# Grand Unified Palin Theory **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [December 24, 2010, 7:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/grand-unified-palin-theory/565308 "2010-12-24T19:39:20Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 18\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Harborwolf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/c89c15/32.png) [@Harborwolf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Harborwolf)\ **Post date:** [December 26, 2010, 2:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/grand-unified-palin-theory/565308/41 "2010-12-26T02:41:22Z")
> [@msmith537](#): > > There is a saying I heard once that “teenage girls may be dumb, but the one thing they know is that guys want to fuck them”. IOW Palin may be an ignoramus, but she at least knows that there are a bunch of people who like what she is saying and are paying attention to her. > > I don’t think she is smart nor do I think she has any particular preconceived plan. She just has the confidence of the narcissitic and dumb who happen to strike the right chord with a certain group. > > In many ways, she is no different from Snookie, Paris Hilton or the Kardashians. She sets out to gain attention and as long as she is getting it she knows whatever she is doing is working. I think this hits it pretty well. We’re seeing the vague concept of celebrity finally drift from pop culture into politics. Now that I think about it, I’m surprised it’s taken someone so long to do it. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Amazing\_Hanna](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/977dab/32.png) [@The\_Amazing\_Hanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Amazing_Hanna)\ **Post date:** [December 26, 2010, 2:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/grand-unified-palin-theory/565308/42 "2010-12-26T02:54:05Z")
Her appeal is simple. Sarah Palin is Everywoman, Cinderella, and The Underdog. Put it together, and you have a whole storybook that the media would love to read you to sleep with. If she can become the President of the United States, the so could you, and there is hope. Because, let´s face it, you´re in all likelihood a lot more qualified to lead than she is. ---
**Author:** ![Chefguy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chefguy/32/138_2.png) [@Chefguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chefguy)\ **Post date:** [December 26, 2010, 3:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/grand-unified-palin-theory/565308/43 "2010-12-26T03:56:01Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > Remember when Dan Quayle announced he was running for the 2000 Presidential nomination? Early polls placed him in eighth place for the Republican nomination - among the eight Republicans who were running at that time. He soon gave it up. > > I think Palin’s in the same situation. Various groups support her now because it costs them very little and she gets good publicity. But when it gets to the point of picking a serious candidate to run against Barack Obama, her reputation will keep her off the list. In a weird coincidence, I read this morning that the Palins have purchased a 4,000 sf house in Arizona in Bristol’s name. Tax shelter anybody? The coincidence part: it’s in the same area as Dan Quayle’s home. The average IQ in the neighborhood just went down another quantum leap. Perhaps they can get together and not talk sense. ---
**Author:** ![foolsguinea](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foolsguinea/32/14751_2.png) [@foolsguinea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/foolsguinea)\ **Post date:** [December 26, 2010, 5:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/grand-unified-palin-theory/565308/44 "2010-12-26T05:43:19Z")
> [@Harborwolf](#): > > I think this hits it pretty well. We’re seeing the vague concept of celebrity finally drift from pop culture into politics. Now that I think about it, I’m surprised it’s taken someone so long to do it. So long? T. Roosevelt Ronald Reagan Arnold Schwarzenegger various sons of famous pols who were recruited by the party for their names various “war heroes” who were moved into the White House Celebrity pols aren’t new, & moving from politics to vague celebrity makes sense for someone who feels safer as a vague celeb, like JFK Jr., or whose talents are more suited to [del]Snooki-dom[/del] reality tv personality-hood, like Palin. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [December 26, 2010, 5:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/grand-unified-palin-theory/565308/45 "2010-12-26T05:48:30Z")
The pilot for the TV series didn’t go well. Too soon? ---
**Author:** ![Lantern](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/d26b3c/32.png) [@Lantern](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lantern)\ **Post date:** [December 26, 2010, 6:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/grand-unified-palin-theory/565308/46 "2010-12-26T06:04:54Z")
> [@Sam\_Stone](#): > > Joe Biden is a good example on the left. He just can’t stop himself from giving an opinion, regardless of whether or not he actually knows something about the subject. That doesn’t mean he’s stupid, or even that he’s particularly ignorant. It’s that he doesn’t know his limits. ``` Few people except hardcore partisans think of Biden as an idiot. He is gaffe-prone but he is also knowlegdeable about a lot of issues especially foreign policy on which he can speak intelligently and at length. The problem with Palin isn't that she makes gaffes but she almost never says anything intelligent. Pretty much all her utterances can be divided into boilerplate, teenage-level snark or gaffes. ``` And while I don’t think Palin is particularly stupid by the standards of the general population she is definitely well below the level of high-level US politicians who are generally much better educated and more intelligent than she is. This makes her sound even more stupid by comparison. ---
