Monthly Archives: October 2009

Interesting bit in this Carville/Matalin interview on CNN yesterday. It isn’t Carville’s observation that Glenn Beck is both nuts and seriously stupid about everything. Rather it is Matalin’s attempted narrative…

http://thinkprogress.org/2009/10/05/beck-pundits-sunday/

“So what he [Beck] has tapped into is really, really what I think is going to be the dispositive future for us. Maligned mothers.”

I’ve heard Matalin use “dispositive” before and it’s always awkward because the word is almost never used outside of a legal context and because few people know the term (I had to look it up to make sure my sense of it was correct).

But aside from that, the really interesting point here is the “future for us” (Republicans/conservatives) will be “maligned mothers”.

First, have any of you heard Beck talking about maligned mothers? I haven’t.

Second, it’s pretty obvious who Matalin is speaking of here and that’s Palin. More accurately, the Palin of propaganda narrative…media/liberal victimized and maligned female with offspring. Dollars to donuts that narrative will be a/the key narrative in Palin’s book.

How does this serve (or hope to serve) Republican propaganda and electoral purposes? As with PUMA, Clintons4McCain etc, it’s an attempt to pull women towards voting Republican, obviously. Second, it’s another means to make the mainstream media (the non conservative noise machine media structures) look invalid or biased. Third, it’s a means to forward Palin as a candidate OR to use Palin (who won’t run) as a supportive voice in forwarding another female candidate. And if that’s it, that other female would be Liz Cheney.

(cross-posted at Plumline)

Update: It is difficult to imagine that the Republican crowd does not have hopes and plans for Ms Cheney.  But I wanted to note an opinion on Palin advanced by Joe Trippi last evening.  He suggested that she would be used for fundraising (which of course also means motivating an activist base).  That’s a smart take on this and a clear possibility.