When Sara Palin was first introduced as McCain’s running mate,Rick Davis, the campaign manager announced that this election will not revolve around issues but on how the electorate perceives the candidates in a general sense.
Though many of us in the progressive communities of the blogs and even some in the MSM dismissed Davis’ statement as that of a campaign manager who does not have a strong candidate in either McCain or Palin, I think Davis may be on to something.The selection of Palin is part of a strategy that is going to make issues irrelevant.
Taking Palin first.She is clearly not an intellectual and lacks any credentials of a politician in the normal sense.She is a fundamentalist Christian, opposed to abortion, stem cell research and evolution.Considering the demographic base Davis plans to appeal to,i.e. rural white voters, these are not such a bad combination of attributes.Further, for a large number of even urban lower middle class white voters, the appeal of a gun toting white woman going up against a black man evokes a past that has strong appeal even today.
These core groups would not care if Sara has ever heard of Iraq/Iran or Pakistan.To them all the muslims and Arabs are the same and should be killed and/or conquered on any pretext whatsoever.Their petroleum resources belong to us and if Sara can beat it out of the Muslims, that makes her that much more attractive to these voters.
McCain can supplement these voters by broadening the appeal of the ticket to embrace moderate voters in suburbia because of his unquestionable patriotism and the suffering he endured as a prisoner of war.There is a die hard group of voters who will forgive any gaffe or lack of knowledge on the part of McCain precisely for the reasons I have stated.
Together,the two candidates offer an iron clad team that cannot be penetrated by invoking arguments about the economy or their statements on war or foreign policy.
It is this argument that Davis was advancing and I think he has a good basis for believing it.Sara’s hair style, her dress and demeanor are all part of the calculated strategy he has devised.She has to project an image of an unsophisticated rural woman, not a New York type of a cosmopolitan.This is why her hair style is shown as a spare one almost resembling the women from the polygamist compound.Her description as a moose hunter toting a high power rifle was also a deliberately planned image to show that the uppity black man better be aware who he was dealing with.
By showing McCain as the weaker link in the team and Sara as the stronger person, Davis hopes to show that a weak old white man can rely on his woman to protect him.Many frontierswomen did that during colonial days and those types of images never hurt anyone seeking to create the image of independent Americans and not “whiners”.
IMO, this strategy,properly executed, has a chance of succeeding.The beauty of the strategy is that these two,McCain and Palin, do not have to endlessly argue the minutiae of policies to make a connection with the voters.And that is what Davis is counting on.