[image: Sara Palin's house, malialitman.com]

The Sarah Palin Syndrome

Anyone who has banged his or her head against the publisher’s wall in trying to break through to the “lucrative” world of selling your Great American Novel to discerning readers knows that the wall is real even though prospects for great sales of your book are not. That is unless you are some sort of celebrity and your ability to read and write in any language are questionable at best. If you are not a known commodity, publishers would much prefer to catch a quick nap than to read or even accept your manuscript as ballast for their hot air balloon. It’s the law of the jungle.

So what are you to do to find your place in the inglorious world of book sales? The answer today seems to be “run for President.” Or at least run for Congress or for governor. Get that pretty little face of yours on the covers of a few magazines and on television. It helps if you look like a potential bed room partner, real or imagined. But if you can speak in complete sentences, beware. Or if you can actually write, double beware. There are unemployed ghost writers at the beck and call of any publisher who are also creative enough to gin up a background of honor or deceit for you that you never lived and never will. They know all the tricks in getting your fraudulent tome on the New York Times best seller list. And the beauty of this course of action is that their name will never appear on your book nor will it mar your new status and good name in the word of publishing

I call it the Sarah Palin syndrome. The fact that she parlayed her celebrity status into 10 or 20 million dollars of personal wealth is real. That is a pretty good consolation prize vis a vis the Vice Presidency. Her new home out there in Arizona is real. And she is welcome—nay invited—to appear again and again for preposterous speaking fees to step up to microphones and teleprompters hither and yon and say “you betcha” whenever the urge overtakes her, or if her bank balance starts to sag.

Oh hell, I’m not picking on Sarah. It all goes “ditto” for Bill and Hillary Clinton, for G.W. Bush, for anyone who served in any White House administration, even for outright weasels like Dick Cheney. You can also name the movie star and you will find a side income in the millions of dollars for appearances, books, and assorted sales of shoes, household items, even to attaching their name and mug shot to persons, places, and things that they know not one iota about. It’s what their agents call an “entitlement.” It comes with the territory.

Now to the point at hand, aka known as the new list of contenders for the pot of gold at the end of their rainbow. In particular, I am referring to the 20 or so contenders for their party’s nomination. They are not real contenders, and they know it. Not for the presidency anyhow. They want their version of 15 minutes of fame. That version has a price tag of about $1 million dollars per year in side income that is soon to become their main income.

Take Mike Huckabee for example. Photogenic he ain’t. Interesting is not a word that fits his persona. Sex appeal? Get real. He knows not of what he speaks, except for how much he now thinks he is worth. His new side income is around $1 million per year according to those in the know. I’m sure Arkansas does not pay its governors a salary more than one-tenth that amount.

Spread the tentacles of this phenom outward and it is known as “cashing in.” It’s the new American Dream for wannabees—those who are brazen enough to go for the brass ring for losers. It has no connection whatever to talent, or doing, or creating, or anything of real value to you or me or them. It is standing the real American Dream on its head, while shaking it, then catching all the change that falls to the ground.

The ultimate insult in this game of “gimmee gimmee gimmee” can be found on the tranquil playing fields of golf. There you will find little boys with their toys (a bag of clubs and little white balls) where they go about doing their version of brain surgery—hitting said ball into a hole in the ground. They are well paid for their time spent out in the open whilst scratching themselves in places that might get you or me arrested.

But it is not their actual playing that is paying them so well. It’s all those little patches they wear all over their clothing that make them look like unemployed clowns. They pull down hundreds of millions of dollars annually for wearing those patches. A few years ago Tiger Woods pulled in about $120 million per year from five or six of his “sponsors.” I think they are paid extra for making a 5-second commercial if they say nothing at all.

OK, what is my point? you may be asking. Is there anything inherently good in paying Bill Clinton $250,000 for saying something that is forgotten almost as soon as he says it? I think not. That money would be better spent for a thousand other purposes that might include feeding the hungry or it could benefit us all. And the same can be said for every politician, every sports player, every actor, and every person upon whom we confer celebrity status for whatever reason and then line their pockets with more money than they are able to count.

Am I angry because I haven’t the good looks, or the connections so that I might pull down my million dollars or so? Hardly. I have no need for wealth or opulence. And that is not a cop out. OK, then who am I to judge others?

I do not judge anyone. I do condemn greed whenever and wherever it rears its ugly head. I have never met an instance in which greed ever worked to the benefit of anyone. It’s that simple. I do sometimes enjoy poking fun at greedy people. If they can’t handle a little fun, that’s also their problem. In this age of poverty and excess, we each must ask “When does much become too much, and too much becomes greed?” Or more to the point about our collective sensibilities “Don’t they even suspect we are on to them?”