Washington DC, August 28, 2010

by Salena Zito

Palin represents not only the anti-establishment, as so many are wont to refer to her brand of politics, but also the anti-elite. She did not attend an Ivy League university, as did our last four presidents. She attended four colleges over five years (from 1982-1987) and, while some view this as evidence of a lack of intellectual curiosity, it might be thought of more appropriately as a mark of tenacity and resiliency.

“Like many of our past politicians and presidents – Democrats Andrew Jackson and Harry Truman especially come to mind – she pulled herself up by her bootstraps and followed her rising star to the national stage,” says Brown.

Read the rest of this great piece here.

(Tony Lee is a conservative writer who lives in Virginia. He coined the phrase “the pinks” to refer to cookie-cutter consultants. Follow him on twitter: @TheTonyLee. — MA)

I hadn’t seen Sarah Palin speak in person since the 2008 elections. If one just watched or read mainstream media accounts of her paid speeches and appearances since then, including some accounts that have been featured on this site, one may have come to the conclusion that Palin was just a money-hungry ex-politician devoid of conviction, half-heartedly speaking to various interest groups and causes to line her pockets and/or raise her national profile to peddle books that she didn’t even write herself.

Read the article at The Atlantic