The Death of Michael Jackson and the Demise of Sarah Palin (and what it all means for America)

Few individuals are weirder than the late Michael Jackson, but Sarah Palin comes mighty close. The former Republican VP candidate shocked the political world by announcing that she is resigning her Alaska governorship. True to form, her quirky, unscripted, and incoherent news conference performance left nearly everyone scratching their heads. Palin’s surprise resignation, however, caps a great week for Democrats; Al Franken is finally declared the winner in Minnesota’s senate race, Republican governor Mark Sanford derails his presidential ambitions by admitting to infidelity, and Sarah Palin zany rationale for quitting her post reinforces the perception that the GOP is fatally unhinged. In truth, the Republican Party has even less of a pulse than Michael Jackson, who at least has the chance of making a posthumous comeback.

Sarah Palin’s rationale for leaving office is about as convincing as Dick Cheney’s defense of water boarding. In fact, Palin displayed a smorgasbord of verbal and emotional tics during her news conference that are symptomatic of the GOP’s decline. For example, the Alaska governor seemed constitutionally incapable of stringing together coherent thoughts and arguments, but she had no trouble spouting a train of mind-numbing clichés to explain her decision. She didn’t want to be a “lame duck” and “collect a paycheck” and “kind of milk it.” No, Palin isn’t one “to go with the flow” because “only dead fish go with the flow.” Sarah “Barracuda” Palin is a self-described maverick, but her thought processes seem composed from a string of lifeless banalities and worn out clichés.

There is also an eerie dissonance between the chirpy cheeriness she tries to project and the anxiety and unease betrayed by her body language. Bush displayed a similar incongruity; the exaggerated macho swagger of a bully compensating for his obvious sense of inadequacy. Incidentally, watch just about any of clip of Bush from several years back and I bet you’ll be struck by how fake he comes across. It’s not only the chasm between his words and reality that alarm, Bush’s body language, tone, and demeanor betray disingenuousness.

Palin tried to sell her departure as a selfless act done for the good of Alaskans and the Republican Party. But her strained explanation and incongruous delivery appear to be masking a truth she cannot admit. She strikes me – and apparently many others – as a quintessential narcissist. That is, she has a grandiose sense of self coupled with an inability to accept criticism, acknowledge mistakes, or empathize with others. Do these qualities remind you of another recent Republican leader? (Hint, think flight suit, bring em’ on, and the guy strumming a guitar while New Orleans drowned).

In fact, conservatives have extolled and exemplified a national form of narcissism for some time. This vanity was enshrined in the Bush Doctrine: The United States represents the culmination of human history, is utterly unique, and is charged with a messianic mission to spread liberty all across the globe. As far as the neocons were concerned, our system of democratic capitalism was supposed to the model for all peoples at all times. The rise of China and the near meltdown of America’s financial system have gone a long way to puncture that conceit.

The conservative disdain for the notion that empathy is a desirable quality in judges fits with this pattern of narcissism. Along these lines, Sarah Palin disparaged Barack Obama’s efforts as a community organizer; ridicule being the polar opposite of empathy. Think of a national Republican leader – Rush Limbaugh and Ann Coulter come to mind – and the last quality you will think of is empathy. Sarah Palin is merely a symptom of cultural malady that is afflicting a conservative movement that is in the process of self-destruction. There is a psychological law at work here; those with an inflated sense tend to destroy themselves and everything they touch. Tragically, this was the fate of Michael Jackson, but at least he possessed the talent to create a legacy that will survive him. George W. Bush and Sarah Palin, on the other hand, are the type that tends to leave a trail of disappointment and destruction in their wake.

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