by Harry Lacey

Created on: November 14, 2008   Last Updated: December 16, 2008

After she was announced as John McCain's running mate, Sarah Palin barely went a day without making some kind of verbal slip-up. In fact, her interview with Katie Couric has already become the stuff of legend; derided by commentators as being misguided, ill-informed and, at times, downright wrong, her struggles to justify her selection as the vice-presidential candidate often appeared comically bad.

But are these negative interpretations of her speech-making and interview technique merely so-called 'liberal media bias' or something of more substance? It is, of course, true that media outlets tend to select more negative soundbites when putting together profiles - this was evident across the board during the last election, from coverage of the speech Joe Biden supposedly plagirised from British politician Neil Kinnock to that of Hilary Clinton's claim to have come under fire in Bosnia. Mistakes are easy currency - they are infinitely printable and repeatable, and are bound to appeal to those members of the general public who relish hearing politicians slip up and fall flat on their faces. It could be argued that Sarah Palin has simply been the target of media attacks much more than others involved in the past campaign. Her manner of tough-talking certainly seems to have become popular with the voting public - despite being branded a liability by prominent figures within the Republican party, she often seemed to be the popular favourite. Her appearances at rallies often garnered higher attendances than John McCain's, and when she spoke the audience were clearly rapt with attention, hanging on her every word and eager to hear more; they never seemed all that concerned with Palin being unable to pick out a magazine or newspaper that she read regularly, or her reliance on Alaska's proximity to Russia as the bedrock foundation of her foreign policy experience. They were concerned simply with her hard stance - her gift of communication appears to lie within her ability to communicate points clearly, simply and powerfully.

There can be, however, no ignoring the frequency of her mistakes, and the sheer depth of their seeming ignorance. The repeated cycle of garbled comments about job creation during the infamous interview with Katie Couric is a prime example of just how she always seemed to fall down - without a clear grasp of the facts, a politician will always look out of their depth; but without an understanding of the simple factors that determine the facts, they come across as being stupid. Which is unfortunate for Sarah Palin, as her understanding often appeared to fall well short of the standard most people would expect of someone so close to the Presidential hotseat.

Perhaps if she can do a bit of reading up before the next election she might have a better chance of being taken seriously; with a little more eloquence and some hard facts, she could still go far.

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