Just What Is It about Sarah Palin?

Just what is it about Sarah Palin that makes her such a threat to her opponents (both outside and inside her own political party)? Seldom has a politician seemingly come from nowhere to generate so much hate, disgust, love, and enthusiasm in the political class of America.

The Christian Science Monitor book blog has a nice summary of all the Palin book activity scheduled for this month:

Being released today is “Sarah from Alaska: The Sudden Rise and Brutal Education of a New Conservative Superstar” by Scott Conroy and Shushannah Walshe. The authors are reporters (Conroy is a digital journalist for CBS News and Walshe was a reporter and producer at Fox News) who were “embedded” on the Palin vice-presidential campaign trail.

[...]

On Nov. 12 comes “The Persecution of Sarah Palin: How the Elite Media Tried to Bring Down a Rising Star” by Matthew Continetti. Continetti is an associate editor at The Weekly Standard magazine. The book’s subtitle probably tells you all you need to know about the book’s political orientation but in case you’re interested, Karl Rove calls it “a tough, revealing look at how the bias or habits of liberals in the media led them to assault a political figure who shared neither their values nor background.”

[...]

On the 17th, just as Palin’s own book hits bookstores, readers will also be able to pick up “Going Rouge: An American Nightmare,” a collection of essays pulled together by two senior editors at Nation magazine. Here, again, the subtitle probably tells you all you need to know about the book’s angle on Palin, but if you need another clue, consider the fact that its publisher, OR Books, has a self-described “distinctive progressive edge.”

To make this all more confusing, however, is the fact that another “Going Rouge” is being published on the same day. That “Going Rouge” is a satirical coloring book by Julie Sigwart and Micheal Stinson who identify themselves as “longtime liberal activists.”

Longer range, journalist Joe McGinniss (”The Selling of the President,” “Fatal Vision”) is currently researching his own unauthorized Palin biography.

Personally, I don't get it. On the one hand, Palin's opponents seem so terrified of her potential that they are desperate to destroy her as quickly as possible and, on the other, her fans see her as the best possible chance to save conservatism. Perhaps it's because I'm conservative on fiscal matters and fairly liberal on social issues that I understand neither her appeal nor the anger directed her way.

One thing for sure: book publishers have to be loving her right about now.