First, it’s a much more central location and thus more convenient.

Second, think of the money we’d save on air conditioning!

Finally, once you gaze upon those busts carved out of a mountain, one might obtain a bit of perspective and realize the pomp, circumstance, and grandeur of a Washington monument or the reflecting pool in the mall is dwarfed utterly by the grandeur that is the vastness of this nation.

Ain’t gonna happen, I know, but I can dream.

– Max

I used to spend a bit of time in the “banana belt” at Rapid City–did quite a bit of business with Prairie States Life
which is headquartered there. Mt. Rushmore is one of those things that’s truly more impressive than advertised–first time I saw it was at night overhead flying in from Denver
with it all lit up–hadn’t known they did that at night. Quite a sight! Fortunately I was first there when they had the original elegant wooden WPA era bldg & cafeteria with that wall of glass that you see in Hitchcock’s “North by Northwest” before they tore it down and put up that Albert Speer-like semi-Fascist stone and concrete monstrosity. The old structure blended with the site so well…Naturally I made all my business trips in the summer–can’t think of why, tho–heh.

Kris, I wasn’t intending to paint with such a broad brush and I apologize if you felt I was painting out of the lines in the that regard. However, I think we both know there are folks in the coastal urban areas that have no idea what the rest of us are like, and consider themselves our betters. That was the group I was trying to reference.

I’ve *met* these people. My wife is an artist, we’ve gone to gallery openings and such events in the past. All black tie and small talk and eating cheese and drinking wine that tastes like, um, prune juice past the sell-by date. Celebrities from the movies, newspapers, television all around, flashbulbs going off like triple-A around Hanoi.

I’m not the brightest bulb in the chandelier, certainly not the most social of animals, but in all my travels I’ve never felt as much a turd in a punch-bowl as at those gatherings.

Wasn’t the dress or manners, it was the ignorance. “You’re from?” “South Dakota.”

I could almost feel the chill in the air. I wasn’t one of them. Half thought South Dakota was somewhere near Nevada, the other half was sure we were to the north but wasn’t certain we had indoor plumbing.

It was most palpable by the media folks. The only thing they knew about my state was that Tom Daschle wasn’t re-elected. Other than that, they were clueless. One might think they’d at least remember Mount Rushmore, or the Rosebud Indian Reservation, or perhaps a ballot issue to outlaw abortion.

Nope. We’re beneath notice. We don’t count.

Again, we’re not of their tribe. And each night I thank God that I’m not of theirs.

– Max

Mr. Xenophon, I hope that I wasn’t speaking with gall when I referred to the narrowness—I meant in the sense of “focus”—of Palin’s *policy interests*, not her experience. In the interviews that I watched, she clearly was not familiar with many of the economic or foreign policy questions on which she commented. With respect to Russia, she could not describe any sort of interaction that she had had with Russian officials during her tenure in office. Again, I don’t think that this mattered because she was not going to play a lead role on those issues, but every weakness comes in for a great deal of attention during a national campaign, especially when the candidate tries to unconvincingly demonstrate that she has no such weakness. It’s not about malice; it’s about probing for weakness in a candidate and seeing if you can hit upon something that captures the public’s attention.

Oh, and I forgot in my last comment to thank Lex for what he wrote. I have long enjoyed reading this blog both for the strength of its content and the civility of its language.

Yo Virg,
Re: #31

“First, she immediately interviewed with Couric, a major mistake on two levels. One, she had just said she cared not a whit for the opinions of people like Couric, and thus by the simple act of acquesing to the interview in the first place, ”

So V-man, I she didn’t make that call about interviewing with perky Kate. McCain’s campaign made that call. The staff was doing their level best to “handle” her.

There was a month or more of ‘Sarah in chains’ when it went really sour and the worst of the MSM damage to her was done.

Then the whole ‘unleash Sarah’ cry went up, they turned her loose and she started firing on all 8 cylinders — SNL appearances, Drill Baby Drill and so on.

Bottomline? McCain and his staff was huge part of the problem.

Sarah on her own? Does fine. Just like in this most recent interview.