The politics of victimhood

Josh Marshall on Palin's future:

What very little shot she had as a future presidential candidate (and it was a much longer shot than I think many realized) is over. She's done. She's back to what she was -- a small person looking for someone to be angry at.

Well, she didn't have to look far. Now she's angry at all the people who are criticizing her decision to resign as governor. As she said on Facebook recently,

How sad that Washington and the media will never understand; it's about country. And though it's honorable for countless others to leave their positions for a higher calling and without finishing a term, of course we know by now, for some reason a different standard applies for the decisions I make.

I've quit jobs before, although it never occurred to me to inform my boss that I was doing it for my country. And I'm hard pressed to name an elected official who was praised for quitting in the middle of a term. But whatever. She's the victim.

This whininess is of a piece with Megan McCain's recent appearance on Bill Maher's show, when she argued that Obama is blaming too much on the Bush administration. When guest Paul Begala shot back that Reagan blamed Carter for everything, McCain replied, "You know I wasn't born yet so I wouldn't know." Begala then retorted, "I wasn't born during the French Revolution but I know about it." McCain, having been exposed as a fraud who couldn't back up her arguments, decided to play the victim at that point: "You clearly know everything and I'm just the blond sitting here."

So there's the tactic. Say something stupid. Get criticized for saying something stupid. Say that the critics are persecuting you and are evidence of what's wrong with this country. I don't think this is a great way to get elected to anything. But if your goals is to make liberals mad, this is pretty effective.