Back in the day, there was Jefferson Airplane singing about Alice when she was 10 feet tall. Back then the general consensus seemed to be that Alice in Wonderland really was full of druggie references. Think of the Caterpillar smoking the hookah...
But in my more advanced years and with a new version of Alice in Wonderland in the theaters, I'm beginning to change my mind.Think about these Tea Party "coincidences":
*Red Queen = Sarah Palin (Wearing her trade mark red yelling "Off with their heads!")
*Mad Hater = Glenn Beck
*Tweedle Dee = Rush /Tweedle Dum= O'Reilley
*White rabbits running around muttering to themselves ("Don't tread on me")= The guys in the Teabagger party.
I think it really was a Poli Sci treatise by Lewis Carroll and as it is late-I rest my case! DG
Over the past week, Sarah Palin encouraged Tea-Party candidates to make energy issues a central part of their campaigns. "There's nothing stopping us from achieving energy independence that a good old national election can't fix," she said.
In some sense, I'm sure the announcement that former Alaska quitter-in-chief Sarah Palin is targeting Congressman Baron Hill and Congressman Brad Ellsworth is a challenge for both men. Her appeal to the fringe right-wing is undeniable, and her media presence is irritatingly strong.
All that aside, though, I couldn't think of a better way to galvanize the Democratic base in support of these two campaigns. From Cillizza's morning round-up:
"Come November, we're going to print pink slips for Members of Congress as fast as they've been printing money," promised Palin. Aside from urging her online army to work to defeat the 20 Democrats listed, Palin will endorse donate and possibly make campaign stops for Republican candidates in the districts, according to a source close to the former governor. The source noted that Palin can also be of considerable help in the online world as well, given her considerable network of engaged supporters, pointing to Palin's endorsement of Sean Duffy, a Wisconsin congressional candidate as evidence. ("It was like a 'Game On!' moment," Duffy said of the impact of the Palin endorsement on his campaign.)
I continue to believe that Palin's position on the Indiana ballot was a net-loss for the McCain effort in 2008.
Let's show Palin and her "army" that Hoosiers want common-sense solutions, not radical rhetoric. Donate to both of our congressmen below!
Not anything long here...just pure speculation. I'm guessing Ex-Gov. Palin & Co. will be the subject of a new reality show. "Kate & 8" are on shaky ground, and Palin needs money. Honestly, I can't wait. I'm sure it will be like Colbert- both Repubs and D's will love it, but for different reasons. PERFECT. U heard it here 1st!
Michael Steele thinks that abortion is an "individual choice," which wouldn't be so much of an issue if he wasn't the newly-elected leader of a Republican Party that really, really wants to be more conservative than ever. Notable GOPers have been quick to help -- ahem, enthusiastically push -- Steele's words back into his mouth, but the gaffe won't quickly be forgotten.
And best for us? He's coming to Indiana next month to speak to a Vanderburgh County Right to Life organization that will be looking for some serious, um, ass-kissing. Did I mention Sarah Palin is coming to referee?
SarahPAC put out a request for donations Wednesday with a message that Palin would soon be traveling the country and working to support leaders who share her conservative values.
PAC spokeswoman Meghan Stapleton said committee staff is sifting through thousands of invitations for Palin and so far only two events are confirmed.
Palin will be attending the Vanderburgh County Right to Life dinner in Evansville, Ind., on April 16 and a breakfast the following day with members of S.M.I.L.E., a nonprofit support organization for people with family members who have Down syndrome. Palin's 10-month-old son, Trig, was born with the condition, which is caused by an extra chromosome and characterized
According to MSNBC Bristol Palin, the daughter of Alaskan Governor Sarah Palin has given birth to a 7 pound, 4 ounce baby boy with the unfortunate name of Tripp Easton Mitchell Johnston Sunday night. From the article on MSNBC's website:
ANCHORAGE - The teenage daughter of Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin has given birth to a son, People magazine reported Monday.
Bristol Palin, 18, gave birth to Tripp Easton Mitchell Johnston on Sunday, the magazine said. He weighed 7 pounds, 4 ounces. Colleen Jones, the sister of Bristol's grandmother, told the magazine that "the baby is fine and Bristol is doing well."
The governor's office said it would not release information because it considers the baby's birth a private family matter.
I'd still like to know more about the conspiracy theory circulating about the birth of Trig Palin, the Down's Syndrome baby allegedly born to Sarah Palin under very odd circumstances and one month premature back on April 18th. One of the problems I have always had with that theory is the timelines don't match for Bristol to have been secretly carrying a baby, delivering that baby AND getting pregnant AGAIN if Trig was her child in time for her to deliver Tripp.
