Nation editor: GOP is ‘male, pale and stale’

By David Edwards

Sarah Palin may be one of the most popular voices in the Republican Party, but the editor of The Nation thinks she is the exception to the rule.

Speaking to CNN's Carol Costello on Monday, Katrina Vanden Heuvel called the Republican Party "male, pale and stale."

Palin joined Republican Governor Jan Brewer in Arizona Saturday to unveil Brewer's new campaign website, SecureTheBorder.org, aimed at fighting backlash against a new anti-illegal immigration law in the state.

"Arizona has become the center of a renewed national focus on border security and illegal immigration since Governor Brewer signed SB1070," the site proclaims. "For too long the calls to Washington have been unanswered and the border remains unsecured.

"However, instead of taking action to help, the state has come under attack by people who are misrepresenting Arizona’s laws and trying to hurt our efforts to support the rule of law," the site adds. "They include President Obama, Al Sharpton, the East Coast media, and political strategists who are trying to use the issue of illegal immigration for political gain. You know what?" Vanden Heuvel replied. "You've got two women in Arizona. You have Sarah Palin with her 'mama grizzlies' and the Republican Party for the most part is male, pale and stale and they're going to become more so because they're going to alienate Latino voters as we have seen over the last two decades whenever the Republican Party trots out these mean-spirited plans like this Arizona bill."

"In the short term, I don't know how [the Arizona law] plays because I think it's going to play in different places regionally but in the long term it is going to marginalize an already marginalized Republican Party which has already become more extremist, more pale and stale," she added.

"This plan doesn't even deal with legitimate security concerns about immigration," she continued. "It is really more about fear, misinformation. There is a legitimate concern but you need real action and not one that as President Obama has said wisely guts the communication between police and communities and the possibilities of a more humane path" to immigration.

This video is from CNN's American Morning, broadcast May 17, 2010.