NEW VOICE COLUMN UP, following on the reaction of rightbloggers to Sarah Palin, particularly her threat to sue reporters and writers who "defame" her. Needless to say they think that's great. I remember a time when these guys were all about defending blog scribes from the attacks of the powerful. Of course, that was before Palin became their professional victim, someone who may be cast as the underdog in any encounter despite her position and privileges.

Ross Douthat's column today about Palin follows the general strategy of talking about her as a symbol rather than as a politician. He talks about what sort of person he imagines her to be, and what sort of person polls suggest she appeals to, which relieves him of the need to consider her disastrous national political career as something for which Palin might at least share some responsibility, and leaves him free to fantasize a Republican mythology in which a Palin figure who has no characteristics except a noble common touch, the love of hardcore supporters, and female genitalia is harried to destruction by the demons of the Left because of them. The actual story, of a local pol who fared badly in the national spotlight, is too painful for him to contemplate. Though she proved a turkey on the ticket, Douthat will no doubt treat her inevitable reemergence as the resurrection of a phoenix.