As Jeff Poor reported, appearing on Fox News Tuesday night, Ann Coulter said what a lot of us have been thinking — that some of Sarah Palin’s most rabid online fans are doing her a disservice by imposing rigid pro-Palin discipline.
As Coulter noted, “…the tiniest criticism of [Palin] — I think many of your viewers may not know this — no conservative on TV will criticize Palin because they don’t want to deal with the hate mail. You say her voice is a few octaves too high, or perhaps Michele Bachman’s speaking voice is more modulated, and you will be inundated with enraged emails.”
RedState’s Erick Erickson agreed, writing: “For the past year, Palin fans have become an online fixture with more venom and insanity than the most rabid Ron Paul fan. They have not evangelized on behalf of Sarah Palin trying to lead people to Sarah Palin, they have freaked a lot of us out.”
Having edited a largely positive book of Sarah Palin quotes (“The Quotable Rogue”), I’m certainly sympathetic to many of Palin’s positions. But I’m more dedicated to intellectual honesty than to any one political candidate (or figure). I’ve defended her when her critics were ravaging her, but I have also criticized her when I felt she was in the wrong. And in so doing, it has been my observation that some of Palin’s most rabid defenders have unintentionally turned off people who might otherwise be predisposed to like her. “Pushing back” on journalists, bloggers or even regular folks on Twitter — can sometimes work. But it can also backfire. Supporters can become a problem.
This is not new. When Eugene McCarthy ran for president in 1968 as the anti-war candidate, it was feared that some of his most rabid young supporters might alienate voters (in this instance, it was because of the way they looked). This spawned the “Get clean for Gene” campaign — which essentially entailed McCarthy volunteers agreeing to get haircuts and take a bath.
We might be experiencing the modern, conservative version of this phenomenon (minus the bathing, of course). It’s important for candidates to have passionate supporters, but sometimes the people who are most inspired to help a candidate aren’t well-suited to be the “face” of a campaign. Sometimes the most dedicated supporters are the last people a candidate would pick to serve as a campaign spokesman. In the Twitter age — where everyone has a microphone — passionate online supporters can especially be a double-edged sword.
If Palin supporters really want to help her out, they would be well advised to take it down a notch. Don’t assume everyone is out to get you. Err on the side of kindness and understanding…