While Joe Biden was doing the typical VP duties last night, appearing on every cable network post debate, you will never guess where the pitbull with lipstick was:
Perhaps it was coincidence that the song “Everybody Wants to Rule the World” was playing as Republican vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin worked the crowd at the Irish Pub last night.
But her amorous fans were definitely ready to let the moose-hunting Alaska governor rule.
“I expect her to be president of the United States one day,” said Suzanne Haney, the Republican leader for the 2nd Ward in South Philadelphia, who gave Palin a $2 bill for luck.
Palin appeared at the bar on 20th and Walnut streets last night to shake hands with her fans for about an hour before the first presidential debate. While the crowd inside was friendly, hundreds of people lined the street outside in protest with signs that read things like “Palin is Santorum With Lipstick.”
Now I can understand the need for some liquid confidence after that disastrous Couric interview, but with only a few days to go before the big debate, now might not be the best time to be doing kegstands in the Irish Pub.
SGEW
You cannot make this shit up. Oh lordy.
SGEW
[Explanatory post, explaining why Walnuts! is funny]
Wonkette
cyntax
I think at this point you really have to be in the bag for Palin not to see her as a gimmicky hindrance. Two minutes of watching Biden last night and there’s no honest way to avoid realizing that she can’t even carry water effectively.
Heh- corner of 20th and Walnut.
Comrade Kevin
That’s an insult to Rick Santorum.
SGEW
Speaking of doing kegstands . . .
Release Sarah Palin’s medical records immediately! Including her bladder capacity!
Comrade Incertus
Who knows? She might actually do better in the debate if she’s tied one on beforehand. I don’t know how she could do worse.
aimai
I blogged this this morning under the title “what, did she stick it in her bra?” This story of watching the debate from a bar is just bizarre. Hello? evangelicals? anti drinking? anti women in public?
aimai
toby
Bible Spice is toast.
Charity
Joe Biden comes on after the debate and the Republicans have… Giuliani?
C’mon, she can’t even stand to be interviewed after her presidential candidate’s debate to mouth some “he did so well”s? They didn’t have to be in the same ROOM even if they didn’t want her to be!
They just really really have no confidence in her at all, do they?
LA Confidential Pantload
Irish Pub’s not bad, but Bard’s (on one side of it) is a lot better Irish place, and the Rum Bar (on the other side of it) serves cooler liquor. Plus my shit-for-brains downstairs neighbor loves to go into the Irish Pub and bore everybody with his stories of being in Vietnam 40 years ago. Come to think of it, maybe that’s why they picked it…
The Moar You Know
The Republic is dying because we all just want someone to have a beer with.
Bobzim
I’m convinced that she’s going to take Kathleen Parker’s advice and Rudy’s going to replace her.
Comrade PeterJ
Politico has a story about it too. They report that there were about 300 protesters outside and as she was leaving one of the was clearly heard shouting:
Jon H
Ya, Irish Pub is pretty nice. In college (early 90s) my roommates and I went down there to see Kathy Ireland, who was there promoting something.
Dunno how it ranks in “Irish pub-ness”.
gbear
I don’t remember where I read it, but it was an announced, planned event that she was going to spend the evening at the bar. Wonder if she watched the debate with the sound turned off like she did the SNL skit?
The Moar You Know
They’re going to have to dump her, and they’ll do it before the debate. I see no way around it. They cannot have her go on TV and spray her idiocy in that snippy, “I’m better than you are” way of hers.
She is destroying him with independent voters.
The base will be furious, but who else are they going to vote for? Obama? Not too likely.
gbear
Actually, nah. Both of them are an insult to lips.
Joshua Norton
Sometimes you wanna go where everybody knows your name….
Just Some Fuckhead
Ya know, Republicans historically just don’t seem to be good at picking running mates.
JGabriel
John, you missed the most telling statement in that article:
Yeah, that effort to win over Philadelphia and PA is going real well…
.
Comrade Mary, Would-Be Minion Of Bad Horse
Thanks to Dan Savage, that is even more disgusting than it appears on first reading.
JGabriel
Comrade Kevin:
No, that’s a fair comparison.
It is, however, an insult to anal froth.
.
Joshua Norton
The McCain group canceled her appearance at a few big money fundraisers here in California. The local Repugs are not happy. Especially since the Chronicle is always running stories about how she’s energized the California Republican base.
But hey, she made 2 bucks at this stop, so it all evens out.
Keith
Is that this or this? Either way, my libido is destroyed for the rest of the year.
