10/19/2010
Sarah Palin’s speech on Saturday at the Republican National Committee’s get-out-the-vote rally in Anaheim, Calif., was a prime example of what Palin does best: slam the Obama Administration’s lies and toxic policies with down-to-earth humor, optimism, and a no-nonsense confidence that drives the Left wild.
Palin boldly honored President Reagan’s approach: “What this great country needs to get back on track is just that Reagan common sense, those principles, those time-tested truths that he applied, Reagan common-sense solutions—lower taxes, smaller, smarter government, less overreach and intrusion, strong, unapologetic national defense—remember, it was ‘we win, you lose’.”
She flashed the media some signature palm writing so they’d “have some easy takeaway” and didn’t hesitate to let them know that, “Yes, I shall be invoking Reagan’s name again. And again. And again. And again. You won’t be hearing me invoking or quoting Alinsky or Mao. We’re kind of a Reagan kind of crowd around here.”
She declared that it’s time to “fire Pelosi, retire Reid and their whole band of merry followers,” and even offered some advice to our Apologizer-in-Chief: “Well, we’ve got a President today who’s getting pretty good at apologizing, but see—he’s apologizing to all the wrong people. So Mr. President, with all due respect, next time that urge to apologize waves on over you, I have some suggestions for who to apologize to. How about apologizing to the 15 million Americans who are looking for work today? Or saying sorry, oops, after the 3 million jobs were lost after your forced-through stimulus package came down the pike … And make a joint apology, you know, cause you don’t want to leave out Harry and Nancy and Barbara and all the others who were part of that lemon of a spending boondoggle, the biggest boondoggle in U.S. history.”
Palin revved up the crowd with affirmations like “there is nothing wrong in America that a good, old-fashioned election can’t fix” and “Our America—we do not seek its fundamental transformation, we seek its restoration—all that is good and strong and free in America.”
She called out Barbara Boxer’s twisted, anti-business priorities: “How about, speaking of California, the priority of Barbara Boxer, chairing the committee that has control over, she can be able to turn on the water just up the road in the Central Valley, yes, to save those family farms and to save those crops that have fed our nation for generations and yet, instead, she’d rather protect a two-inch fish, that little stickleback thing. Now where I come from, we call a two-inch fish, we call that bait. And the people are more important than the bait.”
Despite her tremendous national significance, Palin still possesses a regular, everyman quality that has little time for elitism: “He [Reagan] believed in us—the little guy—and he said that with all due respect. The little guy—just unpretentious, hard-working, patriotic, pro-family, freedom-loving, middle-class, job-creating little guys. That’s whom Reagan could relate to … so how about we make November 2 freedom day and we take it back for the little guy?”
Palin’s delivery was cool, calm, and collected. But unlike Obama’s version of such, hers wasn’t aloof or detached. It was highly connected to the audience—to people’s struggles, emotions, patriotism, and passion to get this country back on a path of prosperity.
Sarah Palin will never be your cookie-cutter political figure. She’ll likely—and hopefully, in my humble opinion—continue to give some in the establishment a bad case of heartburn. And she’ll probably always possess the ability to laugh off the unimportant, thanks to a faith and a sense of priorities that many—myself included—wish they could consistently summon.
She’s a force because she appears to be nothing like the rest.
And despite what her future plans may be, the GOP most certainly needs her charisma, her gutsiness, and her ability to shake up what’s in desperate need of being shaken.
Ms. Bila is an author and commentator living in New York City. For more information on Jedediah, please visit http://jedediahbila.com/.
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