SCARING THE ZEUS-WORSHIPPERS:

Conservatism reborn: Undoing the me-too generation (Tony Blankley, October 22, 2008 , Washington Times)

Has Miss Noonan been napping up there on Mount Olympus through the last several generations of American politics? She accuses Mrs. Palin of not engaging America in a Socratic dialogue, of using phrases untethered to a political philosophy. Exactly what philosophy are the slogans "Change" and "Hope" tethered to? American presidential campaigns, with very few exceptions, have been little more than slogans shouted in the hope of exciting a crowd. The much admired Obama campaign has been the greatest exemplar of style over substance. However, it is Miss Noonan's completely unsupported sneer at Mrs. Palin's mental capacities that is most revealing.

I think that Miss Noonan may have unconsciously touched on what is really going on here when she accuses Mrs. Palin - who is attracting crowds as big if not bigger than any Reagan ever drew - of being a "follower … not a leader." Miss Noonan's unconscious fear may be that it will be precisely Mrs. Palin (and others like her) who will be among the leaders of the about to be re-born conservative movement. I suspect that the conservative movement we start re-building on the ashes of November 4th (even if Mr. McCain wins) will have little use for over-written, over-delicate commentary.

The new movement will be plain spoken and social networked up from the internetted streets, suburbs and small towns of America. It certainly will not listen very attentively to those conservatives who idolatrize Mr. Obama and collaborate in heralding his arrival. They may call their commentary "honesty." I would call it - at the minimum - blindness.

You've got to have something to fill the hole in your soul.

MORE:
Travels with Sarah: As Palin tours New Hampshire, signs of Biblical calling, talent on the stump, and a shot at 2012 (DAVID S. BERNSTEIN, October 22, 2008, Boston Phoenix)

The theory has been around since before John McCain picked Palin in late August — it was circulating on religious Christian blogs in early June when news outlets reported that she was on McCain’s short list. After the announcement, it picked up steam — particularly after it was reported that Palin, at the suggestion of her pastor, had, upon becoming governor of Alaska, patterned herself after Queen Esther.

Soon after the Republican National Convention, an e-mail went viral in conservative Christian circles, in which Pastor Mark Arnold claimed to have found himself next to Palin at a rally in his hometown of Lebanon, Ohio. According to the account, Arnold came face-to-face with Palin, and God spoke through him, telling the governor that “God wants you to know that you are a present-day Esther. . . . Keep your eyes on God and know that He has chosen you to reign!”

Palin, according to the account, immediately began to cry — as did her husband, Todd, when Arnold then repeated the news to him. Arnold also told McCain that the Palins are “called of God and she is an Esther.”

Esther, for those not up on their Old Testament, was a Jewish woman plucked from obscurity to become Queen of Persia after winning a beauty contest. This placed her in the right place, at the right time, to intervene in a plan to annihilate the Jews. In a nutshell, when she revealed herself to be Jewish, the king halted the slaughter and instead hanged Haman, the official behind the plot.

Jews recount the tale on Purim with much gaiety and, for most, little concern about historical accuracy.

Palin, of course, was a beauty-pageant participant (while McCain has oft commented that he “never won Miss Congeniality in the Senate,” Palin won that title in the 1984 Miss Alaska contest), now plucked from obscurity to be in a position to advise the powerful should John McCain become president.

The big question, of course, is for what vital role — what “time such as this” — is Palin being groomed?

One common theory among the Christian cognoscenti is that, just as Esther stopped a threat in Persia to wipe out the Jews, Palin must stop a threat from modern-day Persia — Iran — to wipe out Israel (which would be anathema to conservative Christians, who believe Jews must control that land when Christ returns).

Posted by Orrin Judd at October 22, 2008 6:19 PM