Apology for Sarah Palin

The year is 2011. At the Democratic headquarters of fictitious McClean County, IL, Thelma (55) Sarah (62) and Tanya (45) are stuffing envelopes for the upcoming elections and campaigns. To while away the time, they have been conversing about the general political climate of Illinois and the rest of the nation.

Thelma
Reform. Feh. Such a tired term.

Sarah
But it works, doesn’t it? I mean the term, not reform.

Tanya
Always make that distinction.

Thelma
(Looks at flier) Teddy is a good candidate, he seems to have a decent plan. I mean for a local election, he’s got name recognition-

Tanya
Like a first name basis. You must be really buddy buddy. (smiles and winks)

Sarah
No, he just happened to already have a successful campaign. Of sorts. (clears throat)

Thelma
Hardy-har. Come on, fellow envelope stuffers, we gotta work harder for our fellow-

Sarah
And woman, remember Cindy Feldstein.

Thelma
I said fellow, didn’t I? Non-gendered, look it up, Miss Gloria.

Sarah
Miss Steinem to you, twerp. (smiles)

Tanya
You call Cindy a woman? Good grief, she’s more a paper pushing bureaucrat than anything female.

Sarah
She’s a working woman, which often means that one can’t be as “female” as you might suggest, Miss shopaholic.

Tanya
It’s called shop therapy. I know it’s a weakness, especially in this economy, but come on. I already feel dingy enough going to the dollar store with my coupons for half off.

Thelma
I call that being smart. Too many economy problems right now, which is what Teddy… I mean Falston says in this lovely little flier we’re folding.

Sarah
(grabs flier from Thelma) Do people really read the mailings any more? Why aren’t we doing more stuff online?

Tanya
(grabs flier from Sarah) I usually would also opt for that, but this is just a local election. And, we’re the most stalwart Democratic workers Falston and Feldstein will find in this area.

Thelma
You mean old.

(Sarah makes paper airplane out of flier, throws it towards Tanya)

Tanya
Well? (dodges airplane) What if we have the AARP support they’re looking for? I’m not talking about just you two, but others who come into help are usually over sixty. I say don’t knock an alliance. We’re also in a more rural area were Republicans are around every corner. We’re not Chicago down here.

Sarah
(clasps hands together in prayer.) Thank God.

Thelma
And I thought I was religious. But come on, seriously now. Chicago gave us money, and they give us attention. Media attention. And a weird connection to Springfield.

Sarah
But we’re not either one of those, and they don’t count in this election.




Tanya
What are you talking about, they don’t count? Of course they count – Chicago is the great pro and con role model. As well as, our people have to mess with Springfield, even if it has to be via Chicago.

Thelma
You think that will ever change? (licks an envelope)

Sarah
Depends on how much our dear governor and future governors wish to bow to federal government for funding.

Tanya
Or lack thereof. (throws an envelope into the large pile)

Thelma
But there’s new ideas, like debt loans. Kinda like a bailout.

Sarah
A bailout for the state?

Tanya
They must be nuts thinking people would go for a bailout after what happened with the banks going apeshit with spending.

Thelma
But that’s just it. It would be the people this time, not the banks.

Tanya
But since it’s the people, even if it’s more money, it’s spread thinner. I don’t feel the paltry $100 or $200 they might get back in a tax return is enough. The government needs to forgive people’s debt. I mean, come on. The federal government itself has been running a deficit for how long now? How is that supposed to look to fellow debters?

Sarah
Crazy. (spirals finger at ear) And the music goes round and round…

Tanya
And it comes out here. (Pounds stamp on envelope) Amen sister friend.

Thelma
Eh, something like that. (Dirty look to Tanya)

Sarah
(Looks at flier) Now, we would have had better chances of mandates that made sense if Hillary-
Tanya
(Cuts off) Oh Hells no.

Thelma
Stop right there.

Tanya
Good god woman, let it go.

Sarah
Now, hear me out. I think she would have done a hell of a lot for female interest in politics. She-

Thelma
She’s still important, she’s still in the news, and if you want female interest in politics based on being the center of attention, you can find that in the negative sense – Sarah Palin.

Tanya
Oh, you just gave me back my envelope glue migraine.

Thelma
Now there’s a woman-

Sarah
That should be saved for special occasions. Point taken, I rescind my argument.

Tanya
Thank you.

Thelma
I think it’s an interesting argument.

Sarah
Mentioning that woman’s name is like talking about those who enjoy listening to Rush Limbaugh in the morning rather than drink coffee. Or, I would say in politics, she is like talking about politics in public – it’s not polite.

