Sarah Palin follows the Donald Trump method
Sarah is selling Sarah. The former vice presidential candidate and half-term governor of Alaska is a commodity of one and a marketing machine. She has created a new politics of profit.
Palin's reanimation on the tea
party stage probably means no more than the other intentions she has floated but
never executed. She spent almost a year of the last presidential election cycle
teasing the far right that she was going to run for president. She never did,
but lots of network TV interviews and speculative articles drove up her name
recognition and brand identification.
And she's not running again.
Palin is re-running the same show
in her home state of Alaska by hinting that she is going to be a candidate for
the U.S. Senate. She will not run though. There is too much risk of failure.
She's not the near-unknown who was elected governor of Alaska and then quit 2½
years into the job. She has a profile, and she intends to use it to make money,
which is one commitment she knows how to keep. Running and losing is always bad
for business.
Palin is a product. Not a
candidate.
Politically, Sarah Palin is an
opposite gender version of Donald Trump. She makes grandiloquent statements
about candidacies and a future that she knows will never transpire. Trump and
Palin lack the courage to run for president but have profitably monetized the
speculation about a candidacy. Trump cannot abide the notion of losing, which he
knows is inevitable, and he fears what that might do to his image and revenue
stream. Palin is self-aware enough to realize that she has neither the intellect
nor popular support outside the increasingly unpopular tea party.
So why not make a buck?
In the detritus of the
McCain-Palin presidential campaign, the second name emerged as the lead act. The
first nine months after her resignation as governor, at the end of July 2009, Palin reportedly earned $12 million, including a book deal, a
TV show and speaking fees that were generally more than $100,000 per
appearance.
It's not hard to tell whether
principle is more important than profit for the failed vice presidential
candidate. The tea party has been charged $100,000 for a Palin speech, and, even
as she promotes support of charities, a Toronto cancer center a few years ago
paid $200,000 for her to attend a fund-raiser, and the event sold out at $200 a
seat. Her politics and intelligence might be trifling, but Palin appears to have
evolved a very nice business model: Raise the profile to raise the revenue,
mostly for herself.
And she's back at it.
Until recently, Palin hasn't
been too active, except on social media. She seems to have the entire national
tea party population on her Facebook page, but the TV cameras had not been
showing up when she gave her bargain-priced speeches. A love spat with Fox News
that kept her off the air and then back into the network's arms has left her
fans confused. Donations to Sarah PAC fell off. Why was no one paying
attention?
Palinians should not fear. She
has seen opportunity in the tea party and its plans to beat moderate Republicans
in GOP primaries. This is a nearly risk-free approach to increased
Sarah-wareness.
The candidate runs, Palin speaks
and rallies the initiates. She endorses, and if the campaign fails it is the
candidate's fault, not Palin's; she's moved on to help in another race. But the
cameras came, reporters took notes, images were broadcast, words were published,
and Palin's price went up.
Timing is critical to maximizing
opportunity, of course. When the federal government shut down as a consequence
of tea party obstinacy, Palin jetted off to Washington to help her ideological
consort, Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas, as they crashed the "Barrycades" at the
National World War II Memorial.
Those cameras and bullhorns and
journalists were there. Palin had just arrived from New Jersey, where she had
endorsed the hopeless tea party candidacy of Steve Lonegan, who lost, soundly,
but not without Sarah getting TV time in New York.
In business school, they teach
"know your customer." Palin might have attended that class because she is
promising to help tea party candidates unseat GOP U.S. senators in South
Carolina, Kentucky, Mississippi and Tennessee in 2014. The Sarah Promoting Sarah
tour begins, however, several months ahead at the Iowa Faith and Freedom
Foundation dinner on November 9.
In what is almost certainly a
coincidence of timing, just three days later, Palin's new book goes on sale for
the holidays. She has not written about the Constitution or her understanding of
Paul Revere in the Revolutionary War; Palin, instead, is doing the much more
challenging work of preventing further harm to Christmas. "Good Tidings and
Great Joy: Protecting the Heart of Christmas," can already be pre-ordered. Get
yours now. Or just send a check to Palin. She might not understand politics or
policy, but Palin knows money.
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