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Wielding rapier-sharp wit, Sarah Palin slices her opponents, although some don't notice she's drawn their blood. That's because Palin delivers verbal stabs with down-home charm. Using folksy faux-cuss words that Joe Six-pack swears by, she gets “darn” agitated at the “dang” liberals whose truth is “bullcrap,” which makes for “bass-ackwards” politics.
“How's that hopey-changey stuff workin' out for ya?” she sarcastically asks.
Palin speaks and acts like a populist. Populism is a form of political persuasion in which the little guy's voice is pitched against East Coast elites. Populism thrives when its leaders effectively pit “The People” against unions, Wall Street and Beltway government that has grown too big for its constitutional britches.
Palin excels at class warfare between the haves and the have-nots.
“She managed to endow her threadbare homilies,” observes Jonathan Rabin in “Sarah and Her Tribe” (The New York Review of Books, Jan.14, 2010) “about free enterprise, tax cuts, patriotism, and the evil of government spending with the novelty of her own sudden, fresh-faced presence on the national scene. Most of all, she seemed to embody in her person and her life story the accumulated grievances of the heartland and the West: the resentment in the countryside and the suburbs against the liberal tyranny of the big cities; the antipathy of those who call themselves ‘real Americans” toward the ‘East Coast elites'; the surly resistance of states' rights proponents to ‘the Feds.'”
Some Christians align themselves with Palin's brand of populism. Her put-downs of power brokers sound like Jesus when he grilled religious prima-donnas.
There's a great difference, though, between Jesus' populist instincts and those of Palin. Jesus' insights held layers of meaning. He didn't oversimplify to bully detractors. Nor did Jesus employ selective facts to distort an opponent's argument. He hit the truth straight on, refraining from shading it.
Jesus sided with the powerless against rulers. He prayed, “I thank you, Father, how you have hidden these things that I stand for from the wise and revealed them to babes” (Matthew 11:25). The elite rulers assumed they had the right answers while common folk opened their minds, like an infant who receives a parent's affection.
Critics dismissed Jesus as an amateur, a teacher who lacked religious academic credentials those in power had earned. Yet his populist truth proved so popular that religious elites feared his message might convert their own. They couldn't stop the masses from gladly hearing Jesus.
Exasperated Pharisees blurted out, “You see that you can do nothing to stymie the crowds' enthusiasm for Jesus. The world has gone after him.” (John 12:19).
They became so upset that the Pharisees used extravagant language to describe Jesus' effect on the masses, much like Palin rouses her legions. Jesus' sway with common folk prove so effective that Pharisees interrogated their own to see if some had wavered. “Are you led astray also?” they shrieked. “Have any of the authorities of the Pharisees [the religious elites] believed in Jesus?” (John 7:48).
Listeners detected a quality of love in Jesus' teaching that's missing in Palin's malice. They accepted what he taught because in it they discovered truth in action.
In contrast, Palin rouses crowds to viscerally react. She plays on their feelings of being put-down by elites who sip Starbuck lattes while listening to NPR.
Ray Stannard Baker, a severe critic of Theodore Roosevelt, Jr. wrongly accused T.R. of Palin's rhetorical trait. “He is a dangerous man,” warned Baker, “who makes the people feel intensely without making them think clearly.”
Palin flummoxed the American public to believe she represented small-town values in Alaska. Describing a life of no-frill diners where hard-working guys swig beer, Palin convinces many that she has kept big government off these guys' backs.
Rabin, in his New York Review of Books commentary, pulverizes Palin's “small town minus big government” myth. “Her anti-tax rhetoric (private citizens spending their money more wisely than government does) and disdain for ‘federal dollars' were unembarrassed by the fact that Alaska tops the tables of both per capita federal expenditure, on which one in three jobs in the state depends, and congressional earmarks, or ‘pork.' So, too, she mythologized the straggling eyesore of Wasilla (described by a current councilwoman there as ‘like a big ugly strip mall from one end to the other' as the bucolic small town of sentimental American memory.”
Beware of Palin's populist rhetoric based on slippery half-truths. Jesus' gospel didn't vacillate from what's correct, and it earned him a premature death on a cross.
Palin, in bold contrast, shades truth rather than letting it stand on its own. Unlike Jesus, she isn't a problem solver who asks difficult questions and seeks innovative solutions. It's easier to pillory the press and fling sarcastic jabs to incite crowds.
