... wait, what?

[apocalypsos]

Pressed about what insights into recent Russian actions she gained by living in Alaska, Palin told Charles Gibson of ABC News, "They're our next door neighbors and you can actually see Russia from land here in Alaska, from an island in Alaska."

I really hope the little Siberian chick who lives in the house Palin's apparently watching for insight into Russians has the blinds closed in her bathroom, is all I'm saying.

Comments

[avallonia.livejournal.com]

Ha!

[cdybedahl.livejournal.com]

Won't it be fun to have her a septuagenarian heartattack away from controlling the nuclear arsenal?

[suaine.livejournal.com]

And yet, that still puts her half a world away from Moscow.

[sabra-n.livejournal.com]

Oh. My. God. The Gibson interview sounds more and more amazing the more I hear about it, and I really think Palin was handling herself quite well for the most part until now.

[anne-jumps.livejournal.com]

I know, right? I thought they were having Gibson do it because they thought he'd go easy on her or something.

[silent-sybil.livejournal.com]

That reminds me of a British guy I used to work with. He insisted Brits were more intelligent to Americans "because you could get to so many countries from there in just a little while." Because the opportunity for interaction existed, in other words, not because they did anything about it. How much are we wagering Palin's actually interacted with her "next-door neighbors"? (And let's keep in mind how many Americans don't actually talk to their neighbors at all, anymore...)

[regala-electra.livejournal.com]

But can you see Moscow which is three thousand fucking miles away where the heart of Russia's power lies?

Geography: You're Doing It Wrong.

[thebratqueen.livejournal.com]

Last night I had someone say to me, in complete seriousness, that Palin had more experience than Obama.

My brain broke. As did some of my faith in humanity.

[kimera.livejournal.com]

Hell, I can see Washington from *my* island. And they've just called an election here... hmmm. OH THE POSSIBILITIES.

[azurelunatic]

And we used to be owned by Russia, too!

In all seriousness, the proximity is something that's likely to make one more generally aware of Russia's presence in the global political field, and more likely to have local radio stations/papers/etc. talking about Russia, more likely to have visitors from Russia passing through the major airports (all two of them, none in Wasilla), more likely to have Russian taught as a language option in schools (my elementary school Russian has been reduced to "Nyet" and "Da", though I've picked up "ЖЖ").

However, fully 1/3 of my current grasp of Russian comes from good ol' SUP owning LJ now, and I'd wager that being an LJ user is only slightly less likely to make one aware of Russia than being an Alaskan is.

[fyrdrakken]

He might have been trying to make a point about American insularity vs. Europeans' inability to tune out the rest of the world the way we can get away with. It was certainly an eye-opener for me when I lived in London for a bit after college -- how close it was to all these other nations and ways of thinking and doing things, and how big a contrast it was to American solipsism.

I wouldn't have called it intelligence, though. Greater awareness, maybe, or a more global society.

[suaine.livejournal.com]

What? How? In what universe?

[rhyana.livejournal.com]

Good grief, after listening to the interview, I could actually hear Karl Rove playing with her puppet strings. Yikes!

[silent-sybil.livejournal.com]

Yeah, he definitely said "smarter." However, it does make a lot of sense. Everyone else watches America, for example, far more than we watch everyone else. (sigh)

[thebratqueen.livejournal.com]

Three excellent questions.

[apocalypsos.livejournal.com]

In all seriousness, the proximity is something that's likely to make one more generally aware of Russia's presence in the global political field, and more likely to have local radio stations/papers/etc. talking about Russia, more likely to have visitors from Russia passing through the major airports (all two of them, none in Wasilla), more likely to have Russian taught as a language option in schools (my elementary school Russian has been reduced to "Nyet" and "Da", though I've picked up "ЖЖ").

See ... yes, this. This would have been a better answer than, "I can see their house from here!"

[apocalypsos.livejournal.com]

I'm really waiting for someone to say that to me so that I can ask them if they think the mayor of Carbondale (the nearby town about the size of Wasilla) should be a heartbeat away from the presidency. Considering the current state of that hole, I'm thinking I'm not going to get a good reaction.

[azurelunatic]

It's something you just know, around those parts. There's this awareness that we used to belong to them, and that we could be first to go if they launched ze missiles, and yet there's a certain amount of tourism back and forth, we have sister cities in Russia, our scientists talk to their scientists about stuff only of interest in the frozen North (Dad sent care packages to one fellow; he visited them; they visited us). No one in Alaska has to have the Russians' fondness for vodka explained to them, though we don't have the long and blood-soaked history that makes for the political pessimism there. That sort of thing.

But I don't think Governor Palin is used to speaking to an Outside audience yet, and she's not a writer, and I wouldn't pin her as overly intellectual, and I would bet that her staff is McCain's staff and she's just been slotted in; I doubt she has an Alaskan who is used to Outside translating for her and helping her express herself in a way that the rest of the country can relate to.

I want to like her, I really do, because she's my homegirl, despite Wasilla being a few hundred miles away from Fairbanks. It's such a small state. My friend Shannon has met her. That's the kind of small state it is. But I absolutely don't want her in a higher office.

[apocalypsos.livejournal.com]

I have a feeling that if she weren't a VP candidate and if she were just, like, a friend of my mom's or something, I'd probably like her. She's a lot like Bush, in that I can't stand him as a president but if he were just some guy at one of my parents's parties he'd probably be a good time. (Unlike some people who voted for Bush, I don't exactly find "fun at a party" to be a major factor in voting for the person to run the country.)

But she's running for a position a heartbeat away from the presidency and based on the fact that her stance on pretty much everything is exactly the opposite of mine, I couldn't vote for her in a million years.

[jjloa.livejournal.com]

you now have northwest passage stuck in my head thanks to your awesome icon of awesomeness.

Just wanted to share :)

[azurelunatic]

Alaska is really a very culturally isolated state, as well as a geographically isolated one. It's somewhat isolationist, somewhat xenophobic, very resistant to change for the sake of change, and incredibly phenomenally resistant to the idea of manipulation from any outside source. One of the serious political hotbuttons is the idea of anyone from any other state attempting to influence local politics.

Even if one Alaskan does not agree with another Alaskan, we're still speaking the same language. Anyone who hasn't even been in the state for a whole winter is still a greenhorn. Anyone who doesn't stay in Alaska over the winter is a tourist (which is the same kind of bad word in Alaska that "snowbird" is in Arizona, despite the fact that the tourist industry is big business).

It really does take more adjustment than the average Alaskan would think about in order to talk to someone Outside who hasn't been immersed in Alaska. We do have the advantage that we've got US mainstream media streaming in, so we know the slang and culture -- it's just we have to learn to unpack all those uniquely Alaskan assumptions for people who don't live there.

[azurelunatic]

Exactly. She'd be a pretty fun neighbor, but if she hasn't been Outside enough to learn how to not talk like an Alaskan, she would be in for more of a steep learning curve than I want to see on the VP. And that's without getting into politics. Even after she's spun up, which can happen fast, she is about forty years of progress down the drain.