hatepalin.com

As if we needed any more proof that Palin is a bad flashback to the popular-but-not-that-bright-and-mean-spirited-high-school-cheerleader we all knew, we have the video from her speech to the “National Tea Party Convention” and subsequent interviews where she referenced notes written in ink on the palm of her hand.

Besides being horribly unprofessional (perhaps it was, as Jon Stewart noted, a way to claim the populist position against all those fancy people who use “memory”), it was awfully ironic – nee hypocritical – since she had just excoriated Obama for using teleprompters.

To top it off, the words she had written were hardly difficult point to remember. She had written: “energy, tax cuts, lift American spirit.” That’s the stuff of oratory for the ages.

Sarah – how’s that stupid-y bush-league-y foot-in-mouth-y thing goin’ for ya?

In his Op-Ed piece for the New York Times, Frank Rich states that the ridiculous “Gathering Storm” anti-gay marriage ad, which was made and aired in response to Vermont’s legislature over-riding the Governor’s veto and passing a gay marriage law, marks a turning point. He also argues that because the Republican Iowa caucuses are controlled by the Evangelical Right, even moderate Republican candidates are forced to veer far to the right on the issue of same-sex marriage.

Far from terrifying anyone, “Gathering Storm” has become, unsurprisingly, an Internet camp classic. On YouTube the original video must compete with countless homemade parodies it has inspired since first turning up some 10 days ago. None may top Stephen Colbert’s on Thursday night, in which lightning from “the homo storm” strikes an Arkansas teacher, turning him gay. A “New Jersey pastor” whose church has been “turned into an Abercrombie & Fitch” declares that he likes gay people, “but only as hilarious best friends in TV and movies.”

Yet easy to mock as “Gathering Storm” may be, it nonetheless bookmarks a historic turning point in the demise of America’s anti-gay movement.

What gives the ad its symbolic significance is not just that it’s idiotic but that its release was the only loud protest anywhere in America to the news that same-sex marriage had been legalized in Iowa and Vermont. If it advances any message, it’s mainly that homophobic activism is ever more depopulated and isolated as well as brain-dead.

…

In 2008, 60 percent of Iowa’s Republican caucus voters were evangelical Christians. Mike Huckabee won. That’s the hurdle facing the party’s contenders in 2012, which is why Romney, Palin and Gingrich are now all more vehement anti-same-sex-marriage activists than Rick Warren. Palin even broke with John McCain on the issue during their campaign, supporting the federal marriage amendment that he rejects. This month, even as the father of Palin’s out-of-wedlock grandson challenged her own family values and veracity, she nominated as Alaskan attorney general a man who has called gay people “degenerates.” Such homophobia didn’t even play in Alaska — the State Legislature voted the nominee down — and will doom Republicans like Palin in national elections.

…

As marital equality haltingly but inexorably spreads state by state for gay Americans in the years to come, Utah will hardly be in the lead to follow Massachusetts, Connecticut, Iowa and Vermont. But the fact that it too is taking its first steps down that road is extraordinary. It is justice, not a storm, that is gathering. Only those who have spread the poisons of bigotry and fear have any reason to be afraid.

Please read the full article here:

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/19/opinion/19Rich.html?em&exprod=myyaho

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Does a football coach leave the game with the score tied in the final two minutes of the game so that he can beat the rush out of the parking lot?

Does a General leave his position of command in the final moments of a battle so he can catch a little R&R?

Heck, No!

But Alaska Governor Sarah Palin saw fit to leave Alaska for the final two days of the legislative session so that she could be the keynote speaker at a county anti-abortion fund raiser in Indiana.  She said their persistence in inviting her, and promising her chocolate and all good things that Vanderburgh County Right To Life has to offer made her accept this request from the big pile of ones she’s received.  In fact, she said “You had me at ‘chocolate’.”

She seems to be oblivious or indifferent to the growing frustration with Alaskans that she is more concerned about her national profile and aspirations than she is about the great state of Alaska.

While she was gone, her ultra-conservative and homophobic (who wrote that gays and lesbians were “degenerates” to the state bar) pick for Attorney General went down in flames as 9 Republicans crossed the aisle to join Democrats to defeat the nomination?

Leadership?  I think not.

Ambition to stay in the national eye?  You betcha.

In a significant rebuff, Palin’s nominee for Alaska’s Attorney General, the controversial Wayne A. Ross (known as WAR, according to the vanity license plate on his Hummer, with his wife answering to “Mrs. War”), was defeated by the legislature.  Nine Republicans, including the House Speaker and Senate President, crossed party lines and voted with the Democrats to defeat the nomination 35 to 23.

