Defending Palin: Dreher and the Parker Principle II
John Mark Reynolds
Politics
09.29.2008
Bottom Line:
There are good reasons to think Governor Palin is up to the job of Vice-President and insufficient reasons to doubt it. Critics on the right are basing their arguments on too little information and the wrong kind of information. Rod Dreher, in particular, has jumped on and off the Palin team with astonishing alacrity. His present opinions about Palin are based on inadequate data and his arguments supporting his conclusions are not sound.
Dreher to be right, Palin’s record as governor in Alaska (viewed as wildly successful by most before partisanship took hold) would be a case of amazing luck. my more positive view of the Governor to be right, Palin is a good executive who (under tough circumstances) had some bad moments in two interviews. While Dreher may be proved correct by events, his present reasons are inadequate.
While nobody should keep supporting a bad candidate forever, surely it would be just as bad to miss a great one by dismissing her too quickly. It is true that Palin is being damaged by media stereotypes, many of which gain added resonance from cultural stereotypes about attractive women. It is also true that she has not aided her cause.
I don’t think that cause is lost yet.
Dreher’s view, like that of most conservative critics, gives up on Palin too quickly. There are reasons to think McCain, Biden, and Obama are deeply flawed candidates. There are also good reasons to support them. I actually think Palin as good a bet as the other three based on her performance as governor of Alaska. While her time in the job was short, her success was great enough to warrant the risk that she was merely phenomenally lucky.
Background to the Discussion:
Recently, a national columnist, Kathleen Parker, called on Governor Palin to drop off the Republican ticket for the good of the nation.
She based this extraordinary bit of advice to take this politically disastrous action on two television interviews in which Governor Palin did not perform well.
Let’s be blunt: as political advice, Parker’s column was foolish. There is no chance that the “voluntary” withdrawal of Governor Palin would help. I responded to Parker here.*
Rod Dreher is a columnist I respect who has also become disillusioned with Governor Palin and so I asked for his help in understanding his reasoning here.
(Dreher is right about so much and such a good writer and thinker that my assumption when I saw he disagreed with me was that he must be right! Sadly, I examined his arguments and still am not persuaded.)
The Dreher response lacks rigor and does not help his case. He still believes, based on two network television interviews, that the Governor is “an empty pants suit.” He also cites a political opponent in a previous race and an unnamed “friend in Alaska” to support his case.
This is not an impressive argument or reporting. Political opponents of Ronald Reagan frequently said the same things about the former President as did numerous people in California. One would have had no difficulty writing the Dreher arguments about Palin in 1976 or 1980 about Governor Reagan.
Often such arguments become self-justifying prophesies. Take Palin’s performance at the debate. For good or ill Americans do not generally like candidates who seem like “civics class debaters.”
If Governor Palin “wonks-out” for the debate, she will have the same success that Gore, Mondale, Carter, and other “great communicators” had when they won the good government award for civics class debating, but lost the American people. If she is herself, she has a good chance to win, but goo-goo types will use it against her as sure proof that she is “an empty pants suit.”
Dreher may be right about Palin, but if so, he is merely lucky, his argument is more personal hunch with little data to support it at present.
Dreher’s Argument and My Response:
Dreher says:
"Palin’s problem is not that she is lousy in interviews. Her problem is that her lousiness indicates a disturbing lack of knowledge in areas that are relevant to the presidency — a job that would be hers if her 72-year-old cancer-surviving running mate were to die or be incapacitated. Fair or not, she has a lot more to prove than Joe Biden does. You might think him a gasbag, but the fact is he’s been working at the top of government for many years. If he became president, he wouldn’t be in way over his head. Palin? Not so much, at least on evidence of what we’ve heard from her."
How does Dreher differentiate between her “lousiness” in interviews (which is overstated) and a “disturbing lack of knowledge in areas that are relevant to the presidency?”
What are exactly those areas of knowledge that are necessary to be President?
How has Palin shown in three weeks that her years in government were a fluke?
Dreher does not define his terms and so leaves us with nothing but his impressions.
Palin is an odd situation. She must defend McCain’s views (not her own) in a national forum. She must do so after receiving press and new media criticism that has been stunning in its hatred. Governor Palin must also do so in an environment where the burden of proof is frequently placed on conservatives to prove their intellectual credentials and in a culture where attractive women often are assumed to lack intelligence.
