Sarah Palin was a brilliant choice for the VP slot for McCain:

Sarah Palin was a brilliant choice for the VP slot for McCain:

There are two main roles women play in our media environment and there is one consistent behavior. The roles are object of sexual desire and nurture/caregiver. The consistent behavior is that they cede authority to men. Call this the “Good Woman” mythology. If you doubt this, go sit down at your TV set and watch the next 10 commercials. Watch who makes the decisions, who drives the cars, which gender turns to which gender for answers, and what gender the Voice of God (the narrator, the voice of authority in the commercial) is.

These mass commercial media representations have been consistent for decades, and are part of the mythology that women are taught virtually from birth. The message women receive on a daily basis is that if they look hot, take care of the kids, and don’t get too big for their britches, they will get True Love and happiness. (This mythology, not incidentally, is the value system that keeps most of the companies advertising in the mass commercial media profitable. No one makes money telling women that their intelligence is a thing of value. But Revlon makes a shitload of cash by telling them that the right eye shadow will win them Prince Charming. If you are relying on your audience to buy into that, it’s best to start teaching ‘em young, and keep reminding them of that daily.)

Hillary rarely played the mom card, shot for the top spot on the ticket, and was, unfortunately, publicly outed as a failure in terms of object of sexual desire. If she was doing her “job,” as Chris Rock suggested, all Monica would have had access to was one of the balls – maybe. For that, Hillary was vilified. Even if she’d won the Democratic primary, she’d have been slaughtered in the general election. That is one of the reasons Obama got the nomination.

Palin knows her place – No. 2 on the ticket – and bills herself as a “hockey mom” who wasn’t afraid to strut her stuff in a beauty pageant.

Which of these two women come closest to the “Good Woman” mythology?

Not only that, Palin comes in virtually criticism-proof. She can hide behind her children anytime embarrassing facts start to show up. Spend money from the state taxpayers to take her daughter on a junket to New York? Hey, she’s just trying to raise a family, the best she can! Quit picking on her! (I find this one really ironic, I once wrote a series of articles that ended up with a city manager going to prison for misuse of travel funds. It’s called misappropriation of public money. Or, more bluntly, stealing.)

Polls show that Palin’s pick has drawn white women to the McCain ticket. Of course it does. For these voters, Palin’s selection validates the decisions they’ve made in their lives. The obvious contradictions – I’m just an ordinary mom with five kids, so give me a job where I’ll never have time to raise them, my family’s off-limits unless I’m parading my pregnant unwed teen daughter on stage – don’t matter when it's not about facts, but feelings. For these voters, selecting the best person for the Oval Office isn’t the question at hand. It’s about the narrative and how it makes them feel. Besides, it always works out in the end on Lifetime TV. Why wouldn’t it work out here?

Well done, McCain folks. Sheer cynicism – and sheer brilliance.