Ross is an ultra-conservative board member of the National Rifle Association, whose earlier writings calling gays and lesbians “degenerates” in a letter to the state bar association, gained particular scrutiny and coverage in the progressive press.  When asked about this during the AG confirmation hearings, he failed to provide a direct answer, but instead attempted to hide behind the weak defense that his personal views should have no bearing on his fitness for the position.  Perhaps finally the independent spirit of populist Alaskan Republicans is overwhelming the small-mindedness of the evangelical right wing of the party.

Palin was away at an anti-abortion fund raiser in Indiana during this stunning and surprising defeat.

With sky-high oil prices a thing of the past, Palin is now fighting her political fights in Alaska without the benefit of huge tax windfalls, and against local politicians resentful of what they see as a Governor more concerned about her national standing and future positioning than about dealing with the issues facing Alaska.

A few more embarrassments like the one Palin suffered today, and suddenly McCain’s short list of promising Republican Governors, which excluded Palin, seems all too on-the-money.

John McCain is getting a lot of flak from the hard right evangelical backers of Sarah Palin for leaving the Alaska Governor off of the list of strong gubernatorial Republican candidates for the Presidency in 2012.

Who made the list?

• Bobby Jindahl (Governor, LA)
• Tim Pawlenty (Governor, MN)
• Jim Huntsman (Governor, UT)
• Mitt Romney (Former Governor, MA)
• Charlie Crist (Governor, FL)

Recognizing his omission, McCain said “I’ve left out somebody’s name, and I’m going to hear about it.”

This follows his comments last December where he refused to outright back Palin’s presumed future bid by saying:

“I can’t say something like that,”  adding “We’ve got some great other young governors. I think you’re going to see the governors assume a greater leadership role in our Republican Party.”

Sarah Palin is in an uproar over stories in the Anchorage Daily News that called Levi Johnston – her soon to be son-in-law – a high school dropout.  The fact is, um, you know, when you get right down to it, he’s a high school dropout.  As in, he dropped out of high school.

No shame there.  In fact the had been taking correspondence courses to get his GED.  Good for him.  Unfortunately it came out that his father got him an internship in the oil fields that requires a high school diploma, and he had to drop out of the program.

The persecution complex that Palin has is truly remarkable and unfortunate.  But I’m sure she’ll get a sensitive treatment and venue to air her grievances with Glenn Beck.

Here’s a transcript from a report on the Today Show:

The full transcript of Norah O’Donnell’s report, which began 14 minutes into the 7 am Eastern hour of Thursday’s Today show:

MATT LAUER: During the campaign, handlers tried to keep a tight lid on Sarah Palin, but as Barack Obama’s inauguration approaches, she’s speaking out more and more. But how much is too much? Here’s NBC’s Norah O’Donnell.

(NBC NEWS GRAPHIC: “Unleashed: New Attacks From Sarah Palin”)

NORAH O’DONNELL (voice-over): Sarah Palin’s latest target — her online critics.

ALASKA GOVERNOR SARAH PALIN: Oh, I would love for the names to be on the blog entries so that people are held accountable when they lie.

O’DONNELL: And now telling Esquire magazine she is annoyed by the quote, ‘bored, anonymous, pathetic bloggers who lie.’

O’DONNELL (on-camera): Palin says that she doesn’t mind being criticized personally, but when the smears involve her family, that’s what makes her angry.

O’DONNELL (voice-over): She’s been on a tear defending her 18-year-old daughter Bristol, who recently had a baby boy named Tripp with her fiance Levi Johnston.

PALIN: This report that Bristol and Levi — they’re high school dropouts and they’re going to just look for government handouts to raise their child and stuff — nothing could be further from the truth.

O’DONNELL: On Monday, the Anchorage Daily News posted a scathing e-mail sent by Palin to the paper’s top editor under the subject line ‘More Mistakes?’‘Did you really allow a story to run in your paper today claiming Levi Johnston is a high school dropout?’ She also added, ‘Is your paper really still pursuing this sensational lie that I’m not Trig’s mother? Is it true you have a reporter still bothering my state office in pursuit of your ridiculous conspiracy?’ The paper’s editor admits they have been following up on Trig’s birth, but only in an effort to debunk the conspiracy theories he calls nutty nonsense.

PATRICK DOUGHERTY, ANCHORAGE DAILY NEWS: The way to put an end to it is not to ignore it, but to engage it.