Tanya
Or religion.

Sarah
Oh lord, you had to say that. (swats at Tanya with a stack of fliers)

Thelma
Now what’s wrong with that? You think she’s going to start something?
Tanya
Now why would I do that? (defending herself against Sarah’s continued whacks)

Sarah
Because I can’t stand when you and Thelma fight over your differences.

Thelma
We’ve come to a truce about that. Last time we talked about this and had a problem, we merely agreed to disagree.

Sarah
(stops assaulting Tanya, settles in seat) With a slap fight involving a fish.

Tanya
It was two fish, more fencing with fish than a slap fight… Anyway, it wasn’t bad. Especially considering you just tried to maul me an army of Teddy’s face in print.

Thelma
Not bad? I smelled like haddock for a week. My dry cleaning bill was ridiculous for that damn coat.

Tanya
Oooo…. You naughty little thing.

Thelma
What? You think my swearing has anything to do with my faith? You are sparing, you little wench.

Tanya
No, merely teasing. No, really. It’s like trying to understand the incongruity of something like being Buddhist and Scientologist at the same time.

Sarah
Whoa.

Thelma
What? (stymied/sour look.) How can you be a Buddhist and a Scientologist at the same time?

Tanya
Well… My brother says it’s possible. And he practically lives with Tom and John in Clearwater, so shut your pie-hole.

Sarah
(bows) And there’s religious tolerance, ladies and gentlemen.


Tanya
Oh…

Thelma
You want tolerance? Sarah is a pillar of strength over there.

Sarah
Me?

Tanya
How?


Thelma
She’s married to a Republican.

Tanya
Oh that’s right. Roger is a bit… eclectic.

Sarah
(Nods) Yeah, I live with it. Don’t like to think about it unless I need to vent and need some angry sex. But it doesn’t mean I have to suck its cock when the GOP decides to makes a bad move. This whole health care vote has left my poor husband without a decent blowjob for a year.

Thelma
It’s like the reverse of Mary Maitland and James Carville – in party only. We still know that Mary is the one who wears the pants.

Tanya
Yeah, she doesn’t take crap. But damn, does she have to say it?

Sarah
Which is why Sarah Palin-

Thelma
Is a non-topic.

Tanya
But she’s just so damn pretty, you gotta admit.

Sarah
Yeah…


Thelma
Come on, what is it about looks? You of all people Sarah.

Sarah
What? I can’t appreciate aesthetics just because I associate myself in the feminist camp? You’re full of shit. You’re the zealot of modesty over here.

Tanya
It’s not looks so much as she would make a great angry fuck.

Sarah
Part of me is reviled, part of me is nodding. But lesbianism and Republicans only seems to go together in call girl situations, not actual ideology.


Thelma
Don’t you know you can still be a Republican and be a lesbian?

Sarah
No, it’s called militant dykes. (smiles)

Tanya
Now, hold on. Yeah, I’ve heard of those. They’re the Log Cabin Republicans, right?

Sarah
They actually exist?

Thelma
Not all feminists are Democrat.

Sarah
Not all Democrats are feminist.

Tanya
Which is why we’re here. Another group we can bring in.

Thelma
I mean, we still have to make sure the whole Lily Ledbetter Act takes some root.

Sarah
I still think the ERA has a shot-

Tanya
In hell.


Thelma
Amen. It’s dead as a doorknob, get use to it. We gotta take what we get.

Tanya
Like a momma grizzly.

Thelma
Isn’t that more a protective thing than nurturing?

Tanya
I’d say it’s more of a not-paying-attention thing. I still can’t let her live down the Turkey thing from Youtube.

Thelma
Or the reality show? Endless bits that just seemed to blur together.

Tanya
But she calls herself a feminist?

Sarah
What is it these days?

Thelma
What?

Sarah
I mean, what is a feminist these days?

Tanya
Can I be safe to say it is not Sarah Palin?

Sarah
But she’s not Phyllis Schlafly, who is a flat-out anti-feminist.

Thelma
Ew. That’s the best defense you can come up with? That since Palin’s not one kind of odd filth, don’t go and try to figure out that what kind of filth she is?

Sarah
I don’t know if I’d go so far as to call her filth. I mean, you talk about tolerance. Well, I’ll give you that she is a sort of odd role model, Palin that is. She’s bumbling, but she’s trying to be forceful and hopeful in a weird media campaign that makes everything seem weird, bizarre and fucked up.

