David Theiss

Sarah Palin, if you haven’t noticed, has been in the news a lot lately.

On account of her book being released this week, Sarah Palin has been sitting down with numerous nightly and morning news anchors to take part in softball interviews consisting of questions on topics ranging from the acrimony of the 2008 presidential campaign to Levi Johnston in Playgirl.  And with all this new found exposure, I’ve been reminded of why I love Sarah Palin to begin with.  I remember why each time I see her on television with her Kawasaki 704 glasses (retail price $450) talking about how she’s just a “regular gal,” smiling from ear to ear, I can do nothing else except do the same – I smile.  I remember why every time I see Sean Hannity’s eyes light up with boundless love and infatuation, or hear Rush Limbaugh’s heart start to go pitter-patter each time she utters such timeless catch phrases like, “you betcha!” or talks warmly about her “traditional American values,” I couldn’t be happier.  Or when Fox News anchors go out of their way to somehow wedge her name and Ronald Reagan into the same sentence, and then go even further out of their way to make sure you know they’re not actually comparing her to Reagan when they compare her to Ronald Reagan, I jump up and down like a seven year-old on Christmas morning.  The fact is, Sarah Palin might be my all-time favorite conservative politician, and she has been since the second I found out she was going to accompany John McCain on that magical presidential ticket two years ago – ever since then, I’ve been deeply and madly in love with Sarah Palin.

A recent Newsweek cover asks the question, “How Do You Solve A Problem Like Sarah?” and immediately I think, what problem? Exactly what problem are they seeing that I don’t? Sarah says she’s speaking out to help save this country – to restore it to the principles that it was founded on when guys like Washington, Jefferson and Adams were running things – and I couldn’t agree with her more.  Just think of the good that could be done for this country if the mainstream liberal media would just leave ol’ Sarah alone and let her spread her message of – ummmmm -

Now, in the interest of full disclosure, I should say that I am a Democrat.  To be honest, I’d consider myself a fairly liberal guy – not crazy liberal – but solidly liberal.  So why, in light of that, would I be so full of Palin Power?  The answer is simple: there would be no faster way to destroy the nut-bag, conservative, anti-government, paranoid, tea-party movement, than to let her talk and talk and talk until she can talk no more.  The more she says, the more people realize she has approximately the same amount of depth as her 3-inch platform heels.

People like Rush Limbaugh like to say that the reason Democrats and the media like to make fun of Sarah Palin is because we are scared of her.  They believe that Sarah Palin is potentially the strongest candidate to take on Barack Obama in 2012, or at the very least, the movement’s most qualified leader to spread the message of small government and what are referred to again as “traditional American values” (AKA the overt fear of all non-white people and culture).  When the truth is, we make fun of her because she, quite simply, just isn’t real.  She’s a shamelessly crafted caricature that appeals to the lowest common denominator of American instincts.  Beyond her smile, hair-sprayed ’do, and rote recitations of Reagan platitudes, there’s absolutely nothing there.  No message – not a single original or unique idea.  Absolutely no vision for America.

A year or so ago, the media assaulted her for not knowing what the Bush Doctrine was, twelve months later, they’ve all but stopped caring.  The hard questions are gone.  The conservative women crying sexism are almost silent.  Sarah Palin has gone from a central figure of political discourse to a novelty talk show act whose entertainment value to most falls squarely in between “Jaywalking” and “Stupid Human Tricks.”

And to say any Democrat is afraid of her is to miss the point.  We love her.  We hope that the 60% or so of the American electorate change their mind and start to like her.  We hope that she runs for president and we hope she gets the nomination.  The summer that the Palin For President campaign bus rolls through town will be the summer of endless entertainment.  Suburban soccer moms will cheer as she rallies them against the evils of gay marriage and for the untapped wisdom of racial profiling – they’ll shed cheers of joy when she lectures the administration on the perils of overspending while forgetting George W. Bush’s Medicare Part D.

And I’ll cheer along with them.  Because there is no surer way to deliver 4 more years of Democratic control of the White House than to trot her and her family out on stage every night.  To give you a picture, a Sarah Palin campaign would look a little like what Dan and Rosanne Arnold would look like had either of them decided to run for president.  An updated version of an 80′s sitcom that everyone is a little embarrassed to admit they ever watched.

But today, don’t you think that is the very definition of Must See TV?

You betcha!

Bruce Springsteen crowd surfs back to the stage during his November 10th performance in Clevleand, Ohio.

What: Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band Concert

Where: The Quicken Loans Arena – Cleveland, Ohio

When: Tuesday, November 10th, 2009 – approx. 8:20 PM to 11:20 PM

As anyone who has seen him live knows, a Bruce Springsteen concert is one part rock’n'roll and one part spiritual sermon.   The line between rock star and preacher gets blurred more than a few times during the course of a single  performance, and when those dual roles can meld together and become one, his music can become something bigger and something special – it’s when he goes from simply rocking the house, as he says, to “building a house.”

I was fortunate enough to get to see Bruce Springsteen live for the second time in my life, both times with my dad, this past Tuesday, and we were both absolutely blown away by the performance.  I was able to see him in Cleveland in 2007 on the Magic Tour and was really impressed by the energy and enthusiasm Springsteen and his E Street band brought to his (sometimes 30 year-old) material and how the crowd, of literally all ages, still responded so strongly and passionately to him.  And while I really enjoyed that concert two years ago, it was nothing compared to the three hour epic he put on Tuesday night.

For the final stretch of this US tour, it was decided that instead of force-feeding new music to crowds, he would instead build a set list almost exclusively of his tried-and-true classics – and for a select number of crowds, he would play entire albums cover to cover.  Incredibly, on this night, Cleveland was treated to a concert waterlogged with virtually every Boss hit a fan could ask for including the entire 1975 classic album (and in my opinion, the greatest record ever produced), Born to Run.

While I could go through a blow-by-blow of every song – detailing what I loved and what didn’t go so well – I’ll spare those details and instead give a quick overview of the highlights:

• A new song about Giants Stadium (“The Old Girl” as he calls it), and the opening song “Wrecking Ball” was an appropriately gravel-choked and nostalgic way to open the show.  Hear the new song, performed in said Giants Stadium, here.
• While “Thunder Road” and “Tenth Avenue Freeze Out” were great in their own right, the Born To Run set didn’t truly take off until “Backstreets.”  This is the street corner poet storytelling music many Springsteen fans love and, because he truly doesn’t write songs like this anymore, miss.
• The “Meeting Across the River” and “Jungleland” pairing was amazing – you could practically smell the wet Jersey pavement in the arena.  The crowd was virtually still during trumpeter Curt Ramm’s bluesy “River” riffs and got star-struck during Clarence Clemons’ sax solo in “Jungleland“ by way of some well placed spotlights and disco ball.
• Bruce then collected signs requesting songs from the crowd and filled a few of those requests, playing rollicking renditions of “Red Headed Woman,” “Pink Cadillac” and the emotional “Back in Your Arms” – all were great.
• He ended with the crowd pleaser “Badlands” before coming back out for a pseudo-encore which included the staples “Dancing in the Dark,” the fun and folky “American Land,” and finished the night up with the bombastic “Rosalita.”

By the time it was all said and done, about three hours had passed since the first chords rang through The Q and everyone seemed supremely satisfied and more than a little exhausted.  Many people walking out, some with Springsteen concert shirts dating back to the mid-’70′s, were calling the show an “all-time great” performance.  And while I doubt it surpasses the legendary 1978 Agora performance (which many Springsteen aficionados agree is his best live performance ever), it still was an incredible and unforgettable time.

See the complete set list here.