Liberals who sneer at Palin misunderstand America

There is an email making the rounds entitled

It begins with a small tutorial on what the French call "L'Amerique Profonde" — an inner, hidden, deep America that would elect a Sarah Palin Vice President.

This, the email states, is an America where a Harvard law degree is considered suspect and effeminate; an America of farmers and cowboys, ­summer weekends at college football, pick-up trucks, tailgate barbecues, Right-wing talk radio; where God is an old white guy with a beard who will judge you after you die.

That such an explanation should be necessary suggests the gulf of incomprehension between most Europeans and middle America. But there is a gulf, too, between many of the east coast liberals supporting Barack Obama and that same America.

These past months, the Republican base has been de-energised, all but conceding that this year belongs to the Democrats. Then came Sarah Palin, governor of Alaska, a game-changer — and there is hope for them again.

Americans love a good story and it's all about narrative right now. A Republican writer, lost in Hollywood, put it best: "What movie do you want to see now? Two lawyers go to Washington; or the old vet and his gun-totin' beauty queen with the part-Inuit husband who could be known as First Dude'?"

As a playwright, I have to admire the way Palin delivered her beautifully crafted speech, written by Bush's speechwriter: a masterpiece of ­conservative ideology. It is already being ecstatically compared by the Republicans with the Reagan farewell speech of 1992.

Some Alaskans have a bumper sticker which reads: "Our state is cold but our governor is hot." Once again, parts of the media are hurling sexist insults, and once again — as with Hillary ­ ­­Clinton earlier this year — many of them are coming from women.

As a Left-wing feminist, to read comments from progressive women like, "She can't be a good mother if she's got five kids and wants to be vice president", makes me despair. The irony of hearing Right-wing Republican women defending a working mother is the world turned upside down.
Ironically, in not vigorously defending Hillary Clinton during her presidential campaign against the misogyny hurled at her, the Obama campaign has called down nemesis in a pencil skirt, high heels, and sporting a rifle. And although Obama has tried to stop his more ­zealous supporters from going for Palin, making jokes about her dress sense and her family, some of them just can't help themselves. They're out of touch with who Palin speaks for.

It is this "hockey mom" that "Amerique Profonde" can pull up a chair and talk to. This woman, governor of a state bordering two foreign countries, who is perceived as the real outsider, could be the real antidote to the Washington that this middle America despises.

And by stressing vision over the experience, the Obama campaign has invited through the door another vision, and another kind of visionary.
Now the Republicans, too, can claim change. Why the incomprehension here, then? Like many US ex-pats, I'm often infuriated, dismayed and bemused by what passes in the UK for analysis of my native land. Whether they are Left or Right, from the North or South, black or white, I think that most of my fellow US ex-pats would agree.

To most of Britain, and the rest of the world, the election of Senator Barack Obama has appeared all but inevitable. He is, without doubt, America's best choice — but to think that this means it's a done deal is not to understand this great and volatile republic. America is New York and L.A., Miami and San Francisco. But America is also small towns, small businesses, factory workers. It is a place where owning your own home is considered a right.

There is an America that is passionately against abortion; pro-gun; that does not travel abroad because every landscape, every climate, is represented in America; where "the old country" holds no fond memories because it was the place you had to leave, and the past is a closed door forever. It is where it is possible to make millions, become famous, marry well, but life is lived among those with the same colour skin, where knowledge of what is outside that enclave is sparse, suspect and unwanted.

Further, there are states in the South in which the military is the principal employer, educator and provider of housing and medical care. There, the nation has become a kind of Sparta, where the soldier and veteran enjoys supreme respect. Three of the presidential and vice-presidential candidates have a child in service in Iraq.
It is no paradox that it is in some ways more egalitarian than Britain and, as such, throws up politicians, especially female politicians, who are simply unimaginable here. In the UK, most politicians now go to similar schools and universities and, increasingly, into political careers. They have no real personal narrative. By contrast, Palin is a 360-degree politician: every part of her life and family is integrated in her appeal and her beliefs.

In a country where most people ­sincerely believe that you can make it if you want to, your background and family is part of your narrative: it's an essential and indivisible part of the politician and the woman.

The Republicans have won seven out of the last ten presidential elections. Yet this time, if the Democrats cannot get the most electrifying politician in a generation elected president of the United States, in a year in which the Republicans were expected to be off the radar, their position as a political party may become untenable. That is the risk they run if they attempt to deal with Sarah Palin by simply sneering.

The consequences of this are barely worth considering. This election is for nothing less than the soul of ­America.

For that reason, it is vital that we understand this rich and complex nation better. For better or for worse, America holds the fate of the world in its hands.

John McCain is a 72-year-old who was subjected to years of torture: who knows how he may react to the stresses of office? Should anything happen to him after he is elected — and I believe Palin's rise and the reaction of liberals to her make that more likely — then she will become the most important human being on the face of the earth.
This is not a movie. We need to understand her nation's insularity and how it made her who she
is.