Tanya
Well, true-
Thelma
But what does that say about her character? That she’s resilient? Or that she’s a glutton for punishment? How is that supposed to be good for women?

Sarah
I’d say it’s her attempt to take responsibility for a lot of the stupid things that do happen in politics. Especially on the national stage.

Tanya
By doing them? You’re suggesting the old, do what I say not what I do? If you can figure out what it is she says half the time.

Sarah
But she’s not technically doing them, nor is she in politics proper at this point. But she is one of the few women, not sewn to the Democrats by birth right, who questions being pigeon-holed. She’s no old school feminist, and she ain’t elegant in the way she talks, but her crazy-assed folksy demeanor seems to resonate with a bigger point that this country is in need of a female leader.

Tanya
(winces) But Palin?

Thelma
(rolls eyes) I hate to say it, but Sarah does make a valid point. I don’t say I agree with you completely though, I mean, come on. It is Sarah Palin.

Sarah
But what we’re talking about is a national figurehead. Look at her Alaskan record before she went national. She happened to do a fair amount of good, or so I’ve been able to tell. It’s the national stuff that made her seem nuts and stupid.

Thelma
So, what’s your point?

Sarah
(takes another flier and envelop) Stuff your envelopes ladies, because Cindy and Teddy need our help.

Tanya
Not Sarah? (nudges Thelma)

Sarah
(smiles, flicks others off) I didn’t say I appreciate having the same moniker as the woman. But criticize her all we want now. She’s not the one telling us how to clean our water from natural gas contamination, or how to save coal miners on a budget.

Thelma
And she’s not a Democrat.

Tanya
Yeah, I was just wondering about this.

Thelma
(at Sarah) I was almost starting to wonder if you were a Democrat.

Sarah
Just because I still like the teachings of 70s feminism and don’t bow behind the health care reform tactics of Nancy Pelosi, who would edge out the women’s caucus vote in favor of the Stupak clan on health care reform. (guttural yells) Oy! That pissed me off. But, it doesn’t mean I can’t respect Pelosi’s ability.

Tanya
That was a dirty trick on Pelosi’s part…

Thelma
But I think Sarah is trying to say it’s the Bart Stupak’s who have hijacked the party, not the diminutive moments of women like Pelosi. The conservative streak is starting to hedge out the ability for women to make a choice based on some religious ideology that does not speak for the rest of this country. Yeah, I said it. I go to church and I still think it’s the woman’s choice to choose what happens to her own body. Men should go fuck themselves.

Tanya
It often makes for better porn anyway. (smiles, Thelma looks disgusted)

Sarah
No, I’m not saying that at all, what Thelma’s saying. What I am saying is the parties are only as good as the members who are willing to work for change. Which is why I happen to like this county’s parties and their affiliations. It’s a network of diverse people who bring together local issues.

Thelma
And they don’t bicker about the partisan stuff once elected.

Tanya
Yeah, they usually just pick something else they don’t like about a person.

Sarah
But that’s politics in general.



Thelma
No defense of pragmatic politics from you? I’m disappointed. At least, what I try to find out of this stuff is a broader, or pragmatic, view. It’s why I still like figureheads like Obama.

(Tanya rolls eyes, Sarah glares, folds arms.)

I know, I know. He’s milquetoast in spearheading policy. But as a speaker, he gives a rousing speech when needed. And I think we don’t really listen to his speeches, for what they try to do. Or for that matter any speeches, to do the things that are mostly on our own shoulders as active citizens, anyway. Or hell. Human beings, for God’s sake.

Tanya
So why don’t we give more power to the speech writers than to the politicians?

Sarah
What? That’s anti-democratic, and you know it.

Tanya
They’re probably just not as pretty or as outgoing I guess.

Sarah
And you have to remember another thing about speech writers – Sarah Palin has them. And what have they done for her?

AWP seedlings

Just came back from AWP conference in DC, buzzing with ideas and new leads.
Current project ideas stirring about include a Tea Partier (male, revolutionary war costume) and a Code Pinker (female, black t-shirt, pink feather boa and matching tiara) who go through the odd sensation of being attracted to one another, while simultaneously separating through boasting about their causes, yet having a philosophical discussion that shows the scope of their goals within that group. In the background are both corporate/gov employees carrying signs with random protests on them, and military carrying props like toilet seats, balloons, lampshades and hammers. Occassionally they stop to play catch and do other things that don't mesh with the main conflict in the forefront. The main themes are absurdity with real/serious issues, and problems of lemming-ism tempered by the power of numbers of people organizing. I'd love to get someone like Travis or the Constellations to do some tracks for it.