Palin's remarks were in the grand tradition of the professional wrestling call-out speech, and all that was missing were the cupped hands around her ears, listening to see what people were going to do when McCain-amania ran wild over them.  She took on those horrible 'experts,' 'pundits,' and 'power brokers' that have always counted McCain out and criticized her own small town virtue.  It was classic bait and switch.  The powerful Republican party, who just happened to be in control of the country for the last eight years, had suddenly become a separate entity from the nasty 'Washington elite,' as Palin described them.  Never mind that McCain has been lurking around Washington for the last 26 years, compiling a mediocre record in everything except for a long list of flip-flops to woo the red meat crowd that he needs to fulfill his Presidential lusts.  Never mind that Mr. Maverick, the great enemy of waste, has done nothing to stop the overall swelling of government, especially the ridiculously-bloated military budget.  

No, instead Palin painted herself and McCain as the great Outsiders, poised to ride into office and show the 'Washington herd,' a herd that she assured us McCain doesn't run with, that traditional American values of service, family and fairness were back in driver's seat.

Please.  As Thomas Frank pointed out in his great book, What's the Matter with Kansas?, Republicans have been playing the 'rubes' like this for decades.  The GOP is masterful at winning elections by riling up the aggrieved conservative base, concocting this awful 'liberal elite' that keeps them down.  You know the drill: Washington fatcats, liberal media members, and Hollywood stars all look down on the 'rest of us,' the hardworking families of America.  These liberals are not like us.  They hate our religion, our guns, and our desire to rehabilitate the lost American virtues of patriotism, faith, hard work, and family.  Republicans paint themselves as the outsiders, fighting for regular people against the decadence, waste, and hypocrisy of a nebulous elite.  

It all sounds good so far.  Except, as Frank points out, the Republicans never actually deliver for their base.  On the campaign trail, they promise to end abortion, return prayer to schools, reign in spending, and get the government out of the way so that taxes can be low and small businesses can thrive.  But have any of these things actually come to pass?  What has Dubya really done for the conservative base in his last eight years?  Well, thanks to 9-11, he hasn't had to do anything.  He has his manufactured wars to wage, giving him the excuse to let everything except the war machine go to pot.  With the true movement conservatives, their dreams are always deferred.  They never quite get Roe v. Wade repealed.  They never get that Constitutional amendment banning gay marriage or allowing prayer in schools.  They never quite get affirmative action swept away for good, or trial lawyers shuttered up.  And on the economic front, small farmers and businessmen are never really returned to a favorable position. Instead, corporate power continues to grow, income inequality surges, household incomes stagnate, and personal debt crests to alarming levels.  

Republican promises to their base never come to pass, because the rhetoric is not designed to further policy goals, but to win elections.  You will look in vain for much actual substance in Palin's speech last night.  She made quick reference to fair competition, private-sector projects, and domestic oil and natural gas development.  But for the most part, her speech was a morality play.  All the liberals want to do is increase your taxes, but we will end waste and give the money back to the people.  Hooray!  As if regular people's money is going just to the government.  People's money is going to the rich and powerful, with the help of the government, especially the Republicans.  There is no problem whatsoever with the private sector, at least that part of the private sector made up of huge corporations.  Palin and other Republicans always paint the elite as someone else, even though the majority of the corporate power structure is on their side.  

Will conservatives fall for it again?  Will they believe that McCain and Palin really care about them, the farmers, factory workers, and soldiers?  Will they vote for a party whose economic policies have accelerated the collapse of the household economy and brought America to the brink of fiscal disaster?  Of course they will, because a pleasing narrative is always preferable to the truth.  And while the Democrats are spinning their own narrative that ignores the more stark realities of peak oil and ecological collapse, you get the feeling that at least Obama is serious about real change needing to happen.