Palin Place

Cernig explains what the Sarah Palin Circus is distracting us from , and Nick Gillespie , Kerry Howley and Hilzoy decry various aspects of the sexism and voyeurism around the last week’s thrill ride. My higher self agrees with them completely. The rest of them wonders whom they’re kidding. American presidential politics has previously turned on questions of windsurfing, beer-having, tiger-cage-sitting, arugula eating and bowling prowess. These issues too had "nothing to do with how so-and-so would ‘do the job’ of president," and were, like the brouhaha over Sarah and Todd Palin’s child-rearing philosophies and parenting-role allocations and competency at keeping children unpregnant and happy, utterly gendered. It only stands to reason that a country that already parses the personal gender fitness of male candidates would do the same for female ones. Given that, as Gene Healy writes in his new book , we’ve turned the president into the ...