Doug Wilson's Letter From America

Sarah Palin and Personal Loyalties
Politics
Written by Douglas Wilson
Saturday, February 20, 2010

This will be a hard one to explain, but let me just put it out there anyway.

Those who have followed the political threads on this blog will know that I like and respect Sarah Palin. This is not to say that I believe she is necessarily equipped to be president, but my reservation at this point is not to be taken as a criticism of her compared to all the others jockeying for that position. In my book, the last person who was qualified to be president was probably James Madison.

That said, allow me to point to a couple of recent things that make me like her even more, and which indicate to me that whatever she is doing, it isn't the ordinary political game.

Here is the first indication. Harry Truman said that if you want a friend in Washington, you should get a dog. But contrasted with this, Sarah Palin understands that while political convictions are important, personal loyalties are crucial. I write this hoping that John McCain loses to his primary challenger, and I believe that it is important for the budding tax revolt that he lose. I will rejoice if he loses, and at the same time I think it is admirable in the extreme that Sarah Palin is campaigning for him. If Sarah Palin has endorsed Ron Paul's son in the Kentucky race, as she has, and she endorsed Hoffman in the NY race, as she did, then she certainly knows what the issues are, and knows the difference between party loyalties and personal loyalties. There would be no way for her to turn on John McCain, after what he did for her (for whatever reason), without selling her soul to the twin devils of political expediency and personal ambition. She isn't doing that, probably because she is more interested in going to Heaven than in going to Washington. Let's hope she keeps it that way. So I hope McCain loses, and I hope that Sarah continues give him her full support.

Second, while it is fun to see rowdy conservatives looking forward to the future, as they have been doing at the CPAC convention, I was extremely grateful that Sarah Palin gave that convention a miss. "Politics as usual" includes the methods, and not just the content. Though there are stout souls at such events, there are also opportunists aplenty. It is extremely difficult to show up at a convention like that without looking like Absalom glad-handing at the city gates.

I have my differences, certainly, but Sarah Palin continues to rise in my esteem.

Last Updated in Blog and Mablog on Saturday, February 20, 2010