One of them reached the grandest stage in her profession by virtue of her charm and very-good looks, only to be judged harshly upon that stage for her ignorance and her intolerance. Despite her second-place finish, she earned a new constituency that was far more adoring (and, potentially, much more lucrative) than her old one. In the end, she found herself distracted by the glittering promise of a new career as a celebrity moral scold, to the point where she could no longer be bothered to fulfill her obligations in the lofty yet insufficiently high-profile position she had already attained.

The other one, it turns out, is Carrie Prejean.

Now that summer’s here and her Miss California crown is gone, this year’s spring queen of “opposite marriage” finds herself playing Miss Congeniality in the headlines to another, even kookier Christian-right hottie. Sarah Palin’s sudden, “I-don’t-wanna-be-governor-anymore” cri de coeur of last week caught the political world by surprise, but it really shouldn’t have; for months now, Alaskans seem to have sensed that there was no way they could keep her down on the farm after she’d seen Paree. (I suppose the reference works better if you substitute “frozen tundra” for “farm” and “Bible Belt” for “Paree,” but let’s move on.) The day-to-day drudgery of running the nation’s coldest state clearly paled in comparison to the spotlight that will no doubt be trained on her for perpetuity – as long as she has the media savvy to high-tail it to the Lower 48 ASAP.

I was going to use the phrase “good sense” in place of “media savvy” in the previous sentence, but last week’s impromptu press conference seems to have closed the book once and for all on the use of the words “good sense” anywhere near “Sarah Palin.” With her ever-present props children at her side, she threw excuses at the cameras like a toddler pitching a bowl of spaghetti at the wall – not so much to see if anything sticks, but to see if anybody’s still paying attention. (more…)