Aaron Goldstein
One of the most amazing aspects of the Sarah Palin phenomenon is the response of the liberal media to the large crowds she draws. This was on display during the election campaign and again during the just concluded Going Rogue book tour. The liberal media goes to tremendous pains to point out that the former Alaska Governor’s audiences are primarily white.
Let’s start with MSNBC’s Chris "West Point = Enemy Camp" Matthews. Last month, Matthews was in conversation with MSNBC Correspondent Norah O’Donnell who was covering a Palin book signing in Grand Rapids, Michigan. O’Donnell told Matthews, "This is a largely white -- almost no minorities in this crowd." Matthews replied, "Well, they look like a white crowd to me."(1)
Speaking of Grand Rapids, enter ESPN columnist LZ Granderson. He tried to attend Palin’s book signing there but didn’t arrive in time and felt excluded. Granderson wrote about his experience not meeting Palin for CNN:
I wasn't in line at 5 a.m., so I wasn't one of the 1,000 or so people who obtained the special wristband necessary to gain access to the rogue one.
However, I did get a lot of strange looks from the line, which I guess was to be expected. After all, I'm a black man with dreadlocks and, judging by the racial makeup of most of the cities Palin has scheduled for her tour, it doesn't seem I'm her target audience. (2)
While stopping short of calling Palin a racist he claims she encouraged "racist ugliness" during the 2008 campaign. How exactly did she stir this racist ugliness? By smiling and nodding. I kid you not. To be precise, Granderson writes, "In fact, she egged it on with her smiles and nods and calculated silence." It seems that Granderson is a mind reader what with the "strange looks" he got in Grand Rapids and Palin’s ability to incite a race riot with but a smile and a nod. Can you imagine the horrors that might have been unleashed had she winked?
So we can’t leave The New York Times out of the fun. Nor can we deprive the rich – Frank Rich that is. Here is some of the "wealth of knowledge" he was distributing about Palin:
That demographic is white and non-urban: Just look at the stops and the faces on her carefully calibrated book tour. The affect is emotional — the angry air of grievance that emerged first at her campaign rallies in 2008, with their shrieked threats to Obama, and that has since resurfaced in the Hitler-fixated "tea party" movement (which she endorses in her book). (3)
Rich does not make clear whether Palin endorses the Tea Party movement or Hitler fixation and nor does he care. The only one fixated with Hitler is Rich. This, after all, is the same man who likened a made for TV movie about 9/11 as "propaganda so untroubled by reality that it's best viewed as a fitting memorial to Leni Riefenstahl." (4) The Left spent eight years likening Bush to Hitler. So why not get a head start with Palin and those who publicly support her? Or put another way, the liberal media are profiling Palin supporters. Call it supporting Palin while white.
Yet doesn’t this make the liberal media guilty of judging Sarah Palin’s supporters by the color of their skin and not the content of their character? How does Chris Matthews know if some of those whites who attended the book signing didn’t vote for Obama? How does LV Granderson know he was getting strange looks because of his skin color? Could it be that some of the white people in attendance were unaccustomed to being awake at 5 a.m.? And who is Frank Rich to presume that support for Palin is the same as having a predilection for violence? Would Matthews, Granderson, Rich or any other member of the liberal media in good standing have been prepared to sit at a lunch counter with any of Palin’s supporters and shoot the breeze? Perhaps they might have discovered that some of Palin’s pale skinned supporters donate to charity and volunteer their time to those in need.
Alas, a burgers and cokes summit does not seem to be in the offing so long as the liberal media insists on using the word white as a pejorative – at least where it concerns Palin supporters and the Tea Party crowd. While attending the Tea Party on the Boston Common last April, I observed those in attendance to be overwhelmingly white. But if there is an overwhelmingly white crowd on the Boston Common gathered to protest President Obama’s decision to send more troops to Afghanistan (as there was earlier this month) I don’t hear anyone complaining about the racial composition of the protesters. (5) Nor do I hear the likes of Janeane Garofalo claiming their protest is "about hating a black man in the White House."(6)
By describing Palin supporters as "white" the liberal media is seeking to de-legitimize them and in turn de-legitimize Palin. Yet, of course, white conservatives who harbor no ill feelings towards African Americans or any other minority community don’t like being insulted and lumped in with racists. But as long as the liberal media insists on attributing racist motives to whites who have the temerity to support Palin they will simply dig in their heels and strengthen their solidarity with her. If the liberal media wants a fight they will get one.
It is important to draw attention to this behavior even though Sarah Palin’s book tour is now over. Should she write another book or decide to run for elected office we will hear more from the liberal media about how white and therefore racist her supporters are. When this happens it is incumbent upon Palin supporters to get under the liberal media’s skin by telling them not to judge us by ours.
(2) http://www.cnn.com/2009/OPINION/11/23/granderson.palin.race/index.html
(4) http://www.nytimes.com/2003/09/14/arts/14RICH.html?pagewanted=2
(5) http://boston.indymedia.org/feature/display/209360/index.php
