The thing I find fascinating is that Sarah Palin was originally popular because people could relate to her as someone they knew from their everyday lives: the bubbly, over-achiever hockey mom who really gets involved in the community. Why she's fallen, hard, is that people realized she was in fact another person they knew from their everyday lives: that crazy mom who turns even the PTA into an insane obsessive power-play and forms weird hostile rivalries she executes through byzantine yet childish plots, seasoned with a dash of Fear of Anything Different.
This weeks's topic, selected by Michael, was change. I figured I should go with the season, and go with the political flow. Let's give honors to...Ken for next week. Ken, pick it and put in comments!
If you want to read this the way it really should be formatted, click here for the Scribd version. It's not radically different in appearance, except that the dual dialog is better laid out.
Oh, and yes. This would have to be animated. Assume Hanna-Barbera style.
Change We Can Believe In
INT. STAGE - DAY
(JOHN MCCAIN and SARAH PALIN in front of a green screen. He just can’t get away from them.)
JOHN
People like to bandy the word 'change' around a lot. My opponent--
SARAH
Our opponent.
JOHN
(flinching like a frequently whipped dog)
Yes Sarah. Our opponent wants you to believe change comes from diplomacy, compromise, and hard work. That’s simply not true.
SARAH
That’s right, John. Real change comes from magic rings.
(John and Sarah brandish IDENTICAL RINGS on their upheld fists.)
SARAH (CONT’D)
Magic rings stolen from alien teenagers!
JOHN & SARAH
Wonder Twin powers, activate!
SARAH
Shape of...a Bald Eagle!
JOHN
Form of...a puddle of dirty water! Just like the water on the floor of the cage I spent six years in being tortured daily. When I was a war hero.
(Sarah and John transform into a bald eagle and puddle of
water respectively. Still able to speak, though.)
SARAH
I’m a small-town girl with small-town values. Values like honoring the symbol of our great nation and honoring our great war heroes.
JOHN
Barack Obama called my running mate a pig. Does she look like a pig? No. She’s a majestic eagle.
(Sarah-eagle touches wingtip to John-puddle.)
JOHN & SARAH
Wonder Twin powers, deactivate!
(In a flash, Sarah and John revert to their normal forms.)
SARAH
The big-city elites want to take your guns away.
JOHN
They want to teach your preschoolers about sex.
SARAH
They want to take your pickups and SUVs away.
(Sarah and John touch rings...)
JOHN & SARAH
Wonder Twin powers, activate!
SARAH
Form of...a completely safe and unthreatened polar bear!
JOHN
Shape of...a piece of Arctic glacier, undisturbed by liberal lies about global warming.
(Sarah and John transform again. Sarah-bear stands atop John-ice.)
SARAH
My opponent--
JOHN
(timidly)
--actually, he’s my opponent, Sarah.
SARAH
Right. Our opponent wants you to drive a hybrid. Or walk! He wants you to believe in global warming. Well, I’m from the great state of Alaska and I can tell you, it’s
not getting any warmer!
JOHN
Well, it is getting warmer, Sarah. But the science isn’t conclusive as to whether our actions have anything--
SARAH
--I said it’s not getting warmer, John!
JOHN
Right. Sorry, Sarah.
JOHN & SARAH
Wonder Twin powers, deactivate!
(Sarah-bear and John-ice touch and transform.)
SARAH
Every day I wake up, I have to worry about the threat of Russian invasion. Barack Obama wants to disband the military and send all your children to madrassas. That’s not change we can believe in.
(beat)
This is change we can believe in...
(Sarah and John touch rings again...)
JOHN & SARAH
Wonder Twin powers, activate!
JOHN
Shape of...a bucket of tears. The tears I cried each night after the Vietcong had tortured and beaten me trying to make me turn against America. America, the greatest
country on Earth!
(John transforms into a bucket of tears. It’s magic. Don’t ask.)
SARAH
Form of...a moose!
(Sarah transforms into a moose.)
JOHN
That’s quite a set of antlers you’ve got there, Sarah.
SARAH
What? Oh. Moose! Where’s my gun!
(Sarah-moose runs in circles a few times, finds a tophat, pulls a lion out of it...)
SARAH
Guess I don’t know my own strength.
(Sarah-moose pushes the lion back in and pulls out a rifle and shoots herself!)
JOHN
Sarah! Sarah, are you alright?
(Sarah’s dead.)
JOHN
Oh, great. Now I’m stuck like this.
EXT. PODIUM - DAY
(Bunting and flags everywhere on this cold January day. It’s inauguration day. JOE LIEBERMAN stands behind a dais holding John-bucket-of-tears up to a microphone.)
JOE
John, John!
(calling off stage)
Someone get me a hotplate! The President’s frozen again!
BLACKOUT
I grew up in a small town too, Sarah. Mine was a bit bigger than yours, around 17,000 residents, but then again we didn't even have a mayor. Being an old New England town, we had Selectmen. But you know what? Despite my humble beginnings, I'm not an elitist snob.
You are. Why is that?
You devalue the experiences of urban dwellers, coastal denizens, and the cosmopolitan citizens of this great land, as though we're not "real Americans."
The 18 million people who live in the greater New York metro area are somehow less authentic than the Iowa farmer or Montana miner.
The 18 million people who live in the greater Los Angeles metro area are somehow less American than the Alaska oilman or Colorado rancher.
The families large and small, young couples starting out, and unwed mothers in Boston and Miami, Chicago and Dallas, and the Twin Cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul don't matter. Only the soccer mom from Berryville, Arkansas or the hockey mom from Wasilla, Alaska matter.
Time and again, your party accuses Barack Obama of being an elitist. Time and again your party accuses tens of millions of Americans of being elitists. But what could be more elitist than insisting the experiences of the small-town few are more valid than those of the majority?
I can't blame you for this; this battle is as old as our republic. Jefferson and Hamilton fought over the same ground, over the same definition of America. In the end, Jefferson's gentlemen farmers lost to Hamilton's bankers and industrialists. They lost in blood and pain and death in a war pitting brother against brother. But still you and your fellow travelers fight on, trying to turn back the clock and make an America that never was.
I frankly am tired of the fight. You lost. You lost over a hundred and forty years ago.
The South did rise again: in financial centers like Charlotte, North Carolina; industrial centers like Spring Hill, Tennessee; and tech centers like Huntsville, Alabama. What won't rise again is your brand of small-town elitism.
You are as much an American as I; no more no less. You are as much an American as Barack Obama; no more, no less.
A final thought: the next time you find yourself in your hometown, stop in at Pataya Sushi for a California roll. When you're done, take a short ride down Highway 3 to the Starbucks and have a latte. Don't be afraid of the steamed milk and espresso: it's as American as pizza and poi, teriyaki and tacos.