**Author:** ![Dumbguy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/2bfe46/32.png) [@Dumbguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dumbguy)\ **Post date:** [December 26, 2010, 7:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/grand-unified-palin-theory/565308/47 "2010-12-26T07:16:16Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > She’s just a second rate pol who’s making hay while the sun shines. John Kerry is second rate. Palin is fifth rate, on a good day. ---
**Author:** ![godix](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/278dde/32.png) [@godix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/godix)\ **Post date:** [December 26, 2010, 9:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/grand-unified-palin-theory/565308/48 "2010-12-26T09:08:51Z")
My take is that she really is exactly what she presents herself as. A common man sort of person. And the common man is an uneducated buffoon about politics. Although, the common man seems to do a good job of grabbing money wherever they can and with no morals at all about it. > [@ITR\_champion](#): > > To answer, one needs to realize that over the past generation or so, stupidity has been in. One need only look at some of the big entertainment successes of recent times: Jim Carrey, _Beavis and Butthead_, Jay Leno, _South Park_, Adam Sandler, Tom Green, _Jackass_, etc… Do you realize it’s far more likely that someone who follows Palin would think jackass, tom green, south park, etc are immoral, destroying society, and should be forced off the air? ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [December 26, 2010, 9:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/grand-unified-palin-theory/565308/49 "2010-12-26T09:14:13Z")
No, no, no! Force them all on to public television, and then force that off the air! ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [December 26, 2010, 5:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/grand-unified-palin-theory/565308/50 "2010-12-26T17:50:35Z")
> [@Dumbguy](#): > > John Kerry is second rate. Palin is fifth rate, on a good day. Yes, as soon as I wrote that, I thought about changing it to at least 3rd rate. Second rate is certainly an overstatement, at least on the national level. ---
**Author:** ![joebuck20](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/74df32/32.png) [@joebuck20](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/joebuck20)\ **Post date:** [December 26, 2010, 7:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/grand-unified-palin-theory/565308/51 "2010-12-26T19:25:24Z")
> [@ElvisL1ves](#): > > Her popularity is among that part of the populace, the “real people” that she makes feel reassured about their own ignorance, helping them feel she shares what they prefer to think of as “common sense”. She doesn’t remind them even implicitly that there are many matters that are way over their heads, instead she helps them think they’re just as capable as those “elitists” with their college educations in the Eastern liberal cities who don’t really understand life for the “real people out there”. If someone just like them can be nominated for the White House, and move up to have her own reality TV show, then they can actually be proud of themselves. I agree. I grew around people like this. If on a perfectly clear day Rush Limbaugh said the sky was plaid and Obama said it blue, they would believe Rush unconditionally. I can definitely understand her appeal among a certain subset of plain spoken, rural and/or working class folk who shun intellectual pretensions. Simply put, they see her as one of them. It’s the same reason poor, urban minorities keep voting for people like Marion Barry and Kwame Kilpatrick. It doesn’t matter that they’re morally bankrupt or have no significant accomplishments under their belts other than enriching themselves or talk only in platitudes with no workable plans of fixing the problems plaguing their constituencies. So long as they can successfully cast themselves as one of the little people, they won’t loose an ounce of support. And when the TPTB go after these politicians, that only strengthens the resolve of their constituents who see such takedown efforts as “The Man” keeping them down (in Palin’s case “The Man” being the political establishment and the “lamestream” media). As for how smart she is, I agree with what others have written. She’s smart enough to know she can be far more successful (and become far richer) as a pundit than as a workaday politician. And she has proven quite adept at mobilizing her base and keeping her name in the news, which in her line of work are the types of smarts that matter most. When it comes to thinking critically about issues of substance and offering up workable solutions, however…well let’s put it this way. You typical freshman political science major could easily give her a run for her money. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2010, 2:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/grand-unified-palin-theory/565308/52 "2010-12-27T02:10:36Z")
Some people insist on correct answers even if they’re complicated. Some people insist on simple answers even if they’re wrong. ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2010, 2:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/grand-unified-palin-theory/565308/53 "2010-12-27T02:39:31Z")
