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Are you like Sarah Palin?
I remember Sarah Palin when she won the governorship on a pledge to end corruption and the oil industry's stranglehold on the state's government. Not that I believed her. The oil industry is so bloated with profits, and so arrogant, that instead of just paying off the legislators to do their bidding, they pay the electorate directly. Every citizen gets $1-2K in payoffs every year. Right around the time when the rest of us are making our annual contribution and investment in the well-being and infrastructure of our community - roads, educating our children, building levees, police protection, food supplements for kids in school, etc - they are getting their annual payoff. And most citizens are amenable to being bought off. Who cares if the world that their children are going to inherit will be so full of chemicals that they'll be dying of cancer in their thirties and forties, so long as I can have my big-screen TV now. So, do I believe that the Gov is not also being paid off? No.
The next time that the beauty queen came to my attention is when she went on national TV to make self-righteous speeches about her choice to bear a severely handicapped child. Life Coach Martha Beck, who made a similar choice and wrote a book about her son Adam, correctly reminds people, every time she talks about her decision, that it is a personal matter and that good people choose to terminate pregnancies in the same circumstances. Not her Gov-ship. She used her personal choice to hammer home her conviction that no one under any circumstances - even if they are in mortal danger of their lives or are being asked to bear a rapist's child - should be allowed to terminate a pregnancy. She has more opinions in common with Adolf Hitler than Mother Teresa (herself a devout and fanatical Catholic, remember). Yes, she does, I counted.
So why is Governor Palin just a white-bread version of Secretary of State Condi Rice?
Simple. They are both fiercely and devotedly committed to the supremacy of the rich white male in American society. I've written about Condi as I knew her back in her Stanford days, fiercely and devotedly making sure that no persons of color or women of any color ever achieved tenure on her watch, regardless of their worth or qualifications. Did Stanford get their money's worth in her? DId they ever. Condi is clever and she has hit paydirt. If she were white, she'd be on the ticket. Alas, even a devoted attack dog doesn't get to eat at that rich white male table. Condi and Colin Powell and Justice Thomas won't. Palin will.
No power elite can keep its power intact without the active and vigorous collaborators and traitors, who will infiltrate the freedom movements and report, who can be quoted with clever soundbites that undercut the valid aspirations of millions of good people. Every power elite cultivates and rewards (within limits) these Quislings. Thomas has more power than god. The others are jetting around the world and speaking on behalf of this suffering nation. They are still Quislings.
The only political question that remains: are American women going to let them get away with it? or do we want genuine patriots, people who agree with George Washington that torturing your prisoners brings your nation shame and disrepute, people who believe in civil liberties and democracy, not doing absolutely anything to hold on to your power? Will the Quislings win?
And the personal question: how much of your integrity do you give away, day by day, in order to get and hold on to power? Having social intelligence and picking your battles are wisdom, yes. But there's a slippery slope. Just as I don't wish any little girls to grow up to be a Condi Rice or a Sarah Palin, I also know how easy it is to be seduced by the promise of money and position - and lose our souls in the process. We need to stand for justice, for fairness for all people and for compassion for our fellow citizens who are suffering through hard times if we are going to call ourselves human beings.