I think her handlers probably feared a “positive” gaffe (”Roosevelt talked to America on television.”) and encouraged her to stay general. This was a good strategy (short term) for McCain as it minimizes risk. . . but left Palin unable to free lance using her time as governor to answer questions. She has stayed to campaign talking points to a level harmful to her public image . . . which has a bad decision by the campaign. She, of course, was wrong headed to go along with it.
Suppose she fluffs under that pressure and in that context. A well informed person (or adequately informed person) who does not communicate well (or does so badly) in this particular place is not going to come across as well informed.
Is this a skill that a successful president needs?
I will admit that it is a good skill to have, but it is nothing like negotiating with Putin or other world leaders. The idea widespread in the press that “if she cannot face Couric, she cannot face Putin” is facile, though self-serving for members of the press.
We know Palin has good negotiating skills in the real world.
How?
Governor Palin has negotiated a tough deal (against fierce opposition) to get an uncommonly favorable deal for Alaska on a gas pipeline. This is a mammoth project where even critics concede she picked a good team and managed the issue well. Against this actual executive success which entailed great political risk, Dreher places her fluffing a few questions in a Couric interview to call her an “empty pants suit.”
Wouldn’t it be simpler to assume that she has had a hard time adjusting to the national glare? Must we abandon Governor Palin so quickly?
Dreher continues:
"I wish it weren’t the case — Lord, do I — but it is. JMR is asking Palin critics to prove a negative. He’s asking us to assume that she’s qualified for the presidency in the face of evidence from her own mouth that she’s not. Palin is sequestered from media questioning, so the only opportunity we have to hear from her is when she consents to do these rare interviews. In all of them so far, she has underperformed. And yet we are told that we shouldn’t judge her based on these, that all this proves is she’s not good at doing interviews. Really? Are you comfortable with that?"
I am comfortable with it, because interview skills and governing skills are not the same skills. Just as some very intelligent students freeze up in certain types of exams (some good at formal written exams come unglued at their first “by voice” examination), so do some politicians.
Let me suggest Dreher should assume somebody who has already been a competent executive will go on being one. Palin has a real record in Alaska as a reformer (as both parties there admitted before partisanship sucked up everything into its maw). I am not asking him to prove a negative, but to tell me why parts of TWO high pressure media interviews should overcome Palin’s record as a successful chief executive.
Dreher is implicitly arguing that two hours of media interviews are more revealing about governing capacity than governing.
It may shock Dreher, but I tend to judge people’s ability to govern based on their record as governor and not from their ability to talk (in one hot house way) about their ability to govern.
We also must not over do attacks on Palin’s speaking skills. Governor Palin is an outstanding public speaker who has an awesome ability to connect with an audience. She will be able to use the “bully pulpit” of the presidency.
Second, in all but the worst case scenario Governor Palin will be vice-president for at least some period of time. It is after all the job for which she is running. She will have a chance to add nuance to her strong executive skills.
As for Joe Biden, I see no reason to think him a competent executive. He has run nothing. He has commanded nothing. He has been at the top of government for decades running from a safe seat in tiny Delaware, but one of his presidential campaigns was an embarrassment and the other a non-starter. If Joe Biden had never served in the Senate, it is hard to see the loss to the Republic except for the loss of his frequent gaffes, weird tirades, and overweening ego.
He may know more about the details of how things work in Washington by sheer dint of living (though Biden has never displayed any great intellectual ability as far as I can tell), but how do we know a thing about his ability to govern?
Dreher continues:
"Let’s say the Dallas Morning News wanted to choose a new Sports editor. If I were asked to sit for an interview about the Cowboys, the Rangers, the Mavericks and other Dallas teams, I could probably do about as well as Palin did on foreign policy questions. By the Reynolds Principle, the hiring committee would have no reason to conclude that I was unqualified for the job of Sports editor. After all, I’ve been a section editor before, and have been a professional journalist at a fairly high level for some time. I have proven my skills in the art and craft of journalism and editing. So the fact that I more or less bombed my interview about knowledge relevant to being the Sports editor of the Dallas Morning News only proves, by the Reynolds Principle, that I am no good at giving interviews. Pay no attention to the evidence that I don’t know jack about Dallas sports (which is, in fact, the truth)."
This is a textbook false analogy.
If being Sport’s editor requires detailed knowledge of teams (I will take Dreher’s word for it), then he should not be hired. The question is: has Palin “bombed” in a way relevant to the job for which she is applying?