The Rev. Jack R. Van Ens is a Presbyterian minister who heads the nonprofit, tax-exempt Creative Growth (www.thelivinghistory.com), which enhances Christian worship through storytelling and dramatic presentations aimed to make God's history come alive. Van Ens' book, “How Jefferson Made the Best of Bad Messes,” is available in local bookstores for $7.95.
“How's that hopey-changey stuff workin' out for ya?” she sarcastically asks.
Palin speaks and acts like a populist. Populism is a form of political persuasion in which the little guy's voice is pitched against East Coast elites. Populism thrives when its leaders effectively pit “The People” against unions, Wall Street and Beltway government that has grown too big for its constitutional britches.
Palin excels at class warfare between the haves and the have-nots.
“She managed to endow her threadbare homilies,” observes Jonathan Rabin in “Sarah and Her Tribe” (The New York Review of Books, Jan.14, 2010) “about free enterprise, tax cuts, patriotism, and the evil of government spending with the novelty of her own sudden, fresh-faced presence on the national scene. Most of all, she seemed to embody in her person and her life story the accumulated grievances of the heartland and the West: the resentment in the countryside and the suburbs against the liberal tyranny of the big cities; the antipathy of those who call themselves ‘real Americans” toward the ‘East Coast elites'; the surly resistance of states' rights proponents to ‘the Feds.'”
Some Christians align themselves with Palin's brand of populism. Her put-downs of power brokers sound like Jesus when he grilled religious prima-donnas.
There's a great difference, though, between Jesus' populist instincts and those of Palin. Jesus' insights held layers of meaning. He didn't oversimplify to bully detractors. Nor did Jesus employ selective facts to distort an opponent's argument. He hit the truth straight on, refraining from shading it.
Jesus sided with the powerless against rulers. He prayed, “I thank you, Father, how you have hidden these things that I stand for from the wise and revealed them to babes” (Matthew 11:25). The elite rulers assumed they had the right answers while common folk opened their minds, like an infant who receives a parent's affection.
Critics dismissed Jesus as an amateur, a teacher who lacked religious academic credentials those in power had earned. Yet his populist truth proved so popular that religious elites feared his message might convert their own. They couldn't stop the masses from gladly hearing Jesus.
Exasperated Pharisees blurted out, “You see that you can do nothing to stymie the crowds' enthusiasm for Jesus. The world has gone after him.” (John 12:19).
They became so upset that the Pharisees used extravagant language to describe Jesus' effect on the masses, much like Palin rouses her legions. Jesus' sway with common folk prove so effective that Pharisees interrogated their own to see if some had wavered. “Are you led astray also?” they shrieked. “Have any of the authorities of the Pharisees [the religious elites] believed in Jesus?” (John 7:48).
Listeners detected a quality of love in Jesus' teaching that's missing in Palin's malice. They accepted what he taught because in it they discovered truth in action.
In contrast, Palin rouses crowds to viscerally react. She plays on their feelings of being put-down by elites who sip Starbuck lattes while listening to NPR.
Ray Stannard Baker, a severe critic of Theodore Roosevelt, Jr. wrongly accused T.R. of Palin's rhetorical trait. “He is a dangerous man,” warned Baker, “who makes the people feel intensely without making them think clearly.”
Palin flummoxed the American public to believe she represented small-town values in Alaska. Describing a life of no-frill diners where hard-working guys swig beer, Palin convinces many that she has kept big government off these guys' backs.
Rabin, in his New York Review of Books commentary, pulverizes Palin's “small town minus big government” myth. “Her anti-tax rhetoric (private citizens spending their money more wisely than government does) and disdain for ‘federal dollars' were unembarrassed by the fact that Alaska tops the tables of both per capita federal expenditure, on which one in three jobs in the state depends, and congressional earmarks, or ‘pork.' So, too, she mythologized the straggling eyesore of Wasilla (described by a current councilwoman there as ‘like a big ugly strip mall from one end to the other' as the bucolic small town of sentimental American memory.”
Beware of Palin's populist rhetoric based on slippery half-truths. Jesus' gospel didn't vacillate from what's correct, and it earned him a premature death on a cross.
Palin, in bold contrast, shades truth rather than letting it stand on its own. Unlike Jesus, she isn't a problem solver who asks difficult questions and seeks innovative solutions. It's easier to pillory the press and fling sarcastic jabs to incite crowds.
The Rev. Jack R. Van Ens is a Presbyterian minister who heads the nonprofit, tax-exempt Creative Growth (www.thelivinghistory.com), which enhances Christian worship through storytelling and dramatic presentations aimed to make God's history come alive. Van Ens' book, “How Jefferson Made the Best of Bad Messes,” is available in local bookstores for $7.95.
