The Palin Hope
by Donald Devine
Issue 116 - September 24, 2008

The selection of Sarah Palin as vice-presidential nominee can only be compared to Ronald Reagan’s speech for Barry Goldwater in 1964, only she was already a governor when she first entered the nation’s consciousness. Both revived faltering presidential campaigns but much more importantly they offered hope for a very battered philosophy of limited government that seemed to have run its course in the days of reckless spending and regulation that preceded their dramatic arrival on the national scene.

Let us be very frank. National government non-defense spending has hemorrhaged to historic highs during the last seven years under George W. Bush and Republican Congresses. Spending increased by an all-time modern high of 25 percent over his first term and an additional 14 percent so far the second, vastly exceeding any period since Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society – plus adding the largest new entitlement since Goldwater’s opponent, in the form of Medicare prescription drugs. As far as regulation is concerned, the last year of the Carter Administration produced 73,258 pages of regulation, which Reagan cut back to 50,616 pages. By the end of the Clinton years, the number of pages was back up to 64,438. But the Bush Administration ended 2007 with 72,090 pages – almost back to where Reagan began.

This was the record under self-professed conservatives. What hope could there be for the future of limited government when this year’s candidates were hesitant in describing themselves as such, or even hostile to it? Had the Founders idea of a limited Constitutional government finally run out of steam? It seemed that no one could defend it any longer.

Along came Governor Palin. There she was in Dayton being announced by Sen. John McCain, setting her philosophy and credentials simply and concisely. She introduced herself as “your average hockey mom” but in presenting her family proved she walked the walk of traditional values. She was “elected to the City Council and then elected mayor of my hometown, where my agenda was to stop wasteful spending and cut property taxes and put the people first.” Could Reagan been more simply eloquent? “As governor, I've stood up to the old politics as usual, to the special interests, to the lobbyists, the Big Oil companies and the good-old-boy network.” Conservatives did not need more, but she was just as eloquent and committed to principle in her speech to the Republican Convention.

Maybe there was some future for limited government conservatism after all. Sure, much of the exaggerated media and campaign hype over Palin will disappear. Those on the right gleefully proclaiming polls about one-in-four Hillary Clinton voters saying they were now more likely to vote for McCain will be disappointed. At the end of the day, voters go for or against the top of the ticket. The polls also show that Palin’s selection has lifted McCain’s support among independents and women generally but, again, when it comes time to vote they will decide by whether they want Barak Obama’s or John McCain’s policies. Clearly, the Palin selection has invigorated the conservative base and that effect will last but even that could be mitigated by a very severe McCain public abandonment of principle.

The rap on Gov. Palin is her supposed lack of experience. In pure fact, she has more executive experience than Sen. Obama or even Sen. McCain. Only executive experience – and deep understanding and character - really count. That is why only two legislators have gone directly from the Senate to the White House. People inherently know legislators do not make decisions, only cast votes, usually on compromised positions. Executives must make decisions. And decisions mean the losing parties get angry, so executive popularity is never near unanimous, although Palin’s is quite high. Legislators try to please 100 percent of their constituents – and are usually quite successful. That is why incumbent senators rarely lose and executives are much more likely to be defeated for re-election,

Take a full-page Washington Post headline blaring, “As Mayor of Wasilla, Palin Left Trail of Bad Blood.” That is what happens when executives decide. Someone will not like it whatever one does. Who are quoted in the article? Not surprisingly, it is defeated candidates, lobbyists, bureaucrats and activist liberals. As governor, she produced the same response from politicians and bureaucrats. While the media promote this line to attack Palin, it actually shows she has been successful – and, undercutting its other theme that she has no real experience. To the contrary, these stories prove she can make tough decisions, that she can say “no.” Saying no takes character. As we know going back to Aristotle, democracies cannot survive unless its politicians can say no to special interests and even the people or spending will explode and sink any government no matter how otherwise wealthy.

Actually, I was introduced to Ms. Palin in 1999 when I was recruiting activists for a conservative organization. I was overwhelmed by her intelligence, knowledge and judgment, to say nothing about her commitment to conservative principles. She was willing to discuss limited government philosophy and impressed this professor with her depth. I met her again to recruit her for Steve Forbes’ campaign for president and was again overwhelmed by her questioning and inquiring mind and her willingness to commit to a dedicated conservative even though it would probably not benefit her politically.

In fact, Gov. Palin is criticized for being too ideologically rigid in her thinking because an executive needs a flexibility of temperament to be a great leader. Ronald Reagan was not only principled he knew when to be prudent. After all, he was willing to deal with the Soviet Union, America’s proclaimed enemy, when he understood the great threat to U.S. security represented by its nuclear arsenal but also that Mikhail Gorbachev could be dealt with. In her highly-discussed extended interview with ABC’s Charles Gibson, he tried to both expose her supposed lack of knowledge and her lack of prudence by attacking a strong point of her experience, dealing with neighboring Russia. After first getting her to agree Russia was wrong to attack Georgia, he tried to get her to agree with a long series of questions topped by whether the U.S. should be “going to war if Russia were to invade” again.

Gov. Palin was cool and handled it just right:

What I think is that smaller democratic countries that are invaded by a larger power is something for us to be vigilant against. We have got to be cognizant of what the consequences are if a larger power is able to take over smaller democratic countries. And we have got to be vigilant. We have got to show the support, in this case, for Georgia. The support that we can show is economic sanctions perhaps against Russia, if this is what it leads to. It doesn’t have to lead to war and it doesn’t have to lead, as I said, to a Cold War, but economic sanctions, diplomatic pressure, again, counting on our allies to help us do that in this mission of keeping our eye on Russia and Putin and some of his desire to control and to control much more than smaller democratic countries. His mission, if it is to control energy supplies, also, coming from and through Russia, that’s a dangerous position for our world to be in, if we were to allow that to happen.

No rashness, several critical qualifications, and in general subtle thought – but she won’t be pushed around either – just like Reagan.

At the end of the day, it is results that count. What has she done to limit government? Mayor Palin cut property taxes by three-quarters and eliminated small taxes such as the personal property tax and the business inventory tax. Sales taxes increased with growth as consumption tax advocates anticipate and she refused a new city hall and library while meeting essential needs. She made some enemies – and if the bureaucrats do not disagree, an executive is not doing anything worthwhile. On the other hand, total spending grew in the rapidly expanding town.

As governor, she cut more than 10 percent off the state budget proposed by her predecessor and vetoed $268 million in state projects and imposed objective performance standards. Some have mentioned a so-called windfall profits tax on oil but it was a project of the previous administration that she amended in a less regulatory manner. Yet, total controllable spending has increased under Gov. Palin. As one state conservative critic put it on spending, the best that can be said is that she has not had time to complete her agenda and she has put some funds into a “savings” account (unique to Alaska) and did not spend it all.

Gov. Palin has demonstrated that she has the intelligence to survive whatever the media or her opponents throw at her. If Sen. McCain is elected, she will undoubtedly make a fine vice president. Whether she will be another Reagan, it is too early to tell. Only if she loses and must complete her term as governor or wins and succeeds as president will conservatives know if the hope is fulfilled. We know President Reagan really believed in limited Constitutional government because he did absolutely reduce nondefense discretionary spending over his two terms and did cut total domestic spending relative to Gross Domestic Product. But there is good reason to hope Gov. Palin might just fill those very big shoes.

Donald Devine, the editor of Conservative Battleline Online, was the director of the U.S. Office of Personnel Management from 1981 to 1985 and is the director of the Federalist Leadership Center at Bellevue University.