The real problem with Sarah Palin

Sarah Palin issued a statement the other day, demanding that HBO label its film Game Change, which chronicles the McCain/Palin 2008 U.S. presidential campaign, as a work of fiction. She also asked supporters to donate to her political action committee and used the movies trailer as bait.

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Posturing? Certainly. As far as HBO knows, Palin and her team have not seen Game Change. In an online plea for donations, Palins team tweaks the trailer to garner support. Showbiz tactics? Again, certainly.

This is what American politics, especially the Republican side, has become outrageous posturing and showbizzy machinations. Politics by press release, Tweet and trite, contrived attention-grabbing, media-savvy moments.

Much of Game Change (airing Saturday, HBO Canada, 9 p.m.), a must-see, devastating portrait of Palin and the McCain campaign, is about the allure of celebrity and the injection of showbiz stratagems into U.S. politics.

But is it all true? Or is it fiction? Yes its all true, Danny Strong, the movies writer and co-executive producer, said on the phone last week. Everything in it is verified. The book on which its based [the bestselling book of the same name, a! bout sev eral American presidential campaigns, by journalists Mark Halperin and John Heilemann] is based on eyewitness accounts. The book has not been debunked, as the Palin camp has claimed.

Let me tell you something. The goal of the film wasnt to attack Sarah Palin or change anyones mind about anything. The goal of the film was to talk about the process of how we elect our president, and heres the story, a pretty crazy story, in which a candidate was not vetted to be vice-president of the United States. She was not properly vetted, and we came very close to having a vice-president that perhaps wasnt prepared for that job.

Me, I remember well my first experience of Game Change. That evening in Pasadena during the January TV Critics Press Tour when HBO screened the film for several dozen critics, most of them American.

As Game Change unfolded, there were giggles and laughter. Especially at the front end viewers see John McCain (Ed Harris) and his advisers mull potential running mates. They acknowledge Barack Obama has great presence and a superstar glow. They need a counterpoint to run as vice-presidential candidate. Theres a jaunty tone, and it produced laughter in the room. Even as the Palin character (Julianne Moore plays her superbly) entered the picture, all gee-whiz enthusiasm, there was giggling.

Then the laughing stopped, replaced by groans of embarrassment. Because the depth of Palins ignorance of the world became clear. Palin didnt really understand why there was a North Korea and a South Korea. She clearly thought that Saddam Hussein was behind the 9/11 attacks. She needed to have Germanys role in the Second World War explained to her. She thought the Fed referred to the federal government, not the Federal Reserve. The Governor of Alaska is seen being as ignorant of the world as a small child.

How did it happen? Game Change suggests that in its enthusiasm to involve Palin and dent the Obama surge (Obama is described as a celebrity by McCain advi! ser Stev e Schmidt, played by Woody Harrelson), Palin was vetted in a mere five days. Normally it takes months to thoroughly vet a VP candidate. All of Palins baggage and ignorance came as a surprise to the McCain team. It was about getting the star candidate, the celebrity mom/governor on the ticket.

Nobody articulates this in Game Change, but there was a strong whiff of the ascension of reality-TV celebrity culture in the choice of Palin. Her ordinariness was authenticity epitomized, the equivalent to regular folks made famous by Survivor or American Idol.


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