Friday, July 10, 2009
Noonan is not a Palin fan
Not to pour gasoline on a smoldering issue, but today's column by Peggy Noonan in the Wall Street Journal makes it pretty clear that Peggy Noonan has little use for Sarah Palin:
"In television interviews she was out of her depth in a shallow pool. She was limited in her ability to explain and defend her positions, and sometimes in knowing them. She couldn't say what she read because she didn't read anything. She was utterly unconcerned by all this and seemed in fact rather proud of it: It was evidence of her authenticity. She experienced criticism as both partisan and cruel because she could see no truth in any of it. She wasn't thoughtful enough to know she wasn't thoughtful enough. Her presentation up to the end has been scattered, illogical, manipulative and self-referential to the point of self-reverence. 'I'm not wired that way,' 'I'm not a quitter,' 'I'm standing up for our values.' I'm, I'm, I'm."Of course, read it all to put everything in context. I don't have any specific information on what Governor Palin reads or doesn't read, but I would point out to Ms. Noonan that the same criticism she is making was in fact made against her former boss, Ronald Reagan, who, as it turns out, was reasonably well-read and informed, and not the rube some made him out to be.
21 Comments:
By 
, at
Fri Jul 10, 03:16:00 PM:
Noonan has written many columns on the subject of Palin. Let's try to concentrate on new news. She's pretty useless, regardless of what one thinks of the good ol' gal Sarah Palin.
By 
Elijah, at
Fri Jul 10, 03:16:00 PM:
peggy noonan, mareen dowd, arianna huffington .. aren't they all the same ...elitists so far removed from the common citizen that i doubt they could tell you what a gallon of gas or milk costs
it seems odd that the country is in the state that it is, with all these political intellectual giants
By , at
Fri Jul 10, 03:48:00 PM:
...but today's column by Peggy Noonan in the Wall Street Journal makes it pretty clear that Peggy Noonan has little use for Sarah Palin:
If anything, I'd say that Republicans, and most definitely conservatives, have little use for Peggy Noonan.
By Leif, at
Fri Jul 10, 05:14:00 PM:
The conservative movement and the Republican Party are headed for a showdown. Noonan and her GOP establishment ilk cannot conceal their contempt for the Alaskan upstart. After all, isn't Palin of woman born? Meanwhile, Birnam Wood moves steadily towards Dunsinane Hill.
Farewell, proud MacNoonan.
By smitty1e, at
Fri Jul 10, 05:41:00 PM:
Noonan is not part of a solution to the disease of Progressivism; rather, a part of it.
By Georg Felis, at
Fri Jul 10, 06:11:00 PM:
From the article: “She hurts, as they say, the Republican brand, with her mess and her rhetorical jabberwocky and her careless causing of division.” And here I thought the Republicans hurt the Republican brand, with their voting record on spending, and their slowly growing embrace of larger government. Gee thanks Ms. Doud…er…Noonan. And by the way, that careless causing of division is exactly what your former boss did, when he came to Washington preaching the salvation of lower taxes, smaller government, and a strong defense. There were an awfully lot of Republicans back then who were quite comfortable on their back benches, with their liberal buddies and parties, presenting the token Republican opposition as the Dems went plowing forward.
In her existing job, all she was doing was spending her entire schedule answering baseless charges and dropping into debt a half-million dollars worth every nine months (which would be a full million and a half in debt at that rate by the next election). Passing the Governorship on to the quite capable Lt. Gov and getting out of public office both will help Alaska, and herself. But if you wrote it that way, your recently-found liberal friends would not like you quite as much, would they?
By , at
Fri Jul 10, 06:52:00 PM:
Noonan writes: She wasn't thoughtful enough to know she wasn't thoughtful enough.
I think that statement sums it up best.
By JPMcT, at
Fri Jul 10, 07:16:00 PM:
Those who can..DO!
Those who can't, nowadays, criticize those who can.
They can't even teach...
What's Noonan done lately?
By , at
Fri Jul 10, 07:21:00 PM:
Ronnie Reagan is dead and Peggy Noonan isn't his speechwriter anymore. She has nothing of value to say.
By Dawnfire82, at
Sat Jul 11, 12:11:00 AM:
In this age of armies of Davids and multitudes of opinions, why do these pundits believe that anyone gives a shit about what they think? No one is persuaded by these fools. They just tout the ones that agree with them as proof of the trueness of their cause, and villify those who do not.
