Sarah Palin lost the battle, but won the war

The results are in: Democrat Mary Peltola has defeated former vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin in their House race, a loss that could mark the end of Palin’s political career. The fact that a Democrat won in Alaska, a state that has gone Republican in every presidential election since President Lyndon Johnson’s landslide 1964 defeat against Sen. Barry Goldwater won’t sit well with GOP party elders.

But Palin’s political legacy will endure. The former Alaska governor was a pivotal figure in mainstreaming a new style of Republican politics that ignored traditional guardrails. Her brand of conservative populism weaponized social and cultural outrage and mobilized working class Americans.

Palin, in short, mastered Trumpism long before Donald Trump ever set foot in the White House.

The then-Alaska governor’s few months as Sen. John McCain’s presidential running mate in 2008 was time enough to create a template that has been used ever since in conservative campaign politics. In creating the current playbook, Palin borrowed liberally from the smashmouth partisanship employed by former Speaker Newt Gingrich. But she took his combative, corrosive approach to a whole new level.