A review of Going Rogue: An American Life, by Sarah Palin (Harper Collins, 2009, 413 pp)
“Regardless of the outcome of this election, it just got a whole lot more interesting.”  Those words were spoken by an American media commentator in August 2008, just minutes after John McCain announced that his running mate and the potential next Vice-President of the United States was Sarah Palin, the Governor of Alaska.  Truer words were likely not heard since about Sarah Palin.
What is it about this woman? She is wildly popular among those millions of Americans that would be considered ‘very conservative.’ She is hated with apoplectic rage by the liberal left.
After her astounding campaign speech to over 60,000 people at The Villages community in central Florida one woman summed it up as, “We know her. She’s one of us.” If you are a conservative evangelical Christian anywhere on earth, that statement is likely true for you too. In her book, Sarah Palin refers to herself as ‘born again.’  She begins each day with Bible reading and prayer and ends each of her days again in personal prayer. She commits her life and decisions to the Lord and seeks his guidance in all aspects of her life. She attends Church faithfully. She knows her Bible. She is determined to apply her faith and principles in the public sphere and has rapidly risen from a local councilor in a small Alaska town, to state Governor, to potential President of the USA. It is hard for conservative Christians not to admire and support her.
At the same time she has become the lightning rod for every American that is left of centre and, it seems, even some of those moderates who are part of the GOP political machine. She has been ridiculed mercilessly to the point that many people now are absolutely certain that Sarah Palin actually said, “I can see Russia from my house” when those words were spoken by Tina Fey impersonating her. She has been accused of everything from stealing designer clothes to a conflict of interest because her winter jacket had an Arctic Cat logo on it. There was even a conspiracy theory claiming that her Down syndrome child, Trig, was really her daughter’s child and not hers and that it was all “covered up.”  Newsweek, a supposedly responsible newsmagazine, could have selected any one of thousands of pictures of her for their cover, but they elected to be hostile and sexist and use the picture of her in her running shorts. (Well, ok, you do have to admit that she really is one very fabulous-looking 45 year old woman.)
The release of her autobiography on November 17 has brought her back into the media limelight. In Manhattan, where I now am living, she is everywhere - every magazine, every talk show, every newscast. New Yorkers don’t like her mind you. Most are still besotted with Hilary, but they sure are talking about her. Sarah Palin has emerged as the visible leader of conservative America and she will probably keep that role for the next several years. She might even run for President in 2012. Who knows? She’s not telling.
Her book is divided roughly in two: the first part being her life story from pre-birth up to her call from John McCain to run for the VP position; and the second from that point on to the present.
The first part is downright all-American. Loving, hard-working middle class parents; above average school life; many part-time and full time jobs that were obviously not glamorous (the description of working on ‘the slime line’ at the fish processing plant is not for the faint of heart); her falling in love and eventually marrying her high-school sweetheart. The she becomes just another super-mom with several kids, dogs, a husband who is often working away on shift, a job and then she runs for office and ends up as mayor. My reaction was one of admiration and respect. This young woman was one gutsy, hard working and very determined girl. In fairness, I am absolutely sure that is exactly the reaction I was supposed to have on reading this part of her story.
She fights corruption in the Alaskan energy sector and ends up as Governor. Then she gets the phone call….and everything changes.
The latter part of the book is mostly the inside account, her account, of what happened from that point on. She is critical of the way she was ‘handled’ by McCain’s election staff. Although those criticisms seem to be what are now getting covered by the media, most of her chapters are about the awful and unrelenting attacks and false accusations that have been hurled at her and her family since that time and that continue to this day. In the book she defends against them and gives as good back again.
And then she quits. She resigns as Governor. At the time it happened everybody thought it strange. But she explains in the book that the continued barrage of false ethics complaints about her and requests under Freedom of Information for anything that could be used against her had simply made it impossible for her to do her job, and it had ruined her financially. She was facing over half a million dollars in legal fees. It only appeared that she was quitting. As her father noted, “Sarah’s not retreating. She’s reloading.” How true. With the book already on the Amazon bestseller list for two months before it was even released and her return to the media spotlight, Sarah Palin has seized the podium of the Christian Right and has become the visible leader of that sector of America.