O’DONNELL: And remember when Palin said she’s being treated differently than Caroline Kennedy?

PALIN: I think that as we watch that, we will, perhaps, be able to prove that there is a class issue.

O’DONNELL: This week, those comments drew a reaction on The View from Barbara Walters.

BARBARA WALTERS: Why she still makes it a class issue is something that especially right now, and when we all want to work together — I find disturbing.

O’DONNELL: It’s just one more sign that as Palin tries to quiet her critics, she is sparking another loud debate. For Today, Norah O’Donnell, NBC News, Los Angeles.

In an interview with Esquire magazine that has gotten a lot of press over the last two days, Palin took a swipe both at her home town newspaper and bloggers, who she blames for repeating the rumors that Sarah is not the true mother of her son Trigg.

When I first read the headline I thought – “Oh no, does she mean us?”  But upon reading the full quote, it was clear she was talking about the unsubstantiated rumors that have indeed been out in the blogosphere.  Specifically she was upset that a fact checker had called about the issue of determining Trigg’s mother.  What she didn’t mention was that the story was to have been specifically about busting myths that persisted despite any hard evidence.  In other words, the story was going to try to lay to rest the rumor about Trigg’s “real” mother, as well as other rumors.

I’m finding Sarah’s claims of being victimized by anyone she doesn’t like unstateswomanlike, boring and disingenuous.  I can’t tell if she’s playing the media or really lacks even the self-awareness of an average human.  The liberal media, Tina Fey, Katie Couric, Obama, bloggers – wow, talk about a persecution complex.  And I thought that Alaskan politics were rough and tumble.

Mrs. Palin, whining does not become you.

And in a final note, Meghan McCain was willing to talk about anything (including her appreciation for Marilyn Manson’s ex-wife Dita Von Teese).  Except Sarah Palin.

I think you have to read into that refusal some bad blood.

Lesson:  pick your running mates carefully.  Meet with them more than twice, and for more than a few hours.  A decision like who you choose as a running mate is hugely important.  Personally I’m very glad that we were spared an impulsive decision-maker in the oval office.

Tennessee Republican Chip Saltsman apparently doesn’t understand the difference between satire and poor taste.   Saltsman is (or was, prior to this gaffe) a candidate for the RNC chairmanship.  He sent out a CD with “humorous” songs including “Barack the Magic Negro,” “Ivory and Ebony,” and “The Star Spanglish Banner.”  Are you kidding me?

The self-destructive streak in certain Republicans as power slips away is truly remarkable.  Or perhaps Tennessee is so in the grips of decades-old good-old-boy thinking that this type of behavior is not seen as reprehensible or outside the norm.

Is Saltsman just some anonymous buffoon?  Well, he’s not anonymous.  He was that national chairman of Hillbilly Huckabee’s presidential campaign, and worked on staff for Bill Frist.

Disgraceful.

Here’s what CNN had to say:

(CNN) — A candidate for the Republican National Committee chairmanship said Friday the CD he sent committee members for Christmas — which included a song titled “Barack the Magic Negro” — was clearly intended as a joke.

The title of the song about President-elect Barack Obama was drawn from a Los Angeles Times column.”

“I think most people recognize political satire when they see it,” Tennessee Republican Chip Saltsman told CNN. “I think RNC members understand that.”

The song, set to the tune of “Puff the Magic Dragon,” was first played on conservative political commentator Rush Limbaugh’s radio show in 2007.

Its title was drawn from a Los Angeles Times column that suggested President-elect Barack Obama appealed to those who feel guilty about the nation’s history of mistreatment of African-Americans. Saltsman said the song, penned by his longtime friend Paul Shanklin, should be easily recognized as satire directed at the Times.

The CD sent to RNC members, first reported by The Hill on Friday, is titled “We Hate the USA” and also includes songs referencing former presidential candidate John Edwards and the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, among other targets.

According to The Hill, other song titles, some of which were in bold font, were: “John Edwards’ Poverty Tour,” “Wright place, wrong pastor,” “Love Client #9,” “Ivory and Ebony” and “The Star Spanglish Banner.”

Saltsman was national campaign manager for former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee’s presidential bid in 2007 and 2008. Before that, he held a variety of posts, including a number of positions under former Sen. Bill Frist of Tennessee.

Apparently Bristol’s baby daddy’s momma was arrested for possible manufacture and distribution of Oxycontin.

First Rush, now Mrs. Johnston.  What is it with these people and Oxycontin?

Can the made-for-TV movie be far behind?