> [@godix](#): > > My take is that she really is exactly what she presents herself as. A common man sort of person. And the common man is an uneducated buffoon about politics. Although, the common man seems to do a good job of grabbing money wherever they can and with no morals at all about it. Life can be very good for you if you are attractive and fiercely support the general consensus. ---
**Author:** ![ITR\_champion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/c67d28/32.png) [@ITR\_champion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ITR_champion)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2010, 3:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/grand-unified-palin-theory/565308/54 "2010-12-27T03:27:50Z")
> [@godix](#): > > Do you realize it’s far more likely that someone who follows Palin would think jackass, tom green, south park, etc are immoral, destroying society, and should be forced off the air? There was quite a lot of that sort of talk from Republicans (and Democrats) when I was young, but I can’t recall hearing any of it lately. The last politician to try promoting a bill to drastically increase the FCC’s control over television was Senator Ted Stevens, who was making a cynical move after Janet Jackson’s Boobgate in '04. He’s now defeated, convicted, and dead, and so is the movement for censorship of TV as far as I can tell. There may be a few people out there still demanding it, but nothing like there was a generation ago. ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2010, 5:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/grand-unified-palin-theory/565308/55 "2010-12-27T17:12:11Z")
> [@Suil\_Dubh](#): > > A theory like Gardner’s “Multiple Intelligences” might explain why she seems so shrewd on some levels, and so dense on others. According to Gardner, she could have very low Logical-Mathematical and Linguistic Intelligence, but a much higher Interpersonal Intelligence. > > [Theory of multiple intelligences - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiple_intelligences) > > The article even lists “politician” as a suitable career for people with high Interpersonal Intelligence. > > Gardner’s theory is still controversial, and not fully accepted. But even the simpler “Emotional Intelligence” vs. “Intelligence Quotient” division could help explain her behavior. She could be said to have a high EI but a very low IQ. So she’s basically George Bush with tits? ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2010, 7:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/grand-unified-palin-theory/565308/56 "2010-12-27T19:32:17Z")
> [@Suil\_Dubh](#): > > A theory like Gardner’s “Multiple Intelligences” might explain why she seems so shrewd on some levels, and so dense on others. According to Gardner, she could have very low Logical-Mathematical and Linguistic Intelligence, but a much higher Interpersonal Intelligence. > > [Theory of multiple intelligences - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiple_intelligences) > > The article even lists “politician” as a suitable career for people with high Interpersonal Intelligence. > > Gardner’s theory is still controversial, and not fully accepted. But even the simpler “Emotional Intelligence” vs. “Intelligence Quotient” division could help explain her behavior. She could be said to have a high EI but a very low IQ. Isn’t “high Emotional Intelligence” just a polite way of saying someone is an idiot? I don’t follow Sarah Palin very closely, but what has she done that could be considered “shrewd” by any measurement of intelligence? It’s sort of like when people say someone has “good social skills” (especially WRT things like jobs, fraternities and social groups). Usually what that really means is “I like this person’s superficial mannerism”. IOW, they just “look” and “act” the way that group wants or expects them to act. I do not consider that “intelligent” unless they are consciously altering their appearance or mannarism in order to fit in. It is not “emotionally intelligent” to have a pretty smile. I don’t not belive Palin is doing that. I believe she acts exactly the way she is. It is not “emotional intelligence” to passionately preach to your choir in the pandering, jingoistic half-wit manner of a beauty pageant. It is perhaps why people of limited intellect make good politicians and salespeople. It’s very easy to tell people what they want they want to hear when you aren’t burdened by reason or critical thinking. ---
**Author:** ![Kevbo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/e47774/32.png) [@Kevbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kevbo)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2010, 5:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/grand-unified-palin-theory/565308/57 "2010-12-28T05:38:37Z")
> [@msmith537](#): > > Isn’t “high Emotional Intelligence” just a polite way of saying someone is an idiot? No. I’ve met some very charismatic people that are sharp as a tack. We currently have one in the oval office. But charisma is not related to being smart. For an extreme example look to people with Williams (or is it William’s or Williams’ ?) syndrome. Many are remarkably charismatic. Few can balance a check book. If Palin were Irish, it would just be simple Blarney. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2010, 6:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/grand-unified-palin-theory/565308/58 "2010-12-28T06:12:28Z")
I rise to harumph, sir! Harumph! Nothing “simple” about blarney, it isuggests the Irish gift for speech. improvisational singing to no defined melody. “Refudiate” isn’t blarney, “refudiate” is d’oh. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/grand-unified-palin-theory/565308.md?page=2)