By Purple Avenger, at
Sat Jul 11, 03:10:00 AM:
Noonan has no credibility anymore.
By , at
Sat Jul 11, 05:35:00 AM:
Sadly, Peggy has become a putz.
By TOF, at
Sat Jul 11, 09:42:00 AM:
I'm not a Noonan fan. Writing soaring speeches for RR was all she was good at.
I'm withholding judgement on Palin.
By , at
Sat Jul 11, 10:55:00 AM:
i am not a Noonan fan but she makes a lot more sense than the Coulters and Megyn Kelly's of the world. Go, Peggy.Ok, she actually makes sense.
By Greg Toombs, at
Sat Jul 11, 12:26:00 PM:
Headline should read,
Jealous Elitist Snob's Skills Continues To Sag
By Dawnfire82, at
Sat Jul 11, 12:33:00 PM:
Purple Avenger, Anonymous, Vicki: Proof of what I just said. Thanks, guys.
By , at
Sat Jul 11, 01:28:00 PM:
Dawn, are you including not only the left wing pundits but the right wing ones such as O'Reilly, Limbaugh and wacko Beck? People believe them and support them in lock step. None of them, especially Beck have ANY facts to back up their hate filled rhetoric. All they are doing is fueling the fire.
By , at
Sat Jul 11, 01:31:00 PM:
Dictionary.com definition of elite:representing the most choice or select; best. Dude, I want our people to be the best, don't you?
By , at
Sat Jul 11, 05:32:00 PM:
I found Jonah Golberg's Letter to Sarah Palin --written the night before she resigned--to be a heckuva lot more damning than Peggy's oped, and spot on, too:
Dear Governor Palin,
You’re blowing it.
* * * *
Remember how Mike Huckabee borrowed that Air Force maxim when he got grief during the primaries? “If you’re not taking flak, you’re not over the target.” Well, you were over the target.
But not anymore.
Oh, you’re still taking flak, but not because you strike fear in the hearts of Democrats. You’re taking flak because you’re striking fear in the hearts of Republicans. For Democrats, fairly or not, you’ve become a laughingstock. And for some of McCain’s campaign managers, you’ve become a convenient excuse for their failures.
But while McCain’s strategists do not cover themselves in glory for scapegoating you, you are not without blame either.
For starters, every time I see you on TV, you’re whining about unfair press coverage. Don’t get me wrong: Much of it is unfair, and some of it deserves a response. But it’s not presidential. It’s not even gubernatorial. You are constantly taking the bait, taking up the fights your biggest fans want you to take up.
But here’s the thing: Don’t listen to your biggest fans. Don’t alienate them either, but don’t think that because the Palin4Pres crowd cheers, you’re making progress. Politics is ultimately about persuasion, and you seem entirely uninterested in that, preferring instead to play the victim. Well, victims don’t get elected president. Ronald Reagan was a laughingstock for liberals and despised by the press. But he didn’t whine or take the bait.
Second, peddling a few platitudes and truisms about free markets and limited government is no substitute for really knowing what you’re talking about. Yes, you can talk well about the stuff you know — oil drilling, energy, etc. — but beyond your comfort zone, you fall back on bumper-sticker language that sounds fine to the people who already agree with you but is useless in winning over skeptics.
So here’s my advice. Stay home and do your job and your homework. You’ll still be a national figure come the primaries. But if you can’t surprise your detractors with your grasp of policy when you re-emerge on the national stage, you won’t win the nomination. More important, you won’t deserve to."
Sooner or later, the Republican party will wake up but until then, I fear that most of you--like the soon to be former Governor Palin--will choose to ignore the message, and keep shooting at the messenger(s). Even when they are your own....
By , at
Sat Jul 11, 09:18:00 PM:
This last piece was spot on and prophetic. Much as I wanted to like her -- and still do -- we're better off with Plain on the sidelines for at least the next cycle.
Link, over
By narciso, at
Sat Jul 11, 10:11:00 PM:
She made one trip to a prolife rally, where she talked up the need for missile defense, and the dangers of the stimulus, she did one trip to the state of New
York, to speak about Governor Seward, and to long Island about special needs children she went to Texas to ink the TC/Exxon pipeline deal. She visited the troops in Kosovo and Germany, before she made her decision, what pray tell have Romney and Huckabee done.
