Palin's Rise Proves GOP Just Doesn't Care

If the polls are right, Republicans are about to lose the election, and when that happens Sarah Palin "will reign as the party’s crown princess,” writes Jay Bookman in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. That would be a travesty, because Palin epitomizes the reason Republicans are falling from favor: “The Republican Party hasn’t taken seriously the responsibilities of governing.”

If Republicans “simply cared as much about governing as campaigning, the country might today be reaping the benefits of great prosperity,” Bookman posits. Instead, they’ve made good on their campaign trail cocktail of tribalism, rigid ideology, and a disdain for governance, to disastrous results. Palin is the ultimate symbol of those tendencies. “This country needs a more effective Republican Party,” writes Bookman, but “Republicans have to change, and they show no sign of doing so.” (More Republican Party stories.)