s a hater.
August 9th, 2009 | 7:54 am
What other word than “evil” would you use to describe such a system? Ann Althouse, hardly a knee-jerk Palin defender, even thinks that the reaction to this is overblown. As she writes:
She doesn’t say that the government will kill disabled (or elderly) persons directly, but that death will occur as a result of the decisions of cost controlling bureaucrats who with the power to determine who can receive various treatments. I don’t know why “level of productivity in society” is in quotes, nor do I know whether it is the plan to ration care on this basis. Those are actually serious matters, and I’d like to know the answers.
Sarah Palin is not saying that a single-payer system is evil. She is not saying that government-mandated health care is evil. She is saying that a health care system that could very well treat “undesirables” as second-class citizens and deny them health care is evil. She happens to be right.
August 9th, 2009 | 9:02 am
Mr. Smith (and Ms. Beckwith):
You do not seem to recognize (or choose not to) that we are engaged in nothing less than a battle for the soul of the United States. Gov. Palin DOES recognize this. If you consider our own history, we tend to remember the Revolution as an exercise in cool reason. Very true. But, the Revolution would not have succeeded without the efforts of those like Patrick Henry and Sam Adams — the politically incorrect agitators of public opinion who grabbed the attention of the people and made them open to the more cerebral arguments of John Adams and Jefferson.
Mrs. Jackson above is right. Sarah Palin is a lightning rod and she knows it. Palin writes an op-ed on energy and is rebutted in the Washingpost by Democratic Senators not once, but twice. Romney, Huckabee, Pawlenty, Gingrich, Boehner, Cantor, et al make speeches and release statements by the dozen on the healthcare debate. The response? Nothing. Sarah Palin makes a FACEBOOK POST and generates more response from the public, the media and Democrats (the last two being the same thing) for days.
If nothing else, Gov. Palin has done the country a favor by shining a light on Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel (the brother of Obama’s Chief of Staff), Obama’s Health Policy advisor, and his desire to remake the US into a country where the medical needs and desires of the individual are completely subjugated to those of the collective AS PERCEIVED BY THE GOVERNMENT. It is up to others in the conservative movement to continue to shine that light. If it succeeds, then Gov. Palin’s hyperbole is worth it.
August 9th, 2009 | 10:15 am
I understand that abortions will be provided in Obamacare. Is that right? Doesn’t every successful abortion result in the death of a child? If killing children isn’t evil, then what is? Many thanks to Sarah Palin for her description of Obamacare. Prof. Beckwith and Mr. Smith are good fellows and will see the light. The Partridge Family, the Beatles, the Big Leagues?
August 9th, 2009 | 2:15 pm
>>”There is no way to tell at this point since we do not have a final Democratic proposal, or know who would be appointed to such a commission.”>>
What’s more, even if such a board were to be convened, it would answer to the President only. While we can choose not to re-elect a president, other than that, there’s no accountability other than that option. If Congress decided to make those appointments lifetime appointments – like the SC – even changing presidents wouldn’t make a difference. How would you hold such a board accountable?
August 9th, 2009 | 4:38 pm
Ted: I have repeatedly and often defended Sarah Palin. But she is not above criticism. A leader of stature does not spend an hour or two putting something up on Facebook. They think things through, they choose their language carefully, they don’t sound like a college student’s blog.
That isn’t snobbery. She demeans herself with poorly chosen rhetoric. If all she wants is the 25% that like her to cheer, fine. But if she wants more, she is going to have to improve her performance.
August 9th, 2009 | 4:43 pm
“She doesn’t say that the government will kill disabled (or elderly) persons directly, but that death will occur as a result of the decisions of cost controlling bureaucrats who with the power to determine who can receive various treatments. . . . Those are actually serious matters, and I’d like to know the answers.”
I find it very difficult to figure out just what’s being proposed, but one could do worse that read Salon’s recent piece “Obama wants to kill your grandma.”
August 9th, 2009 | 6:55 pm
Three cheers for Sarah Palin!!! How many evil liberal schemes have become law because those pushing liberalism in politics use cotton candy language to hide the most wretched of their programs. And then their liberal sycophants in the media help by adding more camouflage instead of doing their job of probing and revealing what is afoot.
August 9th, 2009 | 10:26 pm
Comparing Sarah Palin to Ronald Reagan is like comparing the Partridge Family to the Beatles.
Were we to learn that Gov. Palin could be persuaded to approve large increases in the budget of the state militia or state police by an agency chief displaying an easel with cut-out silhouettes of GI Joe or were we to learn that Gov. Palin’s official schedule was vetted by Todd Palin subsequent to his consultations with an astrologer or were all of Gov. Palin’s adult children were given to serial displays of buffoonery, it would be appropriate to compare Gov. Palin to Pres. Reagan.
The man was a capable public speaker, had a capable public relations staff, and made some good decisions on a few contingent questions. That is it.
August 10th, 2009 | 12:02 am
J. Wesley Smith, you say above that “. . . [Mrs. Palin] is in a different league now. What works in sandlot baseball gets you clobbered in the Big Leagues.” To whom in the Big Leagues should she address herself? Whose approval should she seek? She is going to be clobbered regardless of gravitas, choice of rhetoric, and/nuance, so she might as well speak plainly. To quote the earlier comment, above, of James Gibson, your assessment betrays an attitude of Noonanesque elitism.
August 10th, 2009 | 2:23 am
How about “culture of death?” Also unworthy of a substantive leader? Sheesh, if only the Pope had been a little more sensitive to the careful subtelties of political Beatlemanship… Mr. Smith, what would *you* call a panel that decides you shall die because the bureaucrats deem you unworthy of help? You remind me of the people who lament the term “baby killing” as regards abortion. Direct words work. Please demonstrate that Mrs. Palin is *wrong* in her characterization; demonstrate that she is crying wolf.
