She made three interlocking points. First, that the United States is now governed by a "permanent political class," drawn from both parties, that is increasingly cut off from the concerns of regular people.
Political dynasties are nothing new, as John Quincy Adams, James Harrison, and G.W. Bush would likely be willing to agree. The number of political dynasties, oligarchs, and Representative- and Senators-for-Life seems to have grown almost to the point of saturation.
Second, that these Republicans and Democrats have allied with big business to mutual advantage to create what she called "corporate crony capitalism."
These are the guys Teddy Roosevelt used to refer to as "Malefactors of Great Wealth." There's a difference between them and the guy trying to make a living with his grocery store or shoe shop.
Third, that the real political divide in the United States may no longer be between friends and foes of Big Government, but between friends and foes of vast, remote, unaccountable institutions (both public and private).
Monopolies are like that. Being the only game in town, they'll make sure no other games come into town. Meanwhile they'll charge all the traffic will bear and they'll do as they damned well please. It doesn't matter whether the monopoly is a utility, an investment bank, a labor union, or government.
In supporting her first point, about the permanent political class, she attacked both parties' tendency to talk of spending cuts while spending more and more; to stoke public anxiety about a credit downgrade, but take a vacation anyway; to arrive in Washington of modest means and then somehow ride the gravy train to fabulous wealth. She observed that 7 of the 10 wealthiest counties in the United States happen to be suburbs of the nation's capital.
There used to be a theory of "convergence" among political "scientists" who were against U.S. military spending, that the Soviet Union was becoming more capitalist and the U.S. was becoming more centrally planned. Eventually both sides would meet in the middle and we'd all have whirled peas. The Soviet Union went out of business, but the party who was pushing "convergence" continued trying to make the U.S. "converge." My own opinion is that we're now "converging" with Bangladesh. I'm thinking of adding a "Corruption & Degeneracy" subject heading.
Her second point, about money in politics, helped to explain the first. The permanent class stays in power because it positions itself between two deep troughs: the money spent by the government and the money spent by big companies to secure decisions from government that help them make more money.
Money is power. It doesn't matter if it's your money as long as it's your power. In fact, it's easier to spend other people's money than it is to spend your own.
"Do you want to know why nothing ever really gets done?" she said, referring to politicians. "It's because there's nothing in it for them. They've got a lot of mouths to feed -- a lot of corporate lobbyists and a lot of special interests that are counting on them to keep the good times and the money rolling along."
The function of government -- call it Chicago style or Tammany style or Washington style -- is to let contracts. Campaign donors and supporters get contracts, heavy duty donors become ambassadors. Politicians' relatives get consulting contracts to make sure that permits are issued and mountains of paperwork are complied with. "Government services" are doled out by hard-eyed time servers to people sitting docilely in hard plastic chairs holding strips of paper with a number on them.
Because her party has agitated for the wholesale deregulation of money in politics and the unshackling of lobbyists, these will be heard in some quarters as sacrilegious words.
Constitutionally, protecting the free speech rights of one group while suppressing the rights of others is a no-no. If politicians are for sale a proper government doesn't discriminate among buyers. If We the People are lucky the information on who owns a particular politician will be available for perusal.
Ms. Palin's third point was more striking still: in contrast to the sweeping paeans to capitalism and the free market delivered by the Republican presidential candidates whose ranks she has yet to join, she sought to make a distinction between good capitalists and bad ones. The good ones, in her telling, are those small businesses that take risks and sink and swim in the churning market; the bad ones are well-connected megacorporations that live off bailouts, dodge taxes and profit terrifically while creating no jobs.
"Merchants" are looked down upon by the snotty classes. They have been since at least the days of Homer. Today they're dismissed as Babbits or Rotarians or Shriners, not good for much other than kicking in campaign funds. "Profits" are dismissed as mere "greed," rather than as a reward for hard work. Proper young liberals are aghast at the idea that corporations are treated as persons in limited respects under the law. But once you're "too big to fail" you've got a lock on the government udder. For some reason nobody ever brings up the idea of breaking up any organization that's "too big to fail."