The Franken-Palin yin-yang

Photos: wdcpix, MnIndy

Joe Conason contrasts the rise-and-fall paths of Al Franken and Sarah Palin to devastating effect in an essay for TruthDig this week, charting the polar-opposite pair’s divergent trajectories across long decades and over fateful days just past.

Conason starts by sketching out contrasting origin stories in Manhattan and Wasilla (leaving aside, for the sake of argument, Franken’s true upbringing here in flyover land). Then the pair’s wholesome vs. wacky wiring gets crossed somehow.

But somewhere along the line, everything changed for both them and their parties. Franken left showbiz behind to prove himself a serious policy wonk as well as a devoted family man; Palin transformed herself and her family into a reality television show.

The entertainer became a public servant—and the public servant became entertainment.

It’s a mirror-image transformation of personalities that plays out at the national partisan level as well, as Conason describes it: Democrats, turtle-like, plod along, building their party with solid workhorses like Franken, as Republicans race ahead only to meet defeat by dilly-dallying with silly rabbits like Palin.

The contrast crystallizes with the ascension of Franken and the implosion of Palin over the last week:

Beneath the glittering surface, she exhibited profound weakness. Behind the joking persona, he showed moral and intellectual strength.

[Via Norwegianity]