August 10th, 2009 | 8:04 am
D. Skinner, consultations with those “bureacrats” (people) will be optional, not mandatory. No one will deem anyone else unworthy of help. The consultations will allow individuals to decide on what kind of end of life care they want, a decision everyone should make anyhow.
August 10th, 2009 | 9:43 am
It has been interesting to watch the passions flare over Sarah’s words. Passions is the correct word choice. The secret to Sarah’s success is that she is a passionate woman. No, I do not mean the lamp and ashtray tossing passion of Hillary, MoDo and their fellow (pun intended) feminists. That passion is an ungovernable one that does get the better of them from time to time – see Hillary’s youtube clip “I am sick and tired..” if you need more explanation. Or MoDo’s column yesterday.
Sarah’s passion exudes from her naturally. Does she employs the Queen’s English? No. Neither do most Americans. But, it is interesting to note Sarah is a distant, distant cousin of the late Princess Diana so it may just be that she possesses some of the same combustible (and insane) Spencer genes that brought forth both Lady Di and Winston Churchill. The English had solid love/hate relationships with both Lady Di and Churchhill. (Yes, true blue monarchists could never love the “People’s Princess” who not only brought the monarchy to the brink but also caused England to take to the streets in a collective nervous breakdown.) Certainly Sarah has held true to that love/hate family trait.
Sarah’s natural enthusiasm and courage makes her popular with an ever increasing number of Americans. Will she have to go to charm school if she hopes to be president? Who knows? And frankly, today, who cares? She has blown wide open the debate on Obama’s healthcare and that – to quote Martha Stewart- is a good thing.
Just watch.
August 10th, 2009 | 11:48 am
Wesley, my friend, to coin a phrase, you just don’t get it, do you?
To begin with, we’re not concerned here with whether or not you have supported Sarah Palin in the past but only with the substance and the tone of your criticism in the current instance.
I suppose we could get into a long debate about what a leader should or should not do, but I think that you would agree that the first job of a leader is to lead. The style by which a leader leads is, of course, interesting but, in the end, it’s of only secondary importance so long as they get the job done.
Now, certainly, among the pointy-headed academics of the Ivy League (and their scholastic camp-followers) as well as among the effete intellectual snobs of the nether bicoastal regions, Sarah Palin’s style sets teeth a-grinding.
But you have to admit that she got their (as well as many other’s) attention – and brought into the public square – an issue that would most likely have been either pooh-poohed or ignored altogether had it been raised in – say – a roundtable discussion in the corridors of First Things magazine (though, to tell the truth, I would give my left arm to be at FT to hear just such a thing.)
That being said, I stand by my initial point: your criticism of Sarah Palin was based far more on style than, I’d guess, substance; and, further, your criticism of her style was classist based.
As somebody else in this discussion has pointed out, you’re coming parlously close to turning into another Peggy Noonan.
Best wishes,
Ted
August 10th, 2009 | 12:07 pm
Ah, yes, I can understand why Mr. Smith and his fellow think-tank professionals might object to Governor Palin’s blunt, amateurish words. After all, such crudities would never be permitted in the position papers he and his colleagues spread so liberally among their clients inside the beltway.
But for the rest of us, the unwashed masses who don’t read the words of the experts, the governor’s comments reflect not a lack of professionalism, but simple truths. They are a refreshing break from the euphemistic rhetoric we hear so often from the mouths of most politicians and the policy wonks to whom they listen. We appreciate it when a politician actually calls an evil an evil, when she appropriately labels as “death boards” those bureaucrats who will decide who among the ill and disabled will or will not receive medical care. We understand and appreciate such talk because it is the language we speak, the language we hear around the dinner table, the language that runs through our minds when we go to the polls at the local library or high school. And it’s a language we need to hear, the same sort of straightforward language found in…well, the Ten Commandments and the Sermon on the Mount.
Mr. Smith has contributed much to the ongoing debate on life and death issues, and for this we owe him thanks. But it is Governor Palin’s words that resonate with those of us in the trenches who must convert the indifferent majority in face-to-face, one-on-one encounters. Not surprisingly her amateurish phrases are particularly helpful in this task.
I’ll risk a prediction that the phrase “death boards” outlasts whatever official title these panels are assigned.
August 10th, 2009 | 3:17 pm
“I’ll risk a prediction that the phrase “death boards” outlasts whatever official title these panels are assigned.”
Yes, among people who either don’t know anything about what’s actually being proposed, or don’t want to know.
August 11th, 2009 | 7:55 am
This is a prime example of what I was speaking of regarding the lamp and ashtray tossing passion of Hillary Clinton:
http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalpunch/2009/08/lost-in-translation-clinton-says-she-not-bill-is-the-secretary-of-state.html
The target of her disdain was a student. She is the Secretary of State for the U.S. Her behavior is neither professional nor remarks worthy of a “substantive leader”. Which is rather breathtaking as it was only 2 short years ago, many on the Right believed (and the Left, fervently, that Hillary was the shoe-in for POTUS.
The truth is we all know this is the real Hillary. Just as we know who the real Obama is – hint- we saw him when he responded to the low hanging fruit of “what do you think of Prof. Louis Gates arrest?”
And the truth is we know who the real Sarah Palin is. She may be flawed but she’s not stupid.
August 12th, 2009 | 4:39 pm
And your kind of rhetoric is not likely to persuade the population of people Palin is speaking to. You are far too sure that there are no significant populations of the “unconverted” that Palin’s speech will convince. My guess is that her speech won’t convince the populations you are writing to, but neither will your rhetoric persuade those she is speaking to.
So take it easy.
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