~Ever since she received the VP nomination, Sarah Palin has represented herself as an average working class American, a hockey mom, someone who knows what it's like to sit around the kitchen table and worry about how to pay the bills. But more and more information trickles out that belies this image.
~Much has been written about the $150,000 spent on a wardrobe for Palin and her family.* No doubt they needed a wardrobe boost, no doubt Palin needs to look professional. But as the NY Times points out, her "look" has changed little--it just comes with designer labels these days (be sure to check out the slide show.) Why? What's more, according to NPR a Salon reporter went out to see what you could get for $150,000 and realized that she wasn't up for the task--she couldn't easily spend that amount. Could there be some excess involved, you think?
~NPR also pointed out that Palin is not without her own resources--she and her husband have assets worth aroung $1.5 million. In this day and age, it's unlikely that anyone will get very far in the political arena with out considerable financial resources; what galls me is the way Palin portrays herself as "ordinary", not an "elitist", a working class person. Excuse me? That just doesn't work anymore.
~What I don't understand is why people continue to cheer her on. If anything she is a mockery of the average working class people she claims to reprsent.
~*I don't think the clothes issue is particularly sexist, either. I would be equally critical of a male candidate who spent THAT MUCH on clothes, expensive men's suits not withstanding.
5 comments:
It's just an astonishing amount of money. I can't process it.
Seriously, even at $1000 a suit, it would take 150 of them.... And I could easily see $1000 suits and wouldn't begrudge them spending that on her. But was this $10,000 suits?!?!
I keep wondering just how big her closet is.
(See me shaking my head.)
It boggles the mind. I was at Nordstrom's yesterday, meeting a friend for lunch in the little cafe, and wandered around looking at clothing, since I no longer fit into my old business drag. Even looking at the stuff that I wouldn't begin to consider because fo the expense, it was impossible to rack up that kind of a total. So to comfort myself, I bought two shirts at $30 each (half price) and thoguth how glad I was I wasn't running for anything.
It feels rather like the Third World dictators who wear expensive clothes and live in palaces because "my people expect it of me." Yeah, those Third World dictators who orginally came into power because they were "men of the people."
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