Trump winning makes me wonder, Mccain lost but would Palin have come closer to winning

[La Lioness Priyanka]

she has almost the same sort of attributes as trump, open racism, a touch of theater, an outsider, clear lack of knowledge, an impressive ability to lie.

I think 08 would have been almost impossible for the GOP to win, because of GWB and because Obama is a rockstar, but i wonder if Palin had been at the head of the ticket would she have done better than McCain?

[David__77]

1. I definitely think so.

I remember thinking when McCain interrupted the woman calling Obama a Muslim and telling her she had nothing to fear with him as president, he did himself in.

[La Lioness Priyanka]

2. ain't that just the saddest thing.

[JI7]

3. no because she is a woman

And she was mostly ridiculed and not so normalized the way Trump was.

She deserved all the ridicule and criticism but so did trump. Trump actually deserves more criticisms.

[La Lioness Priyanka]

4. you are so smart

and so right!

i forgot how much people mocked her

[NTOZamboni]

12. He got plenty of criticism,

but I wonder if her gender just didn't have the same appeal to authoritarians. They want to obey a strong father figure. (Though the notion of Trump as one's father is ... nauseating.)

[JI7]

15. he did not get the ridicule that Palin got. Palin was treated as a joke and there wasn't this need

to do the same to Obama or VP anytime something negative was reported on her.

Trump behaved horribly at the debate but the media talked about how he did well the first few minutes .

yes, gender does have to do with it but that includes why they felt ok in ridiculing palin but not trump. and trump deserves the ridicule more.

[louis-t]

5. I've always asked, "why is it that repugs always

gravitate toward the dumbest person in the room?"

[brer cat]

8. So that there is no one around who is smarter than they are. nt

[louis-t]

19. I suppose they would rather have a beer with their 'president'

than actually have a country they can be proud of.

[brer cat]

20. You might as well

put a period after country. There may not be one at all when trump is finished.

[HassleCat]

6. Maybe now, but not then.

I guess she might project the right image now, but Republicans regarded her as too crazy to be veep back in 2008. How times change, huh?

[PoliticAverse]

7. Nope. She actually doesn't have his manipulation abilities. n/t

[Crunchy Frog]

14. Agreed. He's a consumate con man. She's just not on the same level.

[RonniePudding]

9. The deplorables were still in the larvae stage in 2008

They weren't ready yet. It took 8 years of a bi-racial president to get them fully in touch with their inner racist.

[JI7]

10. trump brought it out. remember that McCain defended OBama as a person and an american

romney did not play to the bigots either. he ran on economic issues. and romney is mormon also which many of them don't like.

both romney and mccain were never liked by many in the party either. they only ended up winning the nomination because the crazy candidates split the votes .

but if gingrich had been the nominee in 2012 it would have been very ugly .

and add in the media that trump had like no other candidate ever.

[RonniePudding]

13. Yes, my point was this was a voting bloc that saw white patriarchy threatened

And challenged by the election of a bi racial president. These feelings only intensified during his presidency. Trump tapped into that, and molded it into something resembling a constuiency.

The whitelash dynamic is yet another reason why this country utterly disgusts me. This is a man who worked tirelessly for every American for 8 years with grace and dignity. His reward was Trump. It's unspeakably sad and irritating for those of us who still love and admire President Obama.

[geek tragedy]

11. About the same, really. She drove turnout for that ticket. McCain would have lost

much worse had he picked someone more conventional and responsible.

[JI7]

16. like 2012 with ROmney and Ryan ?

[oasis]

17. Palin is a "deplorable magnet". She definitely would get their votes. nt

[triron]

18. except perhaps the premise.

[Willie Pep]

21. I don't think the time was right for a right-wing populist candidate.

The Republicans were reeling from the Bush years so they were on the defense in terms of being perceived as status quo. This year was the opposite in the sense that the Democrats were perceived by many as representing the status quo although Obama clearly had a way better record than Bush.

The biggest difference, though, is the build-up of anger on the Right. There seems to be way more racism and sexism out there now than in 2008, especially on the Internet. Maybe this is just a factor of the growth of social media but there was nothing like the Alt-Right in 2008. Racists and sexists were mostly confined to weird subcultures. Now they are out in the open and have taken over many spaces online. I look at comments sections now and think "what the heck happened?" Even in the offline world I sense a real anger toward "PC culture" and "social justice" that was not as prevalent in 2008.