After a detailed analysis of the media's treatment of Sarah Palin, Red State's Dan McLaughlin comes to the following conclusion.
My reaction to Palin’s decision, the more I think about it, is in some ways the opposite of my reaction to Mark Sanford. Palin has been a deep disappointment politically - she could have accomplished a lot more.
Those of us who saw in her toughness, combativeness and joyful presence on the campaign trail a possible President are inevitably disappointed, as we’ve been disappointed again and again by Republicans - Sanford, Rudy, Fred, McCain, Romney - who one way or another always seemed to lack the fire to take the battle to the other side day in and day out for the cause.
But as a human being, she walks away a success in a way that few people in Washington can contemplate, and few of her detractors could ever relate to. The salmon are biting, the sun is shining, the kids are playing, and the road is rising before her, and she’s going where she’s needed. If that’s the epitaph for good, decent mothers in politics, well, we’re a smaller, meaner nation for it.
