What's Up With the Palin Hate?

There are a lot of stories floating around on the general topic of: "What's up with all that hate directed at Sarah Palin?" So, let's try an Instapundit style link around to highlight a few of them.

Amy Siskind asks "Who's Afraid of Sarah Palin?":

Now the question folks are emailing me to ask is why is this happening? Why the ongoing onslaught against Governor Palin? How can Vanity Fair get away with this?

Well let me explain what Hillary Clinton supporters learned, the hard way, in 2008 - sexism sells! Todd Purdum, who by the way is Dee Dee Myers’ husband (poor Dee Dee), also wrote a hit job on Bill Clinton, and Hillary by virtue, last summer just as the Democratic primary was winding down (that’s when I canceled my subscription!).

Jim Geraghty writes that some of that hate might be about the governor's happiness with her life:

Liberals believe that their ideas, philosophy, worldview, and policies liberate believers, and that the conservative equivalents limit people. Liberals see themselves as rejecting outdated beliefs and obsolete ideas, overturning established orders, and discarding traditions established by superstitious and ignorant forebears who weren't as enlightened as we are. Conservatives, in their minds, are runaway cultural superegos, always wagging their fingers about individual responsibility, dismissing excuses, reminding people that they can't always do what they want because of the consequences to themselves and to others.

Conservatism, they suspect, will leave you in a marriage that doesn't satisfy you, burden you with children you don't want, repress your passions, and trap you in a empty, boring, and unfulfilled life, with no hand of government able to help.

Today almost everyone faces some sort of challenge in balancing work and family; I don't know too many people who believe there are sufficient hours in a day. And then along comes this woman who's made all of these "conservative" choices and now has an amazing career, a supportive husband, a beautiful family, and great health and appearance, and she bears it all, including the inevitable hard times, with pluck and a smile, as far as we can tell.

Violet at the Reclusive Leftist tries to draw some lessons from Vanity Fair's hate.

The Anchoress wonders if some of it is related to class, the right to life, and that "R" after Palin's name:

Both adulation and hate have their subconscious roots and hidden nutrients. But the excessive Palin-hate may also be as simple as this; Sarah Palin, who came from middle class folk, did not go to an Ivy League school but managed nevertheless to find success as a small business owner, then as mayor, then as Governor of an important state, and she’s managed to “have it all” – family, success, expertise on a crucial subject (oil, gas, energy) – without succumbing to the siren song of leftism.

The truth is, if Sarah Palin had a “D” after her name, instead of an “R”, they’d adore her, and they would be falling all over themselves to showcase her as “the successful product of feminism and the opportunities provided by progressivism!” Hell, they’d even tolerate her having allowed Trig to live, as they could then prop her up as a “big tent, pro-choice Democrat, and you know, a Christian…ist…no, she’s an Evangelical Christian! And that’s…okay!”

And Hurley at HBHLS quotes Thomas Sowell's great "Visions of the Anointed" in discussing these GOP "strategists:"

The recent onslaught of criticism directed at Governor Palin by former McCain “strategists” (or senior advisors, whatever you want to call them) reminded me of a passage about Reagan I had read in Thomas Sowell's “A Vision of the Anointed.” When I refer to these “strategists,” I'm speaking strictly of the anonymous snipers. Okay, and maybe some others as well involved.

For many of the anointed, it was never sufficient to declare the Reagan administration's economic, social, or foreign policies mistaken, malign, or even dangerous. It was necessary to ridicule them as the products of a consummately stupid president – an “amiable dunce,” as Democratic elder statesman Clark Clifford called him. This denigration of Ronald Reagan began even before he became president, and was in the fact one of the reasons why his chances of becoming even the Republican nominee, much less president, were considered nil. As Washington Post editorial board member Meg Greenfield recalled the mood she was among Washington insiders in 1980:

"It was the wisdom of the other contenders and of most Republican Party leaders, too, not to mention practically everyone in Democratic politics, that Reagan was: too old, too extreme, too marginal and not nearly smart enough to win the nomination. The Democrats, in fact, when they weren't chortling about him, were fervently hoping he would be the nominee. When he carried the convention in Detroit, people I knew in the Carter administration were ecstatic."

Hurley brings the point home on this current crop of "strategists":

Now moving on to the “anointed” in the Republican establishment, particularly the McCain “strategists” ripping Palin. They are swinish failures who couldn't run a hot dog stand. Everyone knows that these masterminds wrecked McCain's chances after he suspended his campaign, backed out the debate, and then decided to go. The experienced statesman looked lost. While McCain was losing his three debates, putting people to sleep at the convention, and not raising money, Palin was doing the opposite.