I watched the movie Game Change recently, which is about
Sarah Palin. The movie is widely considered to be a negative depiction
of Palin, even by Palin herself (who, as far as I know, has not seen the
movie). And yet, I found myself actually liking Sarah Palin while I
was watching it. Not all of the time, mind you. She could be pretty
ruthless, as when she (on the movie) fired that one aide on account of a
mistake. But the Sarah Palin of the movie came across to me as someone
who genuinely cared for her family, who depended on God, who was
committed to certain principles, and who loved Alaska, enough to wear an
Alaska pin and to care about the public opinion of those who were in
her state (even though she later told Steve Schmidt, played by Woody
Harrelson, that she did not want to go back to Alaska).
I loved
the scene where, right before John McCain was about to introduce Palin
to the American people, her family was telling each other to pray for
her. Piper Palin's remark to her mom that it was cheating for God to
help Palin win the Vice-Presidential debate was cute. I also liked the
scene where Sarah Palin's husband Todd was giving her advice on how to
perform in the Vice-Presidential debate. He reminded her of a debate
she was in when she was running for an Alaskan office, and one of her
opponents was a policy wonk. Todd said that nobody understood what that
opponent was saying, but Sarah spoke straight to the people, and she
won. This scene really humanized Sarah Palin, I thought.
Was
Sarah Palin as uninformed as she appeared on the movie? I'm somewhat
doubtful. There have been some insiders who have said that she wasn't
that uninformed. Carl Cameron's interview with Palin (see here and here) tells me that she has at least some public policy understanding. Does that mean that I'm saying that Steve Schmidt and
Nicole Wallace are lying? Not necessarily. Perhaps they got the
impression that Palin was less informed than she truly was. People
sometimes assume that I know less than I do. (And Palin haters will
probably point to my post here to say that their assumptions are
probably accurate!) I do agree with Schmidt and Wallace, however, that
Palin most likely wasn't informed enough to step into the Presidency.