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Domestic issues Election 2008 McCain Politics

A Wink and a Wagging Finger

Tom Perrotta explains the unique appeal of Sarah Palin in Slate:

[Sarah Palin] engage[s] in the culture war on two levels—not simply by advocating conservative positions on hot-button social issues but by embodying nonthreatening mainstream standards of female beauty and behavior at the same time. The net result is a paradox, a bit of cognitive dissonance very useful to the cultural right: You get a little thrill along with your traditional values, a wink along with the wagging finger. Somehow, you don’t feel quite as much like a prig as you expected to.

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