October 22nd 2008
What If They Hadn’t Bought The Palin Wardrobe?
G
ood luck finding anyone on the sane side of this campaign who’s happy that the GOP spending $150,000 on Sarah Palin’s wardrobe. No one is. But that doesn’t make it a bad decision.
First, McCain/Palin reported the expense and were up-and-up about it. It’s up to the lawyers and regulators to haggle out its legitimacy, and if there’s any question, a quickly pulled together charity auction of the Palin suits and accessories will certainly raise more than $150,000 for charity. Done deal.
But that must makes the move legal, not wise. What makes it wise is this:
The Alaska-shoppin’ Sarah Palin was an utter and complete fashion disaster. Can you imagine what the media and leftyblogs would have said if Palin had hit the campaign trail in her Wasilla-purchased finest? The campaign knew that the Palin wardrobe was a political disaster in the making. They knew what would happen if they rolled out this Sarah Palin: a laugh fest, endless parodies, loud mocking, nasty gossipy news coverage. Well, we’re getting that even with the new wardrobe. It would have been much, much worse without the helpful intervention of Neiman and Marcus.
So the crazy, vicious Left forced the campaign’s hand, and now that it’s out, they’re howling in outrage. Why do they always get to butter both sides of their bread? Why is it so difficult for the McCain camp to portray the Left and the Leftist media for what they are?
And, by the way, the original Politico report was just another Palin Derangement Syndrome hatchet job. Here’s the pivotal part of the entire report … where is it now … oh, there it is … way down in paragraph 13:
A review of similar records for the campaign of Democrat Barack Obama and the Democratic National Committee turned up no similar spending.
A review of similar records. Reporter Jeanne Cummings (it had to be a woman writing, huh?) was sitting on such a choice, catty story she couldn’t risk screwing it up by finding out that the Obama campaign had in fact purchased clothing but not reported it. No, folks, there’s no show of reportorial curiosity here; no evidence of actually picking up the phone and calling the Obama campaign with a few directed questions. Cummings just took their word for it.
She took the word of the man who sat in Rev. Wright’s church for 20 years and never heard anything anti-American, et. seq. ad infinitim.
Update: Thanks to Bookworm for this info: According to The Weekly Standard, the over-the-top podium get-up for the Dem National Convention cost $140,000. Who got the better deal here, the GOP that continues to benefit from Palin’s ongoing and well-dressed appearances, or the DNC, which turned off millions with the whole Greek column thing?
Funny thing, though … I don’t remember the media jumping all over the DNC for its podium expenses.
