Clash of the titans?

Vice President hopefuls, Joe Biden and Sarah Palin go head to head tonight in their first televised debate. I watched the toe curling interview she had with Katie Couric on CBS news regarding Roe v. Wade. Palin was weak and inarticulate in her arguments and surprisingly she couldn’t name any other (except Roe v. Wade) Supreme court decision she disagreed with. Did she actually know any as she faltered completely at that point…?

There was the Palin bounce in the polls probably due to many factors that included that she was a kinda everywoman, defiant hockey mom with kids who experiences the trials and tribulations in life.

But it seems that her bounce has deflated, polls suggest that women aren’t that impressed or dazzled by Sarah barracuda. Palin represents her own class interests and is no liberator of women. How can she relate to economically poor women who don’t have the same advantages as Palin?

Her politics encompass a very narrow and limited understanding of the world. Right-wing populism that include anti-abortion, religion, free market capitalism, gun ownership, foreign policy and destroying the environment. 

Most of what she has to say about even these things is a limited amount of the commonplace fare of what is generally accepted on the right-wing of US politics. She is not used to argument and counter-argument and deep analysis. Why would she be when her ideology tells her that political thought can be reduced to unquestioningly taking the right line on a very limited number of topics? 

In particular at this current moment people are worried about the economic crisis and this will impact on their livelihoods. What can Palin say about that as it was the other religion she worships, free market capitalism, that has stranded the economy up a certain creek without a paddle.

How can Palin relate to what people are going through at this moment as she is part of that political ideology and political movement that is bringing ordinary people to ruin? She is stuck with the same problem faced by Cameron and Osborne in Britain: at the moment they are all visibly part of the problem. They are clearly not going to be part of the solution.