On the other hand, its been an interesting year for the Palins. Oldest son Track Palin all of a sudden joined the military this year under odd circumstances. Is it possible the conspiracy theory folks are onto something, but have the wrong Palin kid pegged as the parent of Trig? Could Track be Trig's father?
Having two teenage kids parenting out of wedlock children in the same year would certainly destroy the family values credibility Todd and Sarah Palin have worked to promote all these years. I have no evidence to support this assertion, but I could definitely see how this would fit better into that conspiracy theory.
As I said yesterday, I think the national Republican brand doesn't just need a lobotomy, it needs a facelift. I gave the myth of Mitch Daniels some flak for not having enough of the latter. Another Princeton-educated, wealthy white guy? The medium is the message, folks, and you aren't going to get your revolution in that package.
Which brings us to Sarah Palin, who I think has monopolized the other end of the spectrum. She certainly has the charisma to fire up the base. In the classic conservative model, she seeks to embody a "new generation" of the Republican Party by rushing backward. But at the end of the day, the reason she was such a drag on the McCain ticket was because she couldn't articulate a message of change to save her life, and what she did get out above her self-induced media frenzy wasn't exactly what the American people wanted to hear.
And thus, as the Republican Governor's Association gathers in Miami, I couldn't be happier to see the Palin Parade march into town and suck every ounce of productivity out of the room. Reports continue to emerge that the other governors aren't exactly thrilled that the media circus that is Palin is making such a scene, and why should they be? They need to rebuild their party, the smoldering ruin of which can primarily be laid at the feet of the current president. And out of the smoke emerges their new savior, just like the old savior.
Empty talking points, fear-mongering, a questionable literacy of the issues -- heck, I couldn't have written the script better myself.
So smile when you see Sarah Palin today.
They're trying to put out their house fire with a flamethrower, and it isn't going to turn out well. This should be fun to watch.
Increasingly irrational Republicans are giddy at the prospect of Sarah Palin gathering together thousands of rabid GOPers in southern Indiana, citing for some strange reason that it will benefit Millionaire Mike Sodrel.
I'm giddy at the prospect that increasingly irrational Republicans have such little political sense that they think their marginalized ideological base will somehow carry them to victory this year.
Sarah Palin, by the way, wants to know the difference between a hockey mom and an albatross. The Wall Street Journal, of all sources, provides an answer:
The one candidate whose popularity has fallen is Gov. Palin, the Republican vice-presidential nominee. Voters are less likely to see her in a positive light, and much more likely to report negative feelings.
Fifty-five percent of voters say Gov. Palin isn't qualified to be president if the need arises, up from 50% two weeks ago. And when given a list of possible concerns about Sen. McCain, voters were by far most likely to say they worry about Gov. Palin's qualification to be president.
Getting the base all riled up is useful for Palin's long-term political ambitions, but it isn't doing anything to move the polls in a substantial way for her, or the rest of the wayward Republican ticket.
If it makes them all feel better, more power to 'em. But there's something to be said about taking that first step toward recovering from an addiction.
On Saturday, Mrs. Dragon and I joined about 20 other volunteers here in Kokomo, IN to canvass Obama supporters to vote early and to persuade undecided voters. We knocked on 58 doors, and we were encouraged by the response.
While many were not home, we got positive responses from the vast majority of those we spoke with, even undecideds. We saw lots and lots of Obama yard signs and signs in windows. We saw a few McCain signs, but not nearly as many as Obama.
I heard that Sarah Palin was in Indiana. Being up North here in Valparaiso, I've been focusing way too much on the national election, and not enough on local news.
In the 'North Country', we are forced to try harder to find out about what goes on in Indiana, seeing how we are in the Chicago media market and such.
The perk that us Northerners have over the Southern part of our great state, is that we all knew about Barack Obama a lot sooner, and in more depth than many of the rest of our fellow Hoosier citizens.
Contrary to popular opinion though, just because we are in the Chicago media market, it doesn't mean we all gave Barack Obama a free pass and no scrutiny, even as Democrats, Liberals and Progressives. Due to Barack Obama, and Hillary Clinton I must say, we have discovered that each of us isn't the only Democrat, Liberal or Progressive IN Indiana. There are lots of us.
I was reading an 'Off the Bus' post of some Hoosiers who took to the recent Sarah Palin rally in Noblesville, Indiana. I thought I'd go ahead and share a bit of it here as my first post.
South Bend Tribune columnist Jack Colwell has been around the block a few times, so perhaps it is appropriate that he dedicated his Sunday column to putting this year's presidential contest in some sort of historical perspective. Specifically, he takes aim at the selection of Sarah Palin by John McCain, and an unfair comparison that he believes unjustly wrongs one of Indiana's own.
In short, Colwell knows Dan Quayle. Dan Quayle is a friend of his. And Sarah Palin...
