What is Palin telling us?
Re “What is it about Palin?” Opinion, July 9
Sadly, I don’t envision at all a Sarah Palin exit from public life as Meghan Daum seems to predict. Friendship being what it should be, however, I can well appreciate the connection between Daum and her friend, Kim, despite their polar-opposite views.
As a conservative, Christian woman and a Republican, what I fail to comprehend and what I do deem “insane” -- to use Daum’s word -- is the GOP’s resolute adulation and defense of Palin’s distinct limitations vis-a-vis most kinds of public service.
The Grand Old Party has enough problems these days without wasting precious time worshiping a woman who is merely a cultural phenomenon.
Sunny Kreis Collins
Palm Desert
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Daum’s column and Palin’s words remind me of my great-grandfather telling me at age 7: “Don’t talk so much and no one will know you know so little.”
Roger Newell
San Diego
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Daum, her conservative friend and everyone else seem to be willfully ignoring the single most cogent point about Palin.
If she had been overweight and unattractive, John McCain still wouldn’t know who she is, and neither would the rest of us.
Barack Obama’s victory was a direct response to eight years of a president who was disinterested in being qualified for office, and also a rejection of Palin’s overwhelming lack of qualification. But sex sells, even in conservative territory.
Cay Sehnert
South Pasadena
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What strikes me most is the fact that Daum’s friend seems to be basing her political choices on some nebulous ideal of religious faith -- rather than education, experience or qualification.
This also seems to be the deciding factor for most Palin supporters that I have met. Because they feel she is a strong person of faith, all other attributes, positive or negative, are discounted. Such attitudes in voters really frighten me.
Scott W. Hughes
Simi Valley
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How can Daum consider herself a feminist and approve of the way Palin was treated? Regardless of whether anybody agrees with her political views or not, the insults and personal attacks directed at this woman continue to be relentless and over the top.
Daum seems driven by an ideological hatred for Palin, a hatred she admits is spilling over into her own friendships. She comes across as intolerant and lacking respect for the views of others.
Cara Stemen
Pasadena
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Although I can certainly understand a modern Christian woman’s excitement about a role model to buck the age-old dictum of wifely subservience, it is Daum’s friend’s “pipe dream” of a third-party option based (apparently) on a narrow interpretation of Christian “values” that strikes fear in my heart.
I assume her friend would hope that her candidate would be victorious in a presidential bid and thus lead our nation in following that same interpretation of Christianity. Theocracy, anyone?
I prefer to trust our nation to someone smarter than me. I don’t care how many years of college you have; I respect your right to have any opinion or value that you want. But I resent forcing those values on the rest of us, trying to return to some imagined yesteryear of picket-fence tranquillity that only existed in Reagan speeches.
Dwain Wilson
Los Angeles
