The Snow Queen melts

OK, I resisted it as long as I could.  Don’t knock a guy when he’s down…  There but for the grace of God…  If you can’t say something nice…  Speak kindly of the departed…  I tried, I really tried to think of something else to write about.  The Fourth of July comes to mind.  Oh, what the hell.

I stumbled on the Snow Queen’s abdication announcement and, at first, thought it must be April 1 instead of July 4.  Then I thought…wait a minute, it’s Tina Fey.  Finally, accepting reality, I joined the other pundits in guessing at the real reason for her fall from grace.

The Snow Queen made a strong case that abdication would relieve Alaskans of the headache she’s given them.  OK, I can buy that.  I live fifteen hundred miles away from her and my head often throbs in sympathy with her constituents.  Especially when I try to see Russia from my back yard.

I then carefully considered the idea that leaving the governor’s office three-and-a-half years before the next presidential election was a smart prelude to participating in it.  Certainly an excellent idea for anyone who needs to bone up on geography, economics and sentence structure.  Plus lots of time to subscribe to and actually read a newspaper.  Katie Couric be damned.

Next I considered the multitude of ethics investigations, bonehead exposures of one’s children to the media, the inability to get along with the Alaska legislature, and the latest evidence of squabbling among some of her fellow Republicans.  Including the astounding revelation in Vanity Fair  that some of them thought that she wasn’t ready to be President.

I thought that maybe, after flying all over the country drawing standing room only crowds, she was bored being governor of a state that has more money than the U.S. Treasury.  And citizens who spend summers killing giant mosquitoes and winters drinking themselves into la-la-land.  Or that the rest of us, not content with worries about money, jobs, health care, a lunatic in North Korea, and unrest in about-to-be-nuclear Iran, needed to be aroused from our near comatose condition.  Slate Magazine  had these thoughts …

“It may be tempting and more comfortable to just keep your head down [and] plod along,” Sarah Palin said Friday, in an attempt to suggest that serving her full term as governor would add to the nation’s apathy. “That’s the worthless, easy path; that’s a quitter’s way out.” Sarah Palin is no quitter. That’s why she’s quitting.

And then I figured that it was simply the Queen’s way of regaining the spotlight.  Senator John Ensign resigns his Republican leadership post to spend more time forgetting his sex scandal.  Then Governor Sanford shares the Funniest Home Video’s spotlight by flying off to Argentina, followed by the longest public apology since the Japanese surrender on the Missouri.  That had to stop or be topped, which she did, God bless her.

Maybe all, or maybe none, of the above.  Maybe it’s just another way of ingratiating herself to those folks who love and support her, come hell or high water.  As Hans, a fellow Californian, put it in today’s NY Times…

Palin’s incoherence and lack of concentration are her political strengths. The segment of the electorate to which she appeals does not value intellect or eloquence. In fact, these qualities are feared because they imply a lack of faith. A person who is well educated, thoughtful, and can answer questions directly, in complete sentences, is exactly what Palin’s supporters do not want.

 

Then again.  I’m reminded of Dick Nixon who lost the California governor’s race in 1962 and promised to leave politics for good.  He came back to haunt us.  In spades.  Could that be the Snow Queen’s playbook?

You betcha.