Today, as I was reading the Wall Street Journal, I came across this column of Peggy Noonan’s. I was annoyed with her trashing of Sarah Palin during the campaign, and now this.
The difficulty of Caroline Kennedy’s hopes for appointment to the U.S. Senate is that she was in, or put herself in, a position demanding of more finesse and sophistication than most political veterans have. To succeed as a candidate for appointment, she needed the talents of an extremely gifted natural, which she’s not. She is an intelligent woman who has comported herself with dignity through a quarter-century of private life in Manhattan. She would never steal your money, indulge in dark political dealing, or growl, like Blago, into a tapped line, “I’ve got this blankin’ thing and it’s golden,” though let’s face it, it’s a little sad we’ll never hear that.
We know someone who is a natural, though. Don’t we ? She, of course, is not a member of the New York elite. She arrived at her present level in politics with no help from the cognoscenti like Noonan. She went to five or six colleges and she has worked on a fishing boat. She got started in politics by running for the school board in her town.
The movie Dave has always been a favorite of mine although it is marred by the usual Hollywood left wing ideas about policy. The character of the vice-president, played by Ben Kingsley, is asked by Dave, who is an imposter playing the role of the real president who is in a coma, how he began in politics. The vice-president tells him (Kevin Kline plays Dave) that he was a shoe salesman who complained about politics until his wife convinced him to run for the city council. From that first election, he rose to be vice-president.
In fact, that is a fairy story. Almost all major politicians, especially Democrats, get started by working in politics all their lives, usually as staffers until a seat opens up. Then they run with the help of the usual machine and usually get elected unless another ex-staffer with better support and more money defeats them.
This year, we actually had a real candidate for vice-president who embodied the supposed ideal of Hollywood. What was their response? You know what it was.
Noonan drones on:
But life is complicated. If you’re going to run as the princess of a dynasty, you have to act and be like a princess—something different, rarefied, heightened. Her problem in part has been that she spent a quarter-century trying to blend in and not call attention to herself. She made herself convincingly average—not distinguished. She has her parents’ dignity but not their dash. She radiates a certain clueless class.
A clueless class certainly describes the Caroline I’ve seen on TV. What else can we do ?
People who’ve seen politics up close when young tend to be embarrassed to be in politics. This is because they have seen too much of the show-biz aspects, the balloons and smiles and rallies. They are rarely (and this is odd) tutored in the meaning behind the artifice: that the artifice exists for a purpose, and the purpose is to advance a candidate who will advance a constructive philosophy. And so they find the idea of coming up with a philosophy sort of show-offy, off point and insincere.
This is one reason modern political dynasties tend to have a deleterious effect on our politics. When you get new people in the process who think politics is about meaning, they tend to bring the meaning with them. On the other hand, those who’ve learned that politics is about small and shallow things, and the romance of dynasties, bring that with them. (They also bring old retainers, sycophants and ingrained money lines, none of which help the common weal.) Those who are just born into it and just want to continue it, bring a certain ambivalence. And signal it. They’re always slouching toward victory. It’s not terrible, but it doesn’t do any great good, either.
So this year, Noonan had a chance to do something about the problem she describes above. She had a real natural who was interested in the politics of meaning and who had come up through hard work and real meaning. What did Noonan do ?
In the end the Palin candidacy is a symptom and expression of a new vulgarization in American politics. It’s no good, not for conservatism and not for the country. And yes, it is a mark against John McCain, against his judgment and idealism.
There is more but it has nothing to do with Ms Noonan’s complaints about the trivialization of policy in present day politics and everything to do with Manhattan social class distinctions. It is sad to see someone decline from wisdom to irrelevance.
???
Look at this interview and compare it to Caroline Kennedy.
Tags: Caroline Kennedy, Peggy Noonan, politics, Sarah Palin
It’s sad to watch Peggy Noonan take on characteristics of people with whom she claims to have little in common.
Many “pundits” among Republicans and Democrats have been moving toward a snobbish Adlai Stevenson faux-intellectualism. It’s more a “Student Council” sort of exclusionary sense of “club superiority.” No different from high school, in that sense.
I once heard a story about Stevenson. After his years of snarking about how darned smart he was, and how dumb the “average” American, after his death he was found to own two books in his living space. A dictionary, and a social registry.
That says it all. I don’t know if the story is true, but it ought to be.
Anyway, I like politicians who aren’t career politicians. And do we only want “smart” people to be politicians—with “smart” meaning attending the “correct” schools, from well to do parentage or having the “correct” background?
I like the way Sarah Palin got into politics. Maybe she will mature into a national leader. Maybe not. But think about the people whom we blithely accept as national leaders these days?
True, they all seem associated with Ivy League institutions. How did that work out the last few years?
We’ll see how folks like Palin and Jindal work out. And who knows? Maybe the Democrats will have some “real” people run for office, too.
Take a look at the interview of her on CBC in Canada about the gas pipeline. I was going to embed it but the code is not posted so they may have copyright issues. It is a lengthy and respectful interview and she knocks it out of the park. Of course, it is on issues she knows about but that will grow.
Maybe the Democrats will have some “real” people run for office, too.
🙂 Still using the rhetoric that those you like are real while those on the other side are not. Well at least some things in the new year haven’t changed.
Hope everyone here has the type of year they want.
peace
james
James, I don’t disagree. My point was that Noonan, who is a Republican, is complaining about phony candidates while she dissed a real person candidate. To some degree, Obama is a real person candidate in that he didn’t get started by being a staff member for a politician. However, he was put in place by Emil Jones who faked a lot of his accomplishments in the Illinois Legislature. Dick Gephardt is an example of a real Democrat and one I could have voted for depending on who the Republicans nominated.
Jeez, James. I am thinking of Caroline Kennedy and Barack Obama, completely manufactured by the media…and never held to the kind of one-sided scrutiny by the MSM media that Palin was. Disagree with her policies if you like, but don’t tell me that her background is less qualified than either of those individuals.
But I don’t expect you to agree.
I have never snarked at you, and I don’t understand why you continue to feel the need to do that to me.
We disagree, and that is fine. You want to have a standard for politicians that applies to both “sides” and I am with you 110%. But look me in the eye, electronically, and tell me how qualified Joe Biden is for any national office. Tell me how intelligent he sounds in interviews. Then tell me that the press held him to the same standards as Palin.
Now do the same thing for Caroline Kennedy.
My point, as you know quite well, is that both Democrats and Republicans have been fielding empty candidates of late. How about we start getting “real” candidates into both parties?
Which was my point.
Eric,
“Disagree with her policies if you like, but don’t tell me that her background is less qualified than either of those individuals.”
Wasn’t doing that. Don’t agree with Palin on much but her qualifications are not the things I focus on. As for looking you in the eye, Biden’s faults have been well documented from his plagiarism episode to his love for shoe leather. But let’s be honest: you keep getting reelected by people from your home state and your qualifications, such as they are, get minimized.
In terms of Kennedy, did you read any of the NY press? She was being slammed for her lack of skills. I will confess this: while I didn’t want her selected, I had no problems with Kennedy.
As for snarking, we will have to agree to disagree.
Mike,
I’m not privy to debates in the GOP but do you think Noonan’s issues with Palin had to do with education? I’m not saying Palin isn’t smart but her educational pedigree might not strike Noonan as appropriate for the party. I think Limbaugh touched on this.
peace
James