Conservatives (some) getting honest about Palin

One expected it from Andrew Sullivan, who has been in the tank for Obama since at least last December and has been on a special mission against Sarah since she first emerged. But of late we have seen any number of conservatives, often after giving her a pretty good chance, come around to the position that Sarah Palin is about as far from being qualified to hold high office as one can imagine. It was certainly a factor in Christopher Buckley, WFB's son, endorsing Obama and getting fatwahed out of his father's old magazine. But as usual, the most eloquent judgment has come from Peggy Noonan, all the more devastating for being fair-minded and almost gentle. Money quote:

But we have seen Mrs. Palin on the national stage for seven weeks now, and there is little sign that she has the tools, the equipment, the knowledge or the philosophical grounding one hopes for, and expects, in a holder of high office. She is a person of great ambition, but the question remains: What is the purpose of the ambition? She wants to rise, but what for?

Peggy sees the Palin choice as an example of the infantilization of American politics. We want people who drop their g's and say "mom and dad,"people who are "like us" rather than adults we might consider looking up to. I might suggest it could be more like a sign of the decline of the empire.