DALLAS, Jan 1, 2009 / FW/ — The elections are long over but although she lost the Vice Presidential race, Sarah Palin is still on the headlines. The former beauty queen and current governor of Alaska have entered our consciousness and perhaps our pop culture, for better or for worse.
Case in point, a Harris Interactive poll commissioned by real estate website Zillow.com named Sarah Palin as the Most Desirable Celebrity Neighbor. The next day, she had to defend her daughter and future son-in-law as not being high school dropouts, saying that Bristol Palin is enrolled in a regular high school while Levi Johnston is taking corresponding courses.
The fodder of comedians during the elections, her speeches were analyzed more at Saturday Night Live than on Nightline. While John McCain is the front runner candidate, Sarah Palin was mentioned more on the press because of her peculiar charm, to use a euphemism.
It is hard not to notice Sarah Palin. She was your atypical candidate. Alaska, her home state is twice the size of Texas in terms of land area, but has a population of less than one million (670,053 according to the 2006 census). She did not go to Yale or Harvard. She went to community colleges and little known universities that was partly financed by the scholarship she won by becoming Miss Alaska.
And perhaps, most of all, Sarah Palin is a mother who faces problems on raising teenage children. In short, Sarah Palin is too real for most of us. She is an outsider inside the Washington beltway. She is not part of an ‘old boy’ network that counts. Sarah Palin, for all intent and purposes became reality TV on the political arena where heroes like John McCain who was a POW and Barack Obama who is dubbed as the New Hope are the main event.
While the Hillary Clinton and Caroline Kennedy’s of this world make us dream, Sarah Palin makes us see the reality of our situation. Perhaps, that is part of Sarah Palin’s charm, the reason why up to now she is still part of the national consciousness when she should have faded after November.
At this point in time, Sarah Palin will go down in history as the first female governor of Alaska and the first woman nominated by the Republican Party for the Vice Presidential post. Like most political figures, she would fade from the comedian monologues when a new and more interesting politician surfaces. One thing that Sarah Palin and her supporters should be thankful for, not one of her antics or speeches made it to the Word of the Year list, like Tom Cruise’s ‘jumping the couch’ which is now part of the slang dictionary.
