Sarah making sense

So she's not dumb.

Sarah Palin deserved all the heckling she got, in my opinion. She made an ass of herself. She seemed to revel in ignorance, and glorify it. But she turns out to be intelligent after all.

I'm watching her right now on Oprah. I'm halfway through the show, and I've got to tell you I find the woman real, candid, and yes, intelligent. I can't believe I'm using that word, because I had never found her intelligent before. My big problem with Sarah Palin is that she has spent the past year celebrating ignorance and stupidity. She seemed to stand for it.

I have not read one word of the book, so I have no opinion on that, but she really comes across differently on this show. I don't buy everything she said, but I do buy the gist of it: that she was a newbie to  that kind of VP stage and of course she made lots of beginner mistakes and was also kind of paralyzed by making more, and the McCain people's obvious terror that she would make more, and the press guffawing when she made more, so it was kind of f viscous cycle.

I'm paraphrasing massively, but that was the gist. And that rings true to me. Of course, I would also argue that was inevitable, and that's why it was dumb to nominate someone who had never gone near that stage.

But as for her role in the whole thing, yeah, I buy her version of it, at least big picture.

That doesn't necessarily contradict what the McCain people have said: that she didn't play ball well, that she went rogue way too often and basically didn't accept that she was a beginner and take direction better.

But I see her point of view, too. She sees them humoring her--eg, saying Good job on the Katie Couric disaster. She also feels that she is the candidate and she's supposed to exert herself and be herself and not roll over and play to a script. That's a very realistic tension to me, and I can see myself being torn if I were in that situation.

Once again: what the hell was she doing in that situation? It was a desperate move by McCain, but hell, he was in a desperate situation, too. He knew he was going to lose if he didn't throw a Hail Mary pass, so he threw one.

I found Sarah least convincing on the blame she laid on Katie Couric for badgering or condescending. Asking what Sarah reads was a reasonable question. It was Sarah who read way too much into it and got ruffled and rambled instead of just naming one. (I also thought Sarah was not completely candid there. It sure sounded like she wouldn't name a magazine because she would be heckled for any name she threw out. So why doesn't she just say that now?)

Sarah has not convinced me that she made a ton of wise choices during the campaign, but she has convinced me that she was facing a ridiculous no-win situation, and she made some reasonable choices in those situations.

Don't even get me started on some of her positions, and some of the hypocrisy. And she still pisses me off for the way she tried to make a virtue out of ignorance and inexperience.

But I understand what makes her tick a lot better, and it's much better than I imagined.

And she is no dumbass. She has not converted me into a fan, but I respect her a whole lot more than I did this morning.