There are two ways of looking at Sarah Palin and her impact on the race. They aren’t necessarily incompatible, but they are different.

One narrative is that she is the “Maverick Reformer.” In that sense John McCain has added some oomph to his earmark cutting/corruption ending/bipartisan appealing/Washington shaking-up message. This is the theme McCain stressed at the Convention and is adhering to on the stump. In this mode she offers help with Independent voters, moderates who distrust Big Anything (government, labor, business), and libertarian Westerners. She’s there to magnify McCain’s message and steal Obama’s. And in this regard her record as Governor — cutting spending, passing ethics reform, renegotiating a pipeline deal — is key.

But there is another, entirely different way of looking at her: the multi-faceted identity candidate. The female angle is obvious. But Rod Dreher makes a convincing case that it is her small town and blue collar appeal that are truly shaking up the race. It may not be gender, but class and geography that are the keys to her appeal.

After reviewing an insightful New York Times column (which of course means it is in the style section) on Palin’s small town associations in her hometown beauty shop, Dreher comments:

I understood more than anything else I’ve read about Sarah Palin why she’s made that gut connection with so many Americans. She really is from a small town, and does not seem to have forgotten that. Think about the powerful message this sends to small-town, rural and working-class voters. Think about what it says about the place she comes from internally, and how she interprets the world. This is a woman who goes to the small-town beauty shop to trade hunting stories with her girlfriends, and to pray with them through their crises — and she didn’t stop going there when she became governor of the state.
Obviously no criterion to select the second to the most powerful man on earth, and I’m not arguing that it is, so don’t be obnoxious in the comboxes. But if you are going to extend your empathy to the African-American who votes for Barack Obama because he sees in Obama something deep and important about himself, and finds that makes Obama trustworthy, you have to extend your empathy to the small-town, rural folks who see the same in Sarah Palin, and have confidence in her. Her experiences have given her a certain place from which she judges the world, and it’s a place shared by tens of millions of Americans — men and women whose views and values are scarcely represented in American newsrooms.

It is in this latter role, as heroine for working class and rural voters, that has to a large extent enraged the media and brought on howls of disapproval from pundits of all political stripes. In their view she really has no place in Washington power circles and the traits which she has in abundance — common sense, loyalty, and faith — are either deemed irrelevant or are distorted into dangerous and exotic tendencies. But this is also the great unknown factor in her appeal. Is she bullet proof from media criticism? Does she grow ever more popular or has she peaked? We don’t know, in large part, because the people to whom she appeals in this regard are largely off the media radar screen. The MSM (urban, liberal, college-educated reporters and pundits) really have no understanding of her appeal because they share so little in common with her and those like her.

I think it’s obvious that McCain selected Palin for the Maverick Reformer role and because of her gender. But whether he had any inkling that her greatest impact may have been as a new sort of identity politician (having only partially to do with gender), is anyone’s guess. Sometimes, when you choose a very different type of running mate — you get more than you ever imagined.