Noonan and Brooks actually fall over themselves trying to compliment Palin on the modest success of being coherent, but these excerpts are striking in that someone might have written them as withering, sarcastic criticism and instead they are supposed to be a celebration of her virtues. Noonan complains that Biden showed too much forbearance, but this is exactly what Noonan and Brooks show in their efforts to tip-toe around the obvious that for all her mastery of the non-answer and glittering generalities, to borrow Halcro’s language, she did not do very well. Incredibly, her fans don’t seem to mind debasing the meaning of excellence if it allows them to call what we saw last night excellent. There ought to have been some acknowledgement that it didn’t matter, that McCain was already fumbling and crumbling under the weight of his own mistakes, but instead we are treated to newfound, baseless enthusiasm:

"Sarah Palin saved John McCain again Thursday night. She is the political equivalent of cardiac paddles: Clear! Zap! We’ve got a beat! She will re-electrify the base. More than that, an hour and a half of talking to America will take her to a new level of stardom."

Well, there’s certainly no accounting for why people become excited about celebrities, but it seems to me that if the base is electrified any more it will begin to suffer permanent damage to its already clogged heart. Noonan also notes that Palin’s “triumph” (no, I’m not making this up) comes on the heels of the defeat of the bailout bill in the House, but the bill comes up again today and is more likely to pass. The bill is “festooned” (that word again!) with what are euphemistically called sweeteners–rather like the sugar one might add to mask the bitter taste of poison–and so it is unlikely the House will reject it again. She says that the rejection of the bill, which the Senate just passed Wednesday with both McCain and Biden voting yea, “could not have helped Mr. Biden,” but it was the Republican candidate who needed the help and McCain’s support for the measure has ensured that he cannot tap into the populist backlash against it.

American Conservative