She has shown some ignorance of the details of foreign policy. Is such ignorance a defeater in a good government leader?
It would mean that she should not be Secretary of State, but it might make her a good president. Wonkish policy knowledge has not been present in some great presidents.
Ronald Reagan lacked detailed knowledge of world affairs. He actually showed little desire to immerse himself in the details of foreign policy or “how Washington worked.” He was a successful foreign policy president by most accounts.
Detailed knowledge of foreign policy or economic policy does not seem a qualification for the job of president. In fact some of our worst presidents (Jimmy Carter and Richard Nixon) had it. Of course, this ignorance is not (assuming Palin is ignorant) in itself a virtue, but it turns out not to be a defeating flaw.
Some great leaders have this flaw, some do not. Is Palin a leader?
On that, the best place to look is at her record as a leader . . . and she has one.
Does Palin show executive competence in finding good people to make her successful in governing? Her work in Alaska pretty much proves that she does. She got the state to pass major reforms, negotiated a major gas pipe line deal, and used her speaking ability to rally support for her ideas. She was (before partisanship set in) viewed by both parties in Alaska as an astoundingly good leader.
Dreher’s belief that two media interviews that putatively show her as lacking a skill that not all good presidents had overcomes her record as governor.
Nonsense.
Since we are electing a leader, I don’t see how two bad media interviews (assuming they were all bad) neutralizes what we know about what Palin has done.
In Praise of Dreher
Finally, even if we accept the simplistic analogy Dreher proposes, his argument (if we think about it) might actually help Palin.
Suppose Dreher wanted to be a sports editor. We know (I assume) two things about Dreher: he is a good reporter and a good editor.
Suppose also our present sport’s page stank and that (in general) sport’s pages around the country were losing readers.
A paper could do worse than to hire Dreher to report on anything (in my opinion), if he showed the desire to get up to speed on the teams he would cover.
My guess is that Dallas is overloaded with tons of folk who know every detail and fact about the Cowboys (and other Dallas teams), but that good writers, journalists, and thinkers are pretty hard to find.
The relevant question seems to be: does Dreher have the desire, capacity, and time to get up to speed as a columnist on the sport’s scene in Dallas?
If he does, then the state of the paper would also matter. If the sports page wasn’t broken, then shaking things up with a new voice (a non-sports voice) might be a bad idea. If it was in free-fall, then changing things would be a great idea. Finding a good reporter, giving him some time to learn the sport’s ropes, and not teaching him “how we do things” might be a great idea.
I am not an editor so I cannot be sure Dreher would be a good sports reporter, but since he is good at the things harder or impossible to teach (raw intelligence, ability to write, reporter’s skills), it is not difficult to imagine betting on him if his paper had developed the reputation for hackneyed and corrupt sports reporting.** This is especially true if in his interview he showed only vague “sport knowledge,” but was known as a quick study and had a passion to get up to speed.
Palin has a reputation as a quick study, a proven record in the very field in which she is applying for a job (executive in government), and time to learn.
Let’s face it: the Washington Republican brand is dead. John McCain had the wisdom (as a good leader) to hire a bright, rising executive (with proven success as as governor). Joe Biden may know the players and the teams better to start, but isn’t he more of the same stuff we have been getting? If he were a lead editor on a paper, then wouldn’t it be a paper that nobody is reading?
It may be that hiring the bright and rising young sport-reporter from the sticks will not work out for John McCain, editor of the Republican paper, but it was a sensible call. There is no reason (after a few short weeks) to call it a failure. We know Palin can work a crowd and give a great speech. We know she is not up to speed on interviews (in this weird environment). We do know she was an effective governor, so the evidence still suggests that she can do the job.
Given the mess in Washington, I cannot imagine she is a bigger risk than more of the same!
But Dreher had more to say:
"I can’t believe that that’s any kind of responsible standard for hiring a Sports editor. Or a vice president.
Let me put the question to Mark, then: if doing press interviews is not a good way to discover the depth and utility of Sarah Palin’s knowledge and fitness for the job, what is? Is there any acceptable way to falsify the statement, “Sarah Palin is fit to be vice president”? If so, what is it? If not, isn’t this all really a charade, and there’s nothing she could say or do that would make you conclude that she’s unfit?"
Both Palin and Biden are bad at press interviews. Biden has been so bad for so long that he has earned a kind of immunity from the howlers he gives. To be fair to Biden, let’s just count his howlers from this election.
Has Palin said anything so bad as Biden’s remarks about several racial minorities?
