NO. 22 WASILLA WARRIORS
HIGH SCHOOL 1978-1982

After a normal adolescence Sarah goes to high school where her Dad was a teacher and mom a volunteer and part timer in the school. She she is interested in sports and dreams of one day becoming The female equivalent of a sports caster like Howard Cosell in the mean time she played woman’s basketball , softball and other sports. She was thankful for the feminine movement which made woman's sports programs possible. Her dad was coach of the basketball team.
During these years of growing up with her siblings she takes pleasure in the outdoors, athletics, religion and family life including hunting moose. Her high school years are uneventful yet formative. She plays basketball and meets Todd Palin a fellow student and part time commercial fisherman.
They graduate and he goes to Seattle for college and she goes to college in Idaho after winning scholarships for the Miss Wasilla Beauty Queen title and being second runner up in the Miss Alaska Contest. Life is pretty prosaic . She says she is a wholesome kid with no vices . She had a platonic relationship with Todd in high school and he gives her her first kiss, no other hot romances, no bout with drugs, no falling out with parents and book doesn’t talk about grades or academic standing. She says father teaches her to love reading.
The most interesting thing in the book is she gives little credit to Lynn Vincent allegedly the person who wrote the book with help from her and her journals or diaries . She does thank the executives at Harper Collins (a Rupert Murdock Property), her editor Adam Bellows and Lynn Vincent and the five others who helped" put words on paper and communicate her message" . This meager recognition shows up on the second page of acknowledgments at the back of the book. If Lynn Vincent never existed would their have been a book? Sure with another ghost writer. But Lynn is a real ghost in this book.
Also we really don’t know her motivation for writing the book except getting" her message" out … and maybe to cash in on the notoriety she gained by being chosen by John McCain as his running mate. One might say he is the real maverick in all this and we have yet to see him write a book on the campaign. Also this is starting out as a most self serving of books, however most autobiographies are. It is a disease that most writers have when they write about themselves. Maybe Ms. Vincent will add the perspective that has been missing up to now.
The most important information in this book is what she doesn't say or write about.
During her high school years (1978-1982) she alludes to no political activity or conviction to speak of except an admiration of the feminist movement. She was not active in any causes and these were the years Regan was campaigning for President. He took office on January 20, 1981. Their is no talk about the Reagan Revolution or how her family voted or supported Reagan. no discussion of what the issues she was interested in were or if she was on any student organization supporting Reagan. There is no mention of Roe v. Wade,(1973), or belonging to any Right to Life organization or supporting same. Guess they were not in her diaries. If she is following her diaries closely it would be like someones Twitter tweets about how they felt physically and mentally and what was happening on personal level at the time except for parts left out. So when we read a political personage's account of their life we expect to find out about their political development, how their ideas began and the mentors or influences that formed them. For instance: we hear from Hillary Clinton in her book that she was active in church and conservative politics in high school as well as being a high achiever academically. No strong influence has yet emerged as lasting influence or a guiding light for Palin. No mention of Barry Goldwater founder of the modern conservastive movement. Labels: Sarah Palin: Going Rogue/ High School

Labels: Sarah Palin: Going Rogue/ High School