As we discussed last winter, the left observes two different sets of rules for “protected classes”.  Women, for example; female politicians on the left are treated with a sort of victorian deference; conservative women, on the other hand, great treated like recalcitrant waitstaff at best, hookers under arrest at worst by the left’s chattering classes.

That much is a given.

But it sometimes the left’s distaste, even hatred, for cognitive dissonance even catches me off guard.

Given that the left has invested millions into creating a rumor factory about Sarah Palin, spawning off tales that are, inevitably, fake (but that don’t need to be true, since their only purpose is to serve as nattering points for the national chattering class, used to defame Palin while still technically following the rules “Journalists” are supposed to follow), it  shouldn’t surprise anyone that they are shopping a aTsourceless rumor that the Palins are getting divorced. 

Yestrday, we discovered the problem: Conservative bloggers don’t have “sources” the way progressives do. Take for instance, the highly influential blog called Immoral Minority, which has been rockin’ the Site Meter lately. Their secret? Sources:

Earlier this week one of my best sources claimed to have explosive new information for me . . .

According to my source Sarah is finished with Todd and has decided to end their marriage . . .

As for the babygate story . . . my sources are still working on it, and the information is becoming more accessible . . .

It’s all about ”sources,” you see. Which is a big problem for conservative bloggers, because for some reason we can’t get any sources with intimate details of the marriages of prominent Democrats.

It’s certainly possible ,not that the story gives us any reason to believe it; the kind of pressure the Palins are under – two very different careers, special needs child, pregnant teenage daughter – have broken up an awful lot of families.

Now, the rumor is hinky to the point that the normally-Palinphobic mainstream media isn’t playing ball with it yet.

The part that amazes me, though is not just the hostility that Palin engenders, but the hatred so many on the left feel for the whole notion of the close-knit, unapologetically Christian family.

A local “progressive” commentator, writing on Twitter (who shall remain nameless) wrote in re the rumors of the Palin divorce rumors:

I am betting on divorce among politicians who preach family values…Because often [“family values”]  are in direct contrast to having loving, open communication and a healthy marriage.

I’ve been astounded at two things, really:  that people on the left still use the term “family values” (we on the right mostly gave it up after it got turned into cheap-irony-fodder twenty-odd years ago, for starters, and then that so many on the left believe their own press about those that differ from them.  It’s been a Hollywood staple for a generation, now; the fundamentalist is dumb; the Christian couple is not just dysfunctional, but secretly depraved; the minister is the villain of the story.

Of course, it’s true – to the extent that it’s true for everyone;  “Family values people” are human, the same curse that faces everyone else; they are imperfect, given to “sin”, to grab a seemingly-appropriate term.  It’s just that it only seems to be tittering material when it’s someone whose worldview presses one to try to live better than that.

So I asked the person in question if she had anything, y’know, a little more empirical:

Archaic ideas about women’s roles bump up against reality/create conflict.

Which prompts the question: what “archaic ideas about women’s roles” are we talking about here?  Whatever you think about Sarah Palin’s politics, she’s hardly a latter day Barbara Billingsley.  She’s vastly more accomplished a person than the vast majority of her critics of either gender, on many levels; as a parent, as a politician, as a communicator.

I’m not sure what to chalk it up to:  conservative women (hispanics, blacks, etc) are targets for self-loathing hatred, or as a projection of the left’s worst traits.