Sunday, October 19, 2008

SNL Humiliates Palin - And She Doesn't Get It

Saturday Night Live took the opportunity of Palin's visit to the show last night to offer a stinging indictment of her lack of intelligence, and she didn't seem to realize it. Palin stood there with a vacant smile on her face while first Tina Fey mocked her small-minded prejudices, unwillingness to talk to the press, and vacant beauty pageant lack of intelligence. Then Alec Baldwin ran her down(while pretending to think she was Tiny Fey) and, in his most cutting lines, pretended to think she was 'hot'. Sarah didn't see the pretense. The mocking comments about her looks were the only time she seemed genuinely pleased. The rest of the time, she didn't even seem to understand the words they were speaking.

Later, during a Weekend Update segment, Palin was ridiculed by Amy Poehler who did a rap that savaged Palin for everything from her comment that she could see Russia, to her moose hunting. Palin sat there smiling, bouncing in her seat, dancing along as if they were complimenting her and not pointing out, to her face, why they think she's an idiot.

Palin chose to go on SNL. Nobody forced her. Certainly, the McCain campaign is familiar with the show, and their stinging satire of Palin. Yet no one questioned the wisdom of having her appear on the show.

What did Palin expect was going to happen? The entire cast would suddenly realize Palin was actually a brilliant observer of the contemporary political scene?

This was one of the more humiliating moments for the McCain campaign. I have never in my life seen a VP candidate destroy a presidential campaign so completely. But let's give credit where credit is due. John 'The Maverick' McCain denied his own instincts to pick Lieberman and let his advisors talk him into picking Palin.

That's all we need to know about McCain's inability to make the sound judgments necessary in a presidential candidate.

Palin makes Quayle look like he was ready for a Macarthur Genius Foundation Grant.

1 comment:

Ralph said...

Watching Palin on SNL, I kept thinking, "Why is she doing this?"

But you're right, Richard. I think she didn't get it. Which makes some sense. People who see everything as either black or white just don't get irony and satire.

They're unable to hold two contradictory ideas in their minds at the same time, which is what you have to do. So she probably hears the superficial adulation and doesnt' get the undermining tone, context, and non-verbal cues.

In contrast. when they skewered Hillary, you knew she knew exactly what they were doing; and she chose to play along with the game because self-mockery made her seem human.