My Tuned In column in this week’s print issue of TIME looks at Sarah Palin’s Family Guy feud and its irony: Palin had her own favorite rhetorical device turned aganst her. Palin’s strength as a politician has been to use identity politics, drawing her authority from her biography (military mom, special-needs mom, small-town native, etc.) rather than resume credentials. When she called a Family Guy storyline about Down syndrome an insult to her son, then was smacked down publicly by the voice actress, who actually has Down syndrome, she was for once outranked by someone with a superior biographical claim:
Now, Palin and her defenders could argue that Friedman is simply one woman with Down and cannot decide for everyone — disabled or not — what is and is not offensive. That response, by the way, would have the advantage of being correct. But it would also implicitly undermine Palin’s claim to authority. She would then be just one more military mom, one more teen mom’s mother — one more hopeful pol looking for attention.
Of course, she’ll still get the attention. As, I suppose, my having written the column proves.