Bobzim
She’ll be given the ax Monday morning.
Comrade Incertus
Oh please let that happen. The evangelicals will love having one of their own replaced by a pro-choice, pro-gay-rights, thrice-married crossdresser. About the only thing they like about him is his penchant for fascism.
Bobzim
Think about it: Rudy and the beauty gets to ride the Trollop Express to Mississippi while Palin does a South Philly Pub Crawl.
MAX HATS
As an avid Dan Savage reader, the term “Santorum with lipstick” made me gag.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Santorum_(sexual_neologism)
Gross.
Comrade NonyNony
I honestly don’t know why the McCain camp keeps having events in Philly when their support in Pennsylvania is something like “everywhere except Philly and Pittsburgh”.
Seriously – find a suburb. Find an ex-urb. Find a small town in the heart of the state and get the campaign to bus people in from other surrounding small towns. But Philly? Seriously? WTF? (This is another tick in my theory that someone in the McCain camp is either seriously incompetent or they’re secretly a Discordian and trying to create maximal chaos from very tiny events that just look like fuck-ups.)
FLILF Hunter
C’mon, gang…
We need to come up with a drink recipe for the Caribou Barbie.
Whatever’s in it, it needs to served flaming, on the rocks, and with a 17-year-old cherry.
Svensker
PTOD
(altho the Caribou Barbie drink with a 17-year-old cherry comes a close 2nd…)
Faces
So, in the mornin’, don’t say you love me
‘Cause you know I’ll only kick you out the door
Yeah, I’ll pay your cab fare home, you can even use my best cologne,
Just don’t be here in the mornin’ when I wake up
JL
So Joe Biden has to prepare for the debate and assume that he could be debating Sarah, Joe, Rudy, or Mitt. Did I miss anyone? She’ll debate Thursday and in that format she can speak gibberish and move on. The danger for Biden will be not to laugh at her answers. The debate has been changed so there will not be any back and forth and she will have her crib notes with her.
SGEW
Rudy! Rudy! Rudy!
Oh please make it happen. The creepy old white male fascist party! Huzzah! Noun verb 9/11 POW, motherfuckers! General Franco in a dress . . . literally.
Unfortunately, if Giuliani actually, somehow, becomes the Vice President in my lifetime, I am honor bound to leave the country*. However, I just can’t imagine how he could.
*I swore it, thrice, upon mine heart. The man is a monster. A monster.
Comrade PeterJ
My guess is that they are going try to play the biggest sexist card ever if she steps down. Only way to salvage it.
While I didn’t think that she would step down because of the damage of having to replace the vp candidate, McCain is rather fond of these stunts and I think there will be a time when there’s nothing to lose by doing it. So he’ll gamble.
She’ll still be on the ballot though.
Comrade PeterJ
Judith and Cindy must have a lot to talk about, both being former mistresses to their current husbands.
The Raven
By the way, while Palin was quaffing some brew in that pub, some 300 screaming protesters were outside. You gotta see the video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hs1RMQl8wMQ
I mean, wow. She really is Cheney with lipstick.
Bobzim
I’d say a Caribou Barbie would be Vodka and moose milk on the rocks – the Alaskan version of a White Russian which Palin saw someone making through the window of a Russian troop barracks as she personally scanned the horizon for incoming MiG 35’s from her own window.
FLILF Hunter
Crap. If only I’d remembered the “be”…
… I might’ve come in first.
I wish I could blame WordPress. What the hell. I DO blame WordPress.
The Raven
Here’s the scene outside the bar where Palin was drinkin’ up:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hs1RMQl8wMQ
Wow. Over 300 enraged protesters. And she’s generating this just by being a candidate for VP. Huge contrast with Obama and Biden, whom people seem to really enjoy welcoming.
SGEW
I do like your Discordian theory, but I will stick to my “greatest performance art piece in human history” theory*.
Never explain something with incompetence when you can explain it in a convoluted conspiracy theory, involving Elvis**.
*John McCain is Andy Kaufman, and has been for decades.
**Who caused 9/11, obviously. And killed JFK.
Comrade PeterJ
Not sure about that, a number of republican vicepresidents ended up being elected presidents. Democratic vicepresidents only become presidents if the president dies.
(Gore would have been the exception if the 2000 election had been fair.)
KCinDC
Even Rudy isn’t stupid enough to board the sinking SS McCain after they throw Palin overboard.
