Sarah, She Wolf of the GOP

William A. Jacobson over at the Legal Insurrection blog speculated earlier this week about “The Obsession With Liberals’ Obsession With Sarah Palin”:

Charles Krauthammer has lambasted the mainstream (i.e. liberal) media for its obsession with Sarah Palin.

That goes double for liberal entertainers and academics, and triple for the left-blogosphere, which is nuts-in-the-head (that’s a precise medical term in Austrian) when it comes to Palin.

But this obsession is not a one-way street.

Admit it, many of us in the right-blogosphere are obsessed with liberals’ obsession with Palin.
…

It didn’t start out this way. But it has developed not because of who Palin is, but who the Palin haters are.

And yes, it is liberals, much more than even conservatives, who can’t stop thinking about her; consider the numerous polls over the last year which show Palin unable to muster a majority even among Republican voters, much less the general electorate, and yet the liberal-leaning media gives Palin more ink than any other figure in America except possibly the president himself.

All sorts of theories are proffered to explain this preoccupation. Just this morning the Washington Post‘s Jennifer Rubin spelled out the standard theory — that the “obsession” must be a ruse to elevate an unelectable candidate:

Much of the punditocracy is obsessed with Sarah Palin. It’s understandable on several levels. First, she makes for good copy and has a knack for coining catchy phrases (“death panels”) and new words (“refudiate” — it’s now in the dictionary). She is controversial and opinionated, so given the choice between, say, a story on John Thune and one on Palin, it’s a no-brainer to choose the best-selling author, TV reality show star and Tea Party darling. But conservatives suspect there’s also some mischief-making afoot — the desire by liberal-leaning members of the media and the White House to make Palin the symbol of the Republican Party, which they are convinced will translate into her presidential run, her nomination and a shellacking for the GOP at the polls in 2012.

While that theory might describe the goal of a few elite members of the Sarcastic Class, it’s fairly evident that most leftists truly do fear a Palin nomination, since they feel that none of the other current GOP hopefuls has much of a chance in 2012.

But what else could explain the liberal obsession with Palin? Everybody’s got their own ideas: Palin’s a Jungian archetype; she’s a Riot Grrrl; she evokes “status-anxiety”; every day produces another theory. How long before “Palin Studies” becomes a college major?

Sarah Palin at the Belmont Stakes in June

But really, everyone knows the real answer: it’s all about sex. I had once planned to make a post about this too-obvious thesis, but then I saw that Harper’s Magazine had a cover story called “Is Sarah Palin porn?” back in June, and so I shelved my idea, since someone had beaten me to it.

But then yesterday I finally got around to actually reading the Harper’s story and discovered to my shock that it’s not about porn or sex at all — that was just a catchy headline for an otherwise standard-issue leftist essay about how awful Sarah Palin is.

I guess it’s up to me, then, since no one else is willing to come out and say it.

Why are liberals obsessed with Sarah Palin?

Because she is their dominatrix.

I posit that American liberal men are, as a group, masochists in search of a sadist. Sarah Palin at first walked into the dominant role completely unwittingly, but once she grasped the erotic control she wielded over her opponents, she became not quite as unwitting about it as some may think.

Sexual kinks are a peculiar thing: they often make no logical sense to an outsider who does not share the fetish. How can liberals denounce Sarah Palin as a Nazi and a bitch and an idiot yet simultaneously harbor a masturbatory fascination with her?

There is a one-word answer: Ilsa. Actually, make that six words: Ilsa, She Wolf of the SS. If that doesn’t ring a bell, it’s the title of a pornographic exploitation film from the mid-’70s about a sadistic female Nazi officer who tortures and rapes concentration camp victims. If you’re familiar with the sexual subculture, you already know that this cult film is a favorite with masochists who require a cruel dominatrix (or at least the fantasy of a cruel dominatrix) for them to achieve sexual release. If you’re not familiar with the subculture of fetishes and sadomasochistic sex games, then you likely will find the whole Ilsa/Nazi/dominatrix thing completely mystifying and more than a little “sick.”

But it doesn’t matter that “normal” people don’t understand: this psycho-sexual pathology plays out right before their eyes every day, whether they’re aware of it or not.

To make it all clear for everybody, I have taken the original lobby poster for Ilsa and updated it to explain contemporary American politics:

(Click on the image or here to view it full-size.)

Do the liberals fear Sarah Palin? Yes. And that fear is the basis of their sexual attraction to her. They want — nay, need — to be dominated, not only because they are masochists, but also because it helps them adopt the morally superior underdog role in the battle of ideas.

Sarah Palin was dragged from obscurity into someone else’s sexual fantasy. She didn’t intend to become the liberals’ dominatrix: she was elevated to that position by submissives who finally found their perfect mistress. She was caught off-guard at first, angry and offended, but by now I think she understands, maybe even subconsciously, that she can use this role to her advantage. Liberals need someone to crack that whip? Crack! Do as Sarah says!