[Vision2020] An Honest Feminist — Finally

[No Weatherman]

Sarah Palin's a Brainiac
by Elaine Lafferty
The former editor in chief of Ms. magazine (and a Democrat) on what
she learned on a campaign plane with the would-be VP.

It's difficult not to froth when one reads, as I did again and again
this week, doubts about Sarah Palin's "intelligence," coming
especially from women such as PBS's Bonnie Erbe, who, as near as I
recall, has not herself heretofore been burdened with the Susan Sontag
of Journalism moniker. As Fred Barnes — God help me, I'm agreeing with
Fred Barnes — suggests in the Weekly Standard, these high toned and
authoritative dismissals come from people who have never met or spoken
with Sarah Palin. Those who know her, love her or hate her, offer no
such criticism. They know what I know, and I learned it from spending
just a little time traveling on the cramped campaign plane this week:
Sarah Palin is very smart.

I'm a Democrat, but I've worked as a consultant with the McCain
campaign since shortly after Palin's nomination. Last week, there was
the thought that as a former editor-in-chief of Ms. magazine as well
as a feminist activist in my pre-journalism days, I might be helpful
in contributing to a speech that Palin had long wanted to give on
women's rights.

Now by "smart," I don't refer to a person who is wily or calculating
or nimble in the way of certain talented athletes who we admire but
suspect don't really have serious brains in their skulls. I mean,
instead, a mind that is thoughtful, curious, with a discernable
pattern of associative thinking and insight. Palin asks questions, and
probes linkages and logic that bring to mind a quirky law professor I
once had. Palin is more than a "quick study"; I'd heard rumors around
the campaign of her photographic memory and, frankly, I watched it in
action. She sees. She processes. She questions, and only then, she
acts. What is often called her "confidence" is actually a rarity in
national politics: I saw a woman who knows exactly who she is.

For all those old enough to remember Senator Sam Ervin, the brilliant
strict constitutional constructionist and chairman of the Senate
Watergate Committee whose patois included "I'm just a country lawyer"
. . . Yup, Palin is that smart.

So no simple task then, this speech on women's rights. For the sin of
being a Christian personally opposed to abortion, Palin is being
pilloried by the inside-the-Beltway Democrat feminist establishment.
(Yes, she is anti-abortion. And yes, instead of buying organic New
Zealand lamb at Whole Foods, she joins other Alaskans in hunting for
food. That's it. She is not a right-wing nut, and all the rest of the
Internet drivel — the book banning at the Library, the rape kits
decision — is nonsense. I digress.) Palin's role in this campaign was
to energize "the Republican base," which she has inarguably done. She
also was expected to reach out to Hillary Clinton "moderates." (Right.
Only a woman would get both those jobs in either party.) Look, I am
obviously personally pro-choice, and I disagree with McCain and Palin
on that and a few other issues. But like many other Democrats,
including Lynn Rothschild, I'm tired of the Democratic Party taking
women for granted. I also happen to believe Sarah Palin supports
women's rights, deeply and passionately.

Many of those — not all — who decried the sexist media treatment of
Hillary Clinton have been silent as Palin has been skewered in the old
ways that female public figures are skewered, as well as a host of
sexualized new ways as well. Some feminists have weighed in; "Even the
reportedly clear glasses she wears to play down her beauty queen
credential and enhance her gravitas can't make up for experience,"
writes my heroine Suzanne Braun Levine, former editor of Ms. Oppose
her on policy? Fine. But how sad for feminist leaders to sink this
low, especially when Palin has worn glasses since she was 10 years
old.

Last month a prominent feminist blogger, echoing that sensibility,
declared that the media was wrongly buying into the false idea that
Palin was a feminist. Why? Well, just because she said she was a
feminist, because she supported women's rights and opportunities,
equal pay, Title IV — that was just "empty rhetoric," they said. At
least the blogger didn't go as far as NOW's Kim Gandy and declare that
Palin was not a woman. Bottom line: you are not a feminist until we
say you are. And there you have the formula for diminishing what was
once a great and important mass social change movement to an
exclusionary club that rejects women who sincerely want to join and,
God forbid, grow to lead.

But here is the good news: women, citizens of America's high and low
culture, the Economist and People magazine readers, will get it. They
got it with Hillary even when feminist leaders were not supporting her
or doing so half-heartedly. Yes, Palin is a harder sell, she looks and
sounds different, and one can rightfully oppose her based on abortion
policies. If you only vote on how a person personally feels about
abortion, you will never want her to darken your door. If you care
about anything else, she will continue to intrigue you. As Time's
Nancy Gibbs noted a few weeks ago, quoting bioethicist Tom Murray,
"Sympathy and subtlety are seasonings rarely applied to political red
meat." Will Palin's time come next week? I don't know. But her time
will come.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2008-10-27/sarah-palins-a-brainiac/1/