They’re not going to dump her, because (1) it would enrage the Palin-fan base that McCain has finally got in line, causing them to stay home at best, (2) it would lead to more examination of McCain’s seriously flawed judgment and impulsive decision making, and (3) who the hell would want to be McCain’s running mate after that?
People need to calm down about what a disaster Palin’s going to be on Thursday. Remember how she was hailed as a master speaker at the convention because expectations had been so low? Remember how Bush was repeatedly declared the “winner” of debates because he managed not to drool on himself? Let’s not keep doing that.
JGabriel
Line I wish Joe Biden could use in the VP debate, but know that he can’t:
.
FLILF Hunter
Oh, please, please, please.
The press is just salivating to have their Eagleton story and The Base(tm) will be in full revolt.
And don’t think for a second it’ll be anyone else but Lieberman, cuz McCain’s gonna tell his campaign staff to shove it. It will be a thing of beauty and we can all just sit back, sip our Caribou Barbies and much on some kettle corn.
Game, set, match: Obama.
Just Some Fuckhead
Couric: You’ve cited Alaska’s proximity to Russia as part of your foreign policy experience. What did you mean by that?
Miss Governor Alaska: The U.S. Alaska has a very narrow maritime border between a foreign country such as Russia, and, uh, on our other side, the uh, land-boundary that we have with such as the Canada everywhere. I personally believe our education over here in the US should help the U.S, err.. should help our next-door neighbors such as are foreign countries, there in the state that I am the executive of. And there… should build up our future of.
JGabriel
KCinDC:
Good point. None of the potential replacement will want to go down in history as the second choice to Sarah Palin.
.
GSD
Grimace McCain reminds me of uber douche-bag Douglass C. Niedermeyer from Animal House.
-GSD
dm
“who gave Palin a $2 bill for luck.”
Am I the only one who remembers that the $2 bill went out of fashion because they became associated with election-day bribes to voters, so possessing one was seen as being shameful?
FLILF Hunter
== munch.
I need an editor.
Comrade Mary, Would-Be Minion Of Bad Horse
I don’t think McCain’s stupid enough to dump her. He needs the support of the base.
IF he had really had to, he’d swallow his pride and try to get Huckabee, who could actually be dangerous as a base magnet who also appears warm, funny and reasonable to many people. I saw him on the Daily Show a year or so back and thought, before I actually researched him, that he was a Republican version of Jimmy Carter.
But don’t expect McCain to try to swap in Giuliani. He’ll lose the base and leave independents pointing and laughing.
JL
Sarah will probably do okay during the debate. After the Couric interview, she lowered the bar to zero so IMO she can only go up. Now I did receive an interesting phone call from a repub friend. She asked whether or not McCain could let her go and I said that would be unlikely. Palin could decide to leave because of family. A small part of me feels sorry for her since she was chosen, because of her evangelical leanings and they did not prepare her for her role.
RoonieRoo
I am beginning to think they are sandbagging with Palin and it is working. They are setting up the nation for what happened with W. When he didn’t drool on himself, he was declared the winner becaues the bar had been set so low.
Now we are allowing them to do the same thing. She won her previous elections folks. She must have had to debate for those positions. I hae a feeling that she will come out a very, very skilled debater and the punditry will fall neatly in the trap.
Dennis - SGMM
KCinDC does a great job of explaining why Palin will stay on the ticket.
I’d add that as long as Palin doesn’t start speaking in tongues or vomit partially-digested moose meat all over the stage she’ll be declared “ready” by the Republicans. Any criticism will be spun as an attack on Hard-Working American Mothers.
Bobzim
Nah, if it does happen, whoever the replacement is will be seen as taking one for the team. If it’s Rudy, it will only get him more security contracts with the world’s mid-level dictators.
Comrade Mary, Would-Be Minion Of Bad Horse
JL, I think the gold standard for sympathetic pieces on Sarah Palin is this one by Ta-Nehisi Coates.
SGEW
This was definitely my belief, based on Sarah Palin’s perfectly acceptable debate performance in the Alaskan gubernatorial election.
But then I saw the Couric interview. And now I read JSF’s direct quotation, above, and I have to double-check to make sure it wasn’t created by cleek’s random Palinism generator. She’s a disaster. Who knows, maybe she can pull the debate off . . . but I wouldn’t bet on it.
Joe Lieberman would do it. He’d do anything if it gets him some attention.
Comrade Napoleon
Arnold S. since he is a member of Sargent Shriver’s family. Pick him and karmitic circle is complete.
