Well…it was bound to happen.
The Palin pick has changed everything…with DittoHeads.
I had an interesting encounter yesterday with a colleague, who is in fact, a raging Dittohead. I knew that he listened to right-weird radio, (here in Portland, we get our Lars Larson and Bill-O on 750am), but I didn’t think he was delusional.
For the most part, he appears normal…he comes to work clean every morning, with his hair combed and his underwear on the inside. This would tend to eliminate him as a “Standard Issue” DittoHead, so I never had any real concerns for his sanity.
The Palin pick has changed everything…with how I view HIM.
As is my wont, I was roaming the office area in the mid-morning on Thursday, looking for an excuse to bullshit for a few minutes.
I chanced upon one of my regular BS partners, and we started to talk about Palin’s speech. The conversation quickly devolved into a completely non-political discussion of her attributes. Now, I know that I will be pilloried for this admission, but this is what guys are prone to do when in casual company.
Whether we want to admit it or not, this conversation is taking place amongst groups of guys, all over the U.S. right now. She’s fascinating in some respects, and it’s apt to make a progressive, heterosexual, male’s head explode from confusion. Quite a number of us are simultaneously attracted and repulsed by Sarah. No explanation is really needed for this phenomenon, since there are a gazillon books dedicated to the subject, (go to Amazon and search for: “Big Head, Little Head).
Okay, back to the story:
Now while we were chatting, the Dittohead from across the way was joining in with gusto…then came the kicker: Per the DittoHead, “Palin was going to kick Obama’s ass.”
Not McCain, but Palin.
For him, Palin is literally the second coming. The sum total of his exposure to this person is about 38 minutes, but he KNOWS. For him, this was enough time to take her measure. Never mind that this Dittohead has complained many times that Obama was “untested” and “unknown”…he was SURE that Palin was “it.”
When I started to laugh, he got SERIOUSLY angry. He took this dismissal very personally. He had incontrovertible, anecdotal proof that Palin was universally superior: That morning on the Lars Larson show, former Hillary supporters were calling into the show to proclaim that they were now supporting the McCain/Palin ticket, due principally to Palin’s speech.
I countered that point with the recent focus groups that were done on her speech, specifically with women and independents. His response was to basically called me a liar, and would not look at the article that I had printed out for him. He proclaimed me a “Typical Liberal.”
The Dittohead had apparently transmuted his religious faith into support for Palin. It was that deep, and that quick. He was stunned that I did not see it, and in no uncertain terms implied that I was an elitist pinhead.
I marveled at his objectification of Palin into the role of “Savior,” since this is what the Republicans dismiss in Obama supporters. He had conflated his religious faith, with his faith in Palin. They were now co-mingled.
This hammered home this basic point for me:
It’s now a base election.
Our base is bigger, and our GOTV operation is better than ever in history. It’s going to be closer than we’d like, (My guess: Obama by 4.5% in the popular vote, and 302 EVs on the low end), but we’ll still win.
It’s going to be a slugfest, but we’ll still win.
We all just need to chill out, ignore the tracking polls for a week, and volunteer for the Democrat of our choice.
Remember, we won this election when McCain picked Palin, it’s just that most people don’t know it yet.
Cheers!
-Stipes!
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