ATTACK SARAH PALIN AS ANOTHER MEAN REPUBLICAN EXTREMIST

This is my third post today on Sarah Palin. But I want to bring to your attention a perceptive blog by George Lakoff on The Huffington Post today.

Lakoff believes that Democrats misunderstand the whole electoral process when they stress issues and world realities. The election is not about objective realities but about voters' perceptions of code words. In other words, the Democrats must frame the issues in terms of voters' perceptions.

Writes Lakoff:

"Election campaigns matter because who gets elected can change reality. But election campaigns are primarily about the realities of voters' minds, which depend on how the candidates and the external realities are cognitively framed. They can be framed honestly or deceptively, effectively or clumsily. And they are always framed from the perspective of a worldview."

So it is not about Palin's supposed lack of experience or knowledge of foreign affairs, but about how voters perceive her. Lakoff believes that it is important for Democrats to correctly and accurately frame Palin as just another Republican extremist meany. Palin is just another Bush/Cheney clone who thinks everything can be solved at the barrel of a gun. Someone who wants to privatise Social Security because she chooses not to see people in need who need Social Security retirement income to just get by. Someone who thinks that the hospital emergency room is the answer to people who cannot afford health insurance.

Palin is a Republican mean extremist who would gladly deprive people of food stamps at the same time she gives upper incomes a tax break. Someone in the mold of Bush/Cheney who thinks that campaigners for civil rights are just uncivil troublemakers. Or like Phil Graham, McCain's economic advisor, who thinks those who complain about the economy and the housing crisis are whiners.

Talk about mean and extremist. Can anyone better fit the description than Sarah Palin?