but the "aw shucks you betcha" factor definitely fades in and out. not exactly groundbreaking stuff -- it should be more than apparent by now that the woman's a fake.

But a while back, when you posted a video of her previous debate performances (All worried that she was gonna ace the debate with Biden - Not.), I did notice that her accent was much less pronounced.

I've also heard a little southern twang sneak in there, seems to me.

Accents can come and go, depending on social context and other factors; idiosynchratic word usage even more so. I've noticed it in myself, I've noticed it in others.

It's mildly interesting, but it's not necessarily intentional deception. (Nor is it unusual in politics, intentional or not. I mean, who thinks Ted Kennedy always speaks with that classic Kennedy accent?)

People tend to adjust their accent depending on the audience or the content of their message. Most do it unconsciously. I have caught myself doing it at work depending on my audience.

Which is not to say that Palin is not an extremely calculating individual - she is. She may just be adjusting the accent at more conscious level than the rest of us.

My 4 year old discovered upon moving from the NE to the SE that all white people sounded different but none of the black people did.

It must also be mavericky to wear your wedding ring only when it's convenient. That's real small town values ya know you betcha!

I seem to remember another faker who sounds all Texas when the crowd he's playing to demands it.

The intention is obvious. When she is speaking as the governor of Alaska her voice has a slight accent but she enunciates clearly and doesn't drop a single "g". But in her public appearances as a vice-presidential candidate she lays it on extra thick. Now, it may be the case that she talks this way at home and that her Official Governor's voice is one that she worked on to sound competent, but either way her VP accent is clearly not how she normally speaks as a politician. Throw in the "aw shucks" and "golly gees", which you never see in her Governor video, and the case of intention is very clear.

But this shouldn't surprise anyone. Dubya knows how to say the word "nuclear", but was told early in his presidential bid to pronounce it incorrectly "newcular". In fact, nearing the end of his reign he slips once in a while and pronounces it correctly.

Like other people on here have pointed out, accent changes depending on social context, sometimes unconsciously.

My first thought on seeing this that I've heard Obama slip in and out of the rhythms of a black preacher for different speeches, and sometimes on the same speech.

Articles like this that harp on the surface qualities and tics of political life turn this whole process back to a culture war and away from issues relevant to selecting public officials.

In Alaska we have a sort of Canadian accent and a sort of Washington/Oregon/California accent. There is also a rural Native accent that sounds similar to the Hawaiian "local yokel" accent. But as far as I know, nobody from here sounds like they just stepped out of the movie Fargo. Not even people from Wasilla.

I can't criticize Palin for selecting vocabulary to suit her audience. Everybody does that and should. We might question her choice of audience, or the strategy of the McCain campaign in choosing a candidate who narrows rather than broadens the campaign...but given that choice it is appropriate that Palin speak to her chosen audience.

As to the accent... I was born, and learned to speak, in a small Northern California milltown whose town accent was set by millworkiers and loggers who migrated from the Ozarks to California in the 1930s. So I can speak "CalArkansas" and identify an Arkansawyer (?) from the accent. But I am also a Certified Coastal Elite: Berkeley, PhD, speak French, comfortable with Europeans, protested the Vietnam War, oppose Prop 8, all of things which mark one as "not from Small Town California."

But when I visit my hometown, as I did last week, the accent is right there...less strong perhaps than among those whose parents had that accent, but I can hear myself doing it.

When I put on my Small Town Pride hat (which I wear here in urban Down Below land) I can understand the frustrations and resentments of my old neighbors. That doesn't mean I have anything but the deepest contempt for Palin (and McCain): they cynically manipulate widely felt grievances. But that accent thing isn't, to me, part of the deal. That is just how things work for those of us who live in two worlds.

I do wish that more of my current neighbors (in the world of urban Northern California sophistication, which I love as much as I love my other home)wold be more respectful of those who seek (often without success) a simpler life in the country. That is not, of course, a new story.

No sirree.

A lot less offensive than Hillary talking Ebonics to African Americans.

As others have noticed accents can change depending on the audience. I know people who adopt different accents when talking to relatives from their home countries like the UK or Australia -- they aren't even aware of it.

But in this case it's clear that Palin is, consciously or not, talking to people in the lower 48 like she assumes we're dumber than the people in Alaska. This could be just something her advisers suggested -- or it could reflect an innate predjudice.

She's channeling the great Edie McClurg (WKRP, Ferris Bueller, etc)!

The fakery of her speech patterns is the least of our problems, if this freaky twit gets anywhere near the White House. And if I were John McCain, I'd be ducking every time she aimed that grin at me.

... and was hired as a sports telecaster. Faking accents is the same as faking being a populist - it is what 'actors' and television personalities do. She was successful because she is photogenic (of sorts) and can perform on TV ... if she's only asked about sports scores. Even in Minnesota very few people talk like that.

Dad was a science teacher and track coach. Daughter was a jock, and grew up in a white collar household. A daughter of toil, she's not.