Why So Mad About Sarah?

Carol Platt Liebau | September 11, 2008 5:56 PM

Byron York looks at the wave of remarkably vituperative commentary aimed at Sarah Palin by the lefty commentariat. He concludes that "[T]hese commentators believe that Palin is so unremarkable, so ordinary, so unaccomplished that her elevation to a national ticket can only be attributed to John McCain’s cynical political calculations." And he notes perceptively that there's a big difference between "common" and "the common touch."

But there's more going on here than simply the yowl of wounded meritocrats. In fact, Sarah Palin presents an existential threat to liberal ideology -- which holds that in order to be truly liberated and powerful, women must have every kind of abortion right imaginable. That women are struggling uphill in a sexist and unfairly capitalist society -- where government is required to level the playing field and enforce true "equality" between the sexes. She's a walking rebuke to the victimology that's the left's stock in trade.

To see a woman -- and a Republican woman, at that! -- breaking all the "glass ceilings" without the help of the government or the approbation of the feminist establishment is just too much. It's a threat to their world views (not to mention to the Democrat Party). It suggests that government isn't always the answer . . . and that the self-appointed spokesmen for women's rights aren't just wrong -- they're irrelevant.

Hence, the venom.