One barometer of the conservative movement’s attitude toward the election is the Weekly Standard‘s cover selection. Two weeks ago, the cover was a cartoon of McCain and Palin speeding along, with text asking "Can They Catch Up?" (Bill Kristol’s answer: "of course.") Last week, the cover was a spooky pre-Halloween shot of a ghoulish White House, with text warning of a "Nightmare On Pennsylvania Ave." (Bill Kristol’s word: you should vote for John McCain because of his taste in movies.) This week it’s a profile of Sarah Palin. (Kristol didn’t write anything for the issue.) If there’s a political graveyard, the Standard is whistling past it.

Fred Barnes might be the only reporter who’s actually stupider and less coherent than Sarah Palin. Longtime New Republic staffers would reminisce around the office about how Barnes, a former TNRer, used to rewrite GOP press releases with minimal revisions. It’s actually easy to pity Barnes, as he lacks a basic self-respect. After all, the guy wrote a fawning Bush biography after Bush nicknamed him "Barney," which is what Bush calls his dog.

That’s all background to establish a general principle. While I see in theory the logic of sending a borderline-retarded journalist to lionize a particularly vapid politician, with Barnes, you’re just going to end up accidentally running something that reveals Palin’s basic unfitness for public life. Most of the piece attempts to answer why the GOP likes Palin so much, but Barnes can’t figure it out ("Palin, as best I can describe it, exudes a kind of middle-class magnetism…") so he just quotes a bunch of Republicans who like her. Then he sort-of brings himself to write that Palin’s ascendance is the silver lining of a probable defeat next month, but he backs away from conceding that point, even though it’s the implicit premise of the profile. 

 But that’s just subpar journalism, nothing remarkable. Nor is it actually harmful to Palin’s ambitions, which she’s pretty open to admitting. ("We’ve got to be assured we have enough people in the party who will live out those ideals and it’s not just rhetoric. Otherwise, I’d be wasting my time. There are a lot of things I would and should be doing.") But then comes the moment when Barnes and Palin discuss her disastrous interviews with Charles Gibson and Katie Couric:

I asked Palin whether she’d do things differently if she could repeat those weeks. She answered by silently mouthing "yes." When two aides–we were on a McCain-Palin bus with staff and security–said "yes" aloud, she chimed in, "Yes yes, yes, yes."

 I resist the temptation to comment. Is this actually a ratfuck in disguise? Does some editor at the Standard actually want to expose Palin as an empty suit, dependent on aides for what to say to a sympathetic reporter? Or is this a wink-and-a-nod symbol to the GOP, like, Hey guys, we can mold this one’s core political identity like we did Bush’s! (Sorry, I just saw W. last night — don’t waste your money.) Either way, any liberal in the country should start praying that the GOP nominates Palin in four years.