From the Department of Endless Rants: Self-Perpetuating Individualism and It's Media Lapdog

1. She still won't go away.
2. She still doesn't answer questions.
3. She still thinks she's the future of the GOP.

Sarah Palin Is Not The Future of The GOP needn't be published here. We have enough material on that.

I'm more curious as to what the implications of the new "permanent campaign" are, especially for Republicans. Yes, the White House Political Office, started by Bush, is slated to be nixed by Obama, but that won't keep Republicans from explicitly positioning themselves to be the next GOP nominee.

The role of the media changes faster than the 4 year election cycle and if I had to guess, I'd say you can expect cable news to start putting out new channels which cater solely to the next election cycle. Maybe they'll call it "The Decision Channel," I don't know, but I think you can expect that next.

What else might we expect?

How about partisan networks? I mean, MSNBC and FoxNews have been the de facto partisan stations so far, but what about partisanship de jure: "Democratic National Television," "The Grand Ol Frequency." I assume the FEC has a whole set of laws on this sort of thing, but if you've ever tried to read the FEC's rules on campaign donations (I gave it a sold 40 minutes before ripping out my hair) you know that any ConLaw prof at Harvard or Columbia could tear the thing apart if give enough time and money.

The fact that I'm writing this and that there are people with as many or less qualifications than I have writing similar things, all of which may some day become important, is extremely scary.

As someone who has had formal training as a newsman but quit because he only liked writing columns and making arguments, I know that we need real journalists who have real standards and make a real effort at "objectivity," if such a thing exists.

Getting a bit more abstract here, the way our country was set up institutionally was such that the people would be fairly removed from the process of governing, with reluctant allowances for a press that would be the people's token advocate and informant. "Democracy" and "freedom" were not the primary goals of our Founding Fathers. "Liberty" and "justice" were.

Suffice to say that the Bill of Rights, which if you ask anyone today to quote the Constitution they would surely quote the BoR, was never intended to grant the degree of licentiousness that now dominates America.

"Look at me, I'm an individual like the Marlboro man, I can do what I want with my guns and my beliefs. What you don't like it? It's a free country, do you hate America?"

(To be fair to Todd Palin, this is no different from the hipster in Riverside Park that sits in his torn-up shit-soaked jeans and ashes his cigarette on runners, like me, who pass by. Then when confronted about it, says "don't run near my bench." Your bench? Really?)

The point of all of this, which I think began from watching Sarah Palin on CNN, is that the way our country perceives politics is changing, and part of it seems to have derived from the general trend to self-righteous individuality that now, more than ever, requires politics to be marketed to each individual like it's a consumer product decision.

What makes things worse is that it's a self-perpetuating process. People, after being treated like an individual, start to actually believe they deserve to be treated like an individual. As the process continues, they not only think they deserve to be treated as an individual, but they think they deserve to be treated like a privileged/knowledgeable/important individual.

Why? Because we ask for their vote, tell them their thoughts on government are important, send them personalized e-mails electronically programmed to "[FIRST NAME/LAST NAME],"and then we let them blog about it and submit iReports to CNN.

I'm not exempt from this in the least. But at least I'm aware of it (as I am with the fact that this post certainly has its share of exaggerations).

Still, maybe if enough of us realize what's going on with the Gospel of the Inviolable Individual we'll be able to correct it and restore a more popular sense of what it means to have signed the social contract.

Then, maybe, CNN will dump its Palin 24/7 correspondents and Politico will nix its "Obamarazzi" coverage of everything the man does from the time he wakes up and takes his daughters to school at 9:47 in his SUV before he goes to the gym to run and do some chest while reading e-mails on his BlackBerry that now has a new colored rubber case to replace its old blue one, this one is red, but not too red, we think he might have wanted black...

Beneath Montpelier, James Madison writhes.