Using The Hood Ornament

Lowry loved Scheuneman's speech. But the import is as follows:

Palin is an authentic, powerful voice of the populist right and in the speech she implicitly connects its call for limited government and sensible fiscal policy with America's role as a world power. Palin can play a very important role in channeling the inchoate populist anger out there in a responsible direction, which makes it all the more important that she engage on the issues in a serious way and avoid rhetorical over-kill.

There is, of course, nothing authentic about Palin - including this speech dictated to her by the neocons.

She remains a monument to cynicism, opportunism and deception. But her endorsement of maximal American military projection across every inch of the globe is an important backstop for establishment conservatism's embrace of endless empire. It helps them claim the mantle of limited government, even as they embrace open-ended, trillion dollar nation-building halfway across the planet, and expand government's reach and incompetence at home. She's a starburst meant to hold the teetering coalition together. And Lowry's still tumescent.