My opinion is that not only do we not gain, we lose. I am
pasting in a commentary I saw on this that appeared in this
morning's paper which may contribute to this discussion:
Ross Douthat: Scenes from a marriage
The press and Sarah Palin have been at war with each other
almost from the first, but their mutual antipathy looks
increasingly like codependency.
Last update: January 17, 2011 - 7:28 PM
In every twisted, wretched, ruinous relationship, there are
moments so grim, flare-ups so appalling, that they offer both
parties a chance to step back, take inventory, and realize
that it's time -- far past time, in fact -- to go their
separate ways.
For the American media and Sarah Palin, that kind of a moment
arrived last week.
It began just hours after the tragedy in Tucson, with a tweet
from Markos "Daily Kos" Moulitsas, the éminence
grise of the liberal blogosphere. "Mission Accomplished,
Sarah Palin," he wrote, linking to a map that Palin's PAC
had put up last fall, placing targets on various Democratic
districts, Gabrielle Giffords' included.
It didn't take long for the media to seize on his attack and
run with it. Forget a nation's grief and Giffords' struggle to
survive: What America really needed, the nation's pundits and
TV producers decided, was a noisy debate about the possible
link between Jared Lee Loughner's crime and Palin's martial
campaign rhetoric.
Given how little connection Loughner seems to have to any kind
of right-wing politics, this conversation looked increasingly
ridiculous by midweek, and even a little bit obscene.
But instead of letting the frenzy die away, Palin decided that
what the country really needed was for her to use the day set
aside for mourning Loughner's victims to make a speech
complaining about her own victimization.
(Or as she put it, rather more pungently, the "blood
libel" being leveled by her critics.) Which, needless to
say, gave the press exactly the excuse it needed to continue
its wall-to-wall Palin coverage for another 48 hours -- and
beyond.
The whole business felt less like an episode in American
political history than a scene from a particularly toxic
marriage -- more "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?"
than "The Making of the President."
The press and Palin have been at war with each other almost
from the first, but their mutual antipathy looks increasingly
like codependency: They can't get along, but they can't live
without each other either.
For their part, the media manage to be consistently unfair to
the former Alaska governor -- gossipy and hostile in their
reportage, hysterical and condescending in their commentary --
even as they follow her every move with a fascination
bordering on obsession. (MSNBC, in particular, should just
change its name to "Palin 24/7" and get it over
with.)
When commentators aren't denouncing her, they're busy building
up her legend -- exaggerating her political acumen,
overpraising her communications strategy, covering her every
tweet as if she were the Viceroy of Red America, and spinning
out outlandish scenarios in which she captures the White House
in 2012.
Palin, meanwhile, officially despises the
"lamestream" media. But press coverage -- good, bad,
whatever -- is clearly the oxygen she craves. She supposedly
hates having her privacy invaded, yet her family keeps showing
up on reality TV.
She thinks the political class is clueless and out-of-touch,
but she can't resist responding to its every provocation. Her
public rhetoric, from "death panels" to "blood
libel," is obviously crafted to maximize coverage and
controversy, and generate more heat than light.
And her Twitter account reads like a constant plea for the
most superficial sort of media attention.
It's a grim spectacle on both sides, and last week's pointless
controversy was a particularly low point. So let me play the
relationship counselor.
To the media: Cover Sarah Palin if you want, but stop acting
as if she's the most important conservative politician in
America. Stop pretending that she has a plausible path to the
presidency in 2012. (She doesn't.)
Stop suggesting that she's the front-runner for the Republican
nomination. (She isn't.) And every time you're tempted to
parse her tweets for some secret code or crucial dog whistle,
stop and think, this woman has fewer Twitter followers than
Ben Stiller, and then go write about something else instead.
To Palin: You were an actual politician once (remember that?),
but you're becoming the kind of caricature that your enemies
have always tried to make of you. So maybe it's time to turn
off your iPad for a while, and take a break from Facebook and
Fox News.
The world won't end if you don't respond to every criticism,
and you might even win a few more admirers if you cultivated a
lighter touch and a more above-the-fray persona. Oh, and when
that reality-TV producer sends you a pitch for "Sarah
Plus Five Plus Kate Plus Eight," just say no.
Breaking up is hard to do, of course.
But for the majority of Americans who are neither Palinoiacs
nor Palinistas, here's the good news: If the press (including
this columnist!) and Sarah Palin can't quit each other, you
can still quit us.
Ross Douthat's column is distributed by the New York Times
News Service.
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