But Dreher gives Biden a pass due to his experience in government. We assume Biden is no fool, because he has been a competent senator for so long.
I am not sure that being a good senator is a good sign of executive skills the president will need, but since we have three of them running (on both sides) it is a point that cuts both ways. (It is a major reason I opposed John McCain in the Republican primaries.)
I assume that a woman who can negotiate a multibillion dollar gas pipe line deal against great opposition is not an “empty pantsuit.”
I think what people have done is more important than how they say it.
One could falsify the statement: “Sarah Palin is fit to be vice-president.” by looking at her record and finding that she was not an effective executive. I have looked at her record, especially at media accounts of her before partisanship took over, and find it very strong.
She could say something to overcome this record of real world achievement. Let me give one example.
She could demonstrate racist attitudes in an unguarded moment. That would be new and relevant information where words matter as an insight into her soul. She has no balancing civil rights track record to make up for it. (This, by the way, is why I think Biden deservedly survives his boorish comments on race.)
The notion, however, that after serving for almost two years in a very powerful governor’s position (the governor of Alaska has many powers compared to many other state governors) that two interviews could show her to be empty headed is foolish. She may be empty-headed and very, very lucky. (Alaska is a small place . . . and so despite her powers there she just lucked out for two years.) That is possible, but it seems more charitable to assume that the pressure got to her in some interviews. I have watched one of her debates that Dreher cites and she seemed able to discuss very arcane Alaska issues with some level of wonkishness.
I see no reason to think her stupid and good reason to think her the kind of “big picture” thinker who makes a good president if she has the right team.
I do know that the present Washington team has done so badly that taking some risk of an outsider seems like a good bet.
———–
* My column on Parker is too harsh. I do not believe her a “sell out,” but I also don’t believe that anybody who thinks her advice, which would be a political disaster, very bad is attacking her for picking on a woman . . . which Parker implies. My phrasing, however, was too cute and left it sounding as if I know her to be a sell out. That is not right and I am sorry to have done it.
If I was wrong, Dreher certainly let me have it, but he may go a bit over the top when he says of my post:
"One of the least attractive features of the Right is a tribalist impulse to punish anyone who is disloyal to the Cause — the Cause being defined not as any particular set of principles, but Getting Our Team To Power. I guess the Left does this too, but I don’t pay enough attention to their internecine battles to say for sure. If the Bush years have taught us anything it ought to be that the instinct to be loyal to the Cause instead of loyal to the truth can never end well. The Cause, if it is just and right, can only be strengthened by truth-telling, and open discussion and debate. Trying to shut up people like Kathleen Parker by suggesting that she’s an elitist who seeks to abandon Our Sarah for the sake of ingratiating herself with some supposed Liberal Establishment is self-defeating. It’s other things too, but I’ll leave it at that."
What if instead of a lust for power, one simply wishes to believe in people and not toss them aside at the first sign of weakness?
I am no partisan . . . and God knows I am no McCain-bot. I likely would not have voted for Rudy (which I made clear in the primaries.) I don’t want to shut Parker down. I just think she is very wrong. Given that she writes from a platform larger than my own by a scale of, well, zillions I doubt she has much to fear from me.
I don’t want to shut her up, just disagree with her.
Finally, if too much loyalty to the cause is a problem, then it is true that those making very harsh judgments of Governor Palin, her abilities, and potential after two media interviews are unlikely to fall into that error.
I will leave it to my readers to decide whether the opposite error, a kind of intellectual panic in which one abandons one’s friends during the first rough patch and makes giant negative generalizations about them, would be any more attractive.
This is not about Dreher or what he is doing in this particular case. Dreher is an honorable man who thinks he has enough evidence to make his judgment.
I do fear, however, that conservatives will over learn the “lesson of Bush” or learn the wrong lesson and so miss a Reagan-like candidate when he comes.
———
**In fact my favorite Greenbay Packer paper did hire a sports reporter from Miami to write on the Packers. There must have been many people hanging about the paper who would have smoked him in a “know your Packers” quiz. He admitted it took him some time to learn the team, but as a good sports reporter, he gave good column space from the beginning. The paper was wise not to hire the person who would have won the office quiz on the Packers and go for an outsider with the broad skills a sports reporter needs.
He replaced a person with legendary knowledge of the Packers after decades covering them. He was a refreshing change.
He was a Palin pick!
scriptoriumdaily.com |
