Electrifying Palin
by David Keene
Issue 115 - September 10, 2008

As the word that Sen. John McCain was about to name Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin as his running mate began to leak out early last Friday, conservatives were ecstatic and the mood of those converging on St. Paul began to change.

Many of those arriving to attend this year’s Republican National Convention were less than enthusiastic about their nominee for president. But they headed home ready to work their hearts out for him and Palin.

The conventional wisdom is that few people vote for or against a candidate for president because of the vice presidential candidate. The last time a running mate made the winning difference was arguably 1960 when Lyndon Johnson tipped the scales in favor of John F. Kennedy by delivering Texas “the old-fashioned way.”

This year might be different, however, as Palin has not only energized the Republican base, but has come out of the box swinging. Who she is and what she represents could very well change the nature of this fall’s contest.

Palin’s formidable oratorical talent was on display as she delivered one of the most electrifying convention speeches since Ronald Reagan took the podium in Kansas City in 1976.

She wowed those in the hall and the 37 million Americans watching her on television with a performance that was all the more impressive to those who knew what had gone on behind the scenes.

National party conventions are scripted and planned to the minute and this year’s GOP convention was no exception, but things started going wrong when former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani began speaking.

Giuliani had agreed to a time limit imposed on him by convention officials and gave them a script to be loaded on the teleprompter that complied with their parameters, but he had no intention of stopping when his time was up.

Convention managers were forced to improvise. They dropped the video biography of Palin scheduled to precede her speech, but then discovered that the “hard” or typed copy of her speech was back at her hotel.

As Giuliani went on, they hurried to get it to the hall and finally handed it to Palin just as Giuliani wrapped up and pushed her out onto the stage. Here, they discovered that Palin’s speech text wouldn’t load into the teleprompter properly.

This was her big test and everything around the governor seemed to be coming unglued, but few in the hall ever knew it. She worked from the text, improvised and threw in a few things on her own and began to wow the crowd even before the teleprompter came back on line.

Those backstage who knew what was going on were even more impressed with her performance than the audience. One of them said later almost in awe of her handling of situation said, “She really is the real deal.”

Indeed she is. What’s more, she changes the game. The expected race between a tired but more experienced Republican ticket against a far more energetic Democratic campaign promising “change” has been transformed into something far different.

Now, it’s a team of proven Republican reformers against two Democrats who talk a good game but have accomplished little. It’s a contest that renders ridiculous the Democratic charge that a Republican win would mean “four more years of Bush.”

What’s more, Palin stands in stark contrast to the widely perceived elitism of a Democratic candidate posturing as a champion of the middle class, but who comes across as more patronizing than compassionate.

Many middle class voters are put off by candidates who seek their votes, but are disdainful of their faith, values and culture. They have a hard time trusting politicians who denigrate small town America.

Palin’s reception by those outside the media was traceable to her performance, her beliefs and the fact that those who saw her speak realized that at last their candidate doesn’t have to talk academically about middle Americans because she shares their concerns as one of them. She stands in stark contrast to politicians who like everything about average Americans as a group but don’t particularly like them as people.

Palin’s importance to McCain and to this race is that between now and Election Day millions upon millions of voters are going to agree with the conclusion of that fellow who viewed her acceptance speech from behind the curtains: Sarah Palin “really is the real deal.”

David Keene is chairman of the American Conservative Union. This originally appeared in the Washington Examiner.