Comrade John Cole
Normally I would agree with KC about tamping down expectations for Sarah, but two things keep me from agreeing in this case:
1.) After eight years of Bush, the public instinctively recognizes retard.
2.) She is so dumb that she will not meet any expectations, period. Journalism degree. Six years. Five schools.
Sack of hammers.
TR
Too bad she didn’t go to the bar from “It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia.”
FabForty
Palin is Santorum with lipstick????
hey…whatever happened to “you can’t put lipstick on a man on dog…..I mean….a pig”?
Comrade PeterJ
A local high school isn’t an ivy league university.
A local election isn’t a national election.
tagged45
I doubt Palin gets dumped from the ticket unless something extremely bad happens, like video surfacing of her tasering baby moose for fun or something. To get rid of her would be to to completely blow McCain’s “experience and hence judgment” credentials out of the water. So I think they grin and bear it and hope for the best.
Now I too wonder if this is just some really high-stakes game of playing “lower the bar” in advance of this upcoming debate: the leaked reports of internal concern, the suggestion that the debate be moved, etc. I hope Biden doesn’t view this debate as a slam-dunk cakewalk, and WE would do well not to enhance the bar-lowering dialogue.
But despite my inherent Democrat-supporting fear of being set up, I can’t imagine Palin’s interview performances are part of the ultimate rope-a-dope strategy. She and her campaign have started to suffer real damage from those interviews and it’s a heavy price to pay just to set up one competent debate performance.
McCain is a reckless gambler but I don’t believe he’d be THAT stupid.
FLILF Hunter
Cept for that part of the Constitution that disqualifies the Governator as a prez-ready dude on account of being furrin-born.
Joe Max
Transcript of Palin’s remarks from Politico – Facepalm doesn’t even cover it anymore:
“Thank you. Thanks for inviting us into The Irish Pub and we know this is going to be a great night for our ticket. Thank you for being here for rooting on John McCain tonight in the debate even, you guys, thank you. Yeah.”
SGEW
Yes, but will they react as we do (with horror), or chant “One of us! One of us!”? That is the question.
[Also: ‘ware use of the “R- word.” It’s a rather touchy subject.]
Comrade Josh Vondoktorpepper
Woohoo! Lemon Party!
Lie baby, lie!
What was Cindy wearing last night? A red dress with flaps of cloth in front of her breasts???
Bobzim
I think she was OK by Republican standards but the McCain campaign unintentionally fucked with her head by keeping her under wraps and frantically trying to cram her.
I get an image of her strapped in an old barber’s chair with those Clockwork Orange contraptions holding her eyes open while they shoot rapid-fire questions from all directions.
I also think she could’ve been a great, if ideologically wrong, politician if she had come up through the ranks.
FLILF Hunter
OMFGWTF!?
I’m beginning to buy into the idea that their strategy is to make her look so lame that even if Biden just says “Hello, Governor Palin” it’ll look like someone beating an injured kitten with a dirty mop.
Napoleon
I know that, but it would only be an issue if they actually win it.
JGabriel
Politico:
Good lord.
My eyes hurt just reading about it. Seeing that outfit must have induced epilectic seizures among some of the attendees.
Of course, they’re Republicans, so everyone would have thought they were merely speaking in tongues.
.
Comrade Mary, Would-Be Minion Of Bad Horse
Woohoo! Lemon Party!
“You should all be very ashamed of yourselves …”
FLILF Hunter
Sure, but it’s disqualifying simply on the assumption you might win.
But in all seriousness, look for Arnie to run for senate eventually. It’s as close as he’ll ever get.
J. Michael Neal
I’m a little sensitive to this one, since it took me 20 years to get my bachelor’s degree, and I actually failed out at one point.
Svensker
.
Why did you say that? The mental images are seriously hurting what’s left of my brain.
Just Some Fuckhead
I dunno. “The Senatenator” just doesn’t have that je ne sais quoi.
Just Some Fuckhead
Don’t let it get to ya. Intertoobz commenters are the most highly educated minimum wage workers yer likely to meet.
Comrade Jake
You remember those trade missions with Russia she cited in the Couric interview.
It would seem as though they just might be made up as well.
Man Sully is ruthless with this stuff. I love the “Odd Lies of Sarah Palin”.
Comrade Josh Vondoktorpepper
I’m not. It took me over ten years to get my BA, and that includes going to community college, failing classes, retaking classes, and not finishing my senior project on time. I don’t let that take away from my worth as a person, but I also sure as hell know I’m not qualified for elected office.
