Just admit you blew it
Sarah Palin hasn’t really been relevant as a political player in over a decade – even if her template has been used for the GOP to elect even more and more incompetent politicians. Neary 15 years after she resigned the governorship of Alaska because she couldn’t be bothered to actually do her job, she decided to run for federal office for the first time since seeking the vice presidency, only to lose in embarrassing fashion. It marked the first time that Democrats won a congressional race in Alaska in 50 years.
Rather than try and analyze what went wrong, Palin is reacting with outrage that she wasn’t chosen – saying that America should join her in being outraged at the ranked choice voting system that Republicans once cheerfully supported as a way of pushing their political rivals out of office. She was even more insulted that the Republican rival she ultimately beat out didn’t drop out of the race and back her. While it all sounds preposterous, this is essentially what Republicans are saying when they talk about the 2020 election being rigged.
They know they lost – so any amount of explaining that won’t make a difference – they’re outraged that they were rejected by the majority of the American people – particularly in Palin’s case where she’s enraged that the other Republican in the race didn’t help her win. The fact is that it’s always about their lack of power and nothing else – and when they find themselves powerless, they ramble endlessly about how it’s everyone else’s fault. This rant is a sign that things are where they should be – Palin was beaten before and can be beaten again, as can the rest of the GOP that we spent much of the last six years pushing back.
James Sullivan is the assistant editor of Brain World Magazine and an advocate of science-based policy making