Or should I say, Art imitates Life? I seriously cannot wait for Thursday for the Biden/Palin debate.
Seriously folks, it is absolutely scary to think this woman could be the second most-powerful person of world's remaining superpower.
Fred Clark makes an excellent
point about why she is so scary:
After watching Palin's interview with Katie Couric, I realized that Palin's problem is not primarily a lack of information or a lack of knowledge of the facts of the matter. Yes, she is appallingly ill-informed, but I think that's more a symptom than the actual disease.
We've seen this disease before. We've been watching it for eight years now. This is ignorance born of incuriosity. And that incuriosity arises from a lack of empathy. Like President Bush, Gov. Palin doesn't know because she doesn't care.
Here is the video of the section of the Couric interview on the economy, and here is the transcript. Note this section:
COURIC: Would you support a moratorium on foreclosures to help average Americans keep their homes? PALIN: That's something that John McCain and I have both been discussing -- whether that ... is part of the solution or not. You know, it's going to be a multi-faceted solution that has to be found here.
COURIC: So you haven't decided whether you'll support it or not?
PALIN: I have not.
COURIC: What are the pros and cons of it do you think?
PALIN: Oh, well, some decisions that have been made poorly should not be rewarded, of course.
COURIC: By consumers, you're saying?
PALIN: Consumers -- and those who were predator lenders also. That's, you know, that has to be considered also. But again, it's got to be a comprehensive, long-term solution found ... for this problem that America is facing today. As I say, we are getting into crisis mode here.
The question was to name some "pros and cons" of "a moratorium on foreclosures to help average Americans keep their homes." This is a bit like the old routine about "What was the color of George Washington's white horse?" -- part of the answer is contained in the question itself. The "pro" side of helping average Americans keep their homes is that you're helping average Americans keep their homes.
And yet Gov. Palin wasn't able to come up with even that. She doesn't seem to comprehend or be capable of imagining the downside of mass foreclosures. In 2007, 1,650 families in Alaska lost their homes, but their governor is unable to say for sure whether that's a Good Thing or a Bad Thing.
Palin's problem, in other words, isn't that she's been inadequately briefed about the housing crisis or the consequences of foreclosures, or that she lacks a grasp of the policy options for addressing these problems. Her problem in this interview is that she can't be bothered to imagine what this means for real families who are really losing their homes. Not a lack of information, but a lack of empathy.
That's troubling, because a lack of information can be fixed. Someone who doesn't yet know enough can set out to learn more. But someone who doesn't care about other people because they are other people, well, I don't know how to fix that. I'm not sure it can be fixed.