So how are Canadian Christians to re-act to this woman? We can’t vote for her. It’s not our country. But as Pierre Trudeau reminded us many years ago, “living next to the U.S. is in some ways like sleeping with an elephant. No matter how friendly or temperate the beast, one is affected by every twitch and grunt.” You might not agree with much else Trudeau said, but on that one, he was spot on. We are affected. Canada’s social mores, our economy, our foreign policies, our economy, our armed forces and our overall culture are inextricably linked with the United States.  So Sarah Palin matters to Canada, regardless of whether we like her or not.
The ‘Political Centre’ of Canada is well to the left of the ‘Political Center’ of the US. Universal health care has been a basic Canadian right since the 1960’s and there is no politician, unless he or she has a death wish, that would ever advocate moving to a system as bizarre as the US now has. Abortion has been functionally unrestricted in Canada for over twenty years and the costs are covered by government health insurance. Gay marriage is legal throughout Canada. There are greater ‘social safety nets’ for the unemployed and disabled. There are stronger restrictions on discrimination and free speech. The list goes on. There is just a lot more ‘government’ in our lives than in the lives of the average Americans. In this regard the policies of the Conservative Party of Canada are, in many ways, to the left of the Democratic Party of the US. Many of the economic and social policies advocated by Sarah Palin just would not fly in Canada. Her libertarian, small government, “government is there to protect, not to provide” may resonate in a few pockets of Alberta, but beyond that they are non-starters here. So there’s really no point in looking to her for leadership on many of those issues in Canada.
On the hot button moral issues she has a more nuanced position than is portrayed in the media. She clearly states that she is opposed to abortion in all cases, including those of rape, incest or ‘deformed’ fetuses, and would always counsel a prospective mom not to abort her baby. But she also clearly states that she would never want to send a woman to prison for having an abortion. Similarly she is opposed to gay marriage but she maintains a close and loving friendship with one of her roommates from college who now lives as a lesbian. As Governor she refused to veto a state bill extending spousal benefits to same sex partners and was excoriated by the religious right for not doing so. Her position was clear: the issue had been vetted through the highest court in Alaska and they had ruled that such a provision was required under the Alaska constitution and she was not going to go against what the highest court had ruled to be the law of the land. She told the right-wing activists that they had to get working to get the constitution changed and not waste their time yelling at her for something that was going to be forced through even if she didn’t sign it. Point well-taken. We could learn from her. It is likely more effective to educate and persuade than to use laws and sanctions if we in Canada are to regain the hearts and minds of the general population.
On energy and resource conservation, she has advocated very well-informed positions stemming from her expert knowledge and experience in energy management in Alaska. She firmly believes that you can love the land, protect it passionately and still make extensive use of its resources, while at the same time developing alternative ‘green’ sources of energy. While nothing she will ever say will endear her to the Canadian environmental movement, most of the rest of Canada know that our economy still depends far too heavily on resource extraction and export. Canada has little choice but to share a ‘wise use’ model of natural resources with Sarah Palin and our close neighbours, the Alaskans.
On international relations she aligns herself with the Reagan doctrine of “peace through strength” and is pushing for a robust role for the US armed forces in Afghanistan. The question here is not one of what approach is more appropriate for a Christian to support, but much more one of what is most likely to work and what to fail. The surge seems to be working in Iraq, but that does not mean it will work in Afghanistan. I’ve been to Afghanistan. It’s a world unto itself. It’s huge. Invaders never last long. Just ask the British and the Russians. Maybe a surge of 240,000 instead of 40,000 would be needed.  Maybe it would be best if the west just pulled out and adopted a practice of ‘containment’ instead, letting the tribes and warlords and Taliban fight it out and blasting them if they stepped too far out of line. Who knows? I don’t. But I don’t think that Sarah Palin really does yet either.
So on those issues that are just not our battles, let’s just sit back and shake our heads at the spectacle that is American political life and let Sarah and company sort it out.. On those where we do share a common ground, let’s be prepared to give Sarah Palin our vocal support and defend her against left/liberal attacks in Canada. And it would be a good idea to add her to your prayer list. She’s one very remarkable woman and she will need all the help and wisdom she can get.

Craig Stephen Copland
New York, November 2009