Quayle left himself open in the vice presidential debate to that famous line that he was "no Jack Kennedy." He also answered the questions, didn't keep repeating rehearsed lines and didn't cheapen responses with winks, claims to be Dan Six-Pack or "you betcha" lingo.
Quayle made no claims that ignorance of Washington would make him better suited to lead Washington. That was the argument of Jimmy Carter, who campaigned as a Washington outsider and then proved to be a poor president because he couldn't figure out how to get things done as the president, the ultimate Washington insider.
Speaking of Washington, Sarah Palin makes Dan Quayle look like George Washington.
Call at 3 a.m.? There should have been no terror at the thought of Quayle answering. Palin?
No, they're not the first major party ticket to feature a woman -- no matter how many times Chris Matthews tells us so -- but they do have this little historical fact working for against them:
The McCain/Palin ticket is the first in American history in which both candidates were found to have violated ethics standards before a national election.
A tip o' the hat to the Orange Devil for pointing me toward that, and similarly reminding me of this factoid.
Here's a striking finding: the analysis shows that in the past week, nearly 100% of the McCain campaign ads were negative, compared with about a third of the Obama ads.
I've been saying for a while that I think Sarah Palin's expectations have been lowered so much that if she is able to walk across the stage without tripping then she will "win" the debate.
Andrew Halcro, who ran against her in 2006, writes about debating Sarah Palin in the Christian Science Monitor. Halcro debated Palin over 20 times, so he knows what she's like in that setting.
The entire piece is worth reading for sure, but here are some excerpts:
On April 18, 2006, Palin and I sat together in a hotel coffee shop comparing campaign trail notes. As we talked about the debates, Palin made a comment that highlights the phenomenon that Biden is up against.
"Andrew, I watch you at these debates with no notes, no papers, and yet when asked questions, you spout off facts, figures, and policies, and I'm amazed. But then I look out into the audience and I ask myself, 'Does any of this really matter?' " Palin said.
Palin is a master of the nonanswer. She can turn a 60-second response to a query about her specific solutions to healthcare challenges into a folksy story about how she's met people on the campaign trail who face healthcare challenges. All without uttering a word about her public-policy solutions to healthcare challenges.
In one debate, a moderator asked the candidates to name a bill the legislature had recently passed that we didn't like. I named one. Democratic candidate Tony Knowles named one. But Sarah Palin instead used her allotted time to criticize the incumbent governor, Frank Murkowski. Asked to name a bill we did like, the same pattern emerged: Palin didn't name a bill.
And when she does answer the actual question asked, she has a canny ability to connect with the audience on a personal level. For example, asked to name a major issue that had been ignored during the campaign, I discussed the health of local communities, Mr. Knowles talked about affordable healthcare, and Palin talked about ... the need to protect hunting and fishing rights.
Add the low expectations to the latest uproar over moderator Gwen Ifil's upcoming book (which is likely to make her far tougher on Biden to appear 'neutral'), and I think the Republicans may score tomorrow.
Newsweek's Fareed Zakaria on the Sarah Palin interview with Katie Couric in general, and the above interaction specifically:
This is nonsense-a vapid emptying out of every catchphrase about economics that came into her head. Some commentators, like CNN's Campbell Brown, have argued that it's sexist to keep Sarah Palin under wraps, as if she were a delicate flower who might wilt under the bright lights of the modern media. But the more Palin talks, the more we see that it may not be sexism but common sense that's causing the McCain campaign to treat her like a time bomb.
Can we now admit the obvious? Sarah Palin is utterly unqualified to be vice president. She is a feisty, charismatic politician who has done some good things in Alaska. But she has never spent a day thinking about any important national or international issue, and this is a hell of a time to start. The next administration is going to face a set of challenges unlike any in recent memory. There is an ongoing military operation in Iraq that still costs $10 billion a month, a war against the Taliban in Afghanistan and Pakistan that is not going well and is not easily fixed. Iran, Russia and Venezuela present tough strategic challenges.
I think there's something out there. Call it God, Jehovah, Allah, Ginkgo Biloba or Banane Royale (that's banana split, ya'll). I've considered and discarded the notion that there's a vast no one and nothing out there. God is watching the show and eating a gigantic bowl or popcorn and burping on His/er Slurpie.
Now, with that being said, what is predictable and almost certain is your internal monologue: "So what, Amos? What does that have to do with anything?"
I just had an epiphany watching a video of our own Lt Gov Skillman making a "speech". Hoosiers have our own Hoosier version of Sarah Palin. They are both female, both brimming with confidence, both fairly attractive...both way over their heads, both completely unqualified, both don't make a whole lot of sense when they speak, both are mouthpieces for their running mates...the similarities between the two are almost scary
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