In a 9/23 AP report, Condoleezza Rice got some strange new respect — but only so that Sarah Palin could be knocked. Here’s the lead (or “lede,” as those who want to signal insiderness write): “One is the nation’s top diplomat with a doctorate in Russian studies who has visited more than 50 foreign countries this year alone. The other is the first-term governor of Alaska who may have seen Russia on a clear day and got her first passport just last year.”
Well, at least the snarkmaster of a reporter ID’d Palin as the governor of Alaska. Later in the article, he (or an editor — you never know) wrote, “Rice played second fiddle to Palin on one of America’s most critical relationships, meeting Afghan President Hamid Karzai some three hours after the ex-mayor of Wasilla.”
Yes, she’s the ex-mayor of Wasilla, all right. Ho ho ho. What a joke. What was she supposed to do, run for mayor in some classier town that she didn’t live in? If you have political ambition, you really can’t do much better than become mayor of your town and governor of your state. How many of us have done as well?
And she is the governor, though some journalists are loath to acknowledge it. They want to keep her in Wasilla. Back in the ’40s, some Republicans acted like Harry Truman had just walked in from the haberdashery. In the ’80s, Democrats acted like Reagan had just walked in from Warner Brothers.
But you know all this, dear readers . . .