J.A.F. Rusty Shackleford
Breaking: Sarah Palin To Be Replaced
Dennis - SGMM
M’kay, the McCain has become a series of ever more improbable stunts. It’s up to us to predict the next one: forewarned is fore armed. What’s Next?
Comrade Jake
Shackleford – that was awesome. I nearly fell out of my chair.
rob!
this VP debate is going to be the political equivalent of a snuff film.
if Palin wasn’t such a lying, crooked, judgmental, cruel-to-animals power-mad religious fanatic, i’d almost feel sorry for her.
JL
Before I linked to Politico, I thought the link to lemon porn was bad.
Jon H
I’m convinced that she’s going to take Kathleen Parker’s advice and Rudy’s going to replace her.
No way. She’ll be replaced by Ted Nugent.
Just Some Fuckhead
Where’s Justin Timberlake when ya need him?
Dickie Moe
I think Palin is probably partying because she realizes that it is obvious to anyone with a brain, that she, as a VP candidate, has more experience and is better qualified than the GQ model Obama is, and could beat him hands-down if the race were between them. Obama should be running as someone else’s VP candidate – he obviously has no capacity as an executive of any kind whatsoever.
That’s why the Obama campaign (oh, I mean, “the league of independent, concerned, conservative christian voters”) has been leveling every attack on her they can. Avoid any talk of issues – the issue for them has become “see how stupid and inexperienced Sarah Palin is? Plus, she wears clothes I wouldn’t be caught dead in. Look at her hair!”
Pathetic. They throw rocks and hide like children.
Mr. “I have a bracelet too” Obama can’t even tell people what he does for a living, and doesn’t dare let anyone know what he did before he starting his latest campaign.
I almost feel sorry for anyone stupid enough to actually vote for him, since that does pretty much indicate a pitiful mental deficiency.
Just Some Fuckhead
They should replace her with The Risen Christ. They can have Biden debate an empty cave with a rolled-away stone.
McCain/The Risen Christ ’08
The Moar You Know
Arnold is fucked. California Dems hate him for being an anti-union, pro-corporation big business tool who is more than willing to hop into bed with the fundies when it suits him to squeeze out some votes. The California Republicans also now hate him with a vengenance, going so far as to semi-covertly fund, via our state prison guard union, a recall effort.
His offense?
They wanted him to partcipate in their jihad to slash every state program to the bone in order to fix our deficit, and he wouldn’t do it – he was not willing to sacrifice his political career for the selfish interests of a party so far in the minority in California politics that they face a real danger of becoming completely irrelevant in the next few years. Instead, he cut a deal with Democrats, and in this state that’s the last thing you’re allowed to do if you’re a Republican.
So Arnie has a real problem. He would like to progress up the job ladder, I’m sure, but he probably won’t last another term as governor here in California. His odds of becoming a California senator are exactly zero – he is widely despised here. No one will be amending the Constitution anytime soon to allow him to vault into a national executive office position – no VP or presidential slot for him, ever.
He could move elsewhere, I guess, but he’d have to start over and I think he may be getting a bit old for that. I’m also at a loss to think of what state would be supportive of his very socially liberal yet savagely anti-labor platform.
Comrade Jake
From Ta-Nehisi Coates over at the Atlantic:
I like it.
L. Ron Obamanov
Heh, you might want to triple-check that “direct quotation”.
Comrade Scrutinizer
I can’t see this as a McCain campaign ploy to make her look better at the VP debate either. I mean, it’s the VP debate, for God’s sake. Who’s gonna care? In the meantime, the campaign is hurting both Palin and itself by keeping her under wraps. She can’t get better if she doesn’t get a chance to fuck up. And the campaign needs to rely on it’s VP pick to do stuff like Biden did for Obama last night after the debate. Yeah, I know, John, sack of hammers, and I agree. But this choice of Palin, and then muzzling her, makes the stupidest stuff Clinton’s campaign did look like brilliant strokes of genius.
L. Ron Obamanov
Also, “mocked” is on track to become the most overused word in the 2008 campaign.
It needs to be thrown under the bus, pronto.
Dennis - SGMM
Normally, no one. But this is Sarah and John’s Bogus Journey and John can’t even fuckin’ play Twister.
lampwick
I hope they replace Palin with Bobby Jindal. That way McCain’s flaming disaster of a campaign can take the entire Republican farm team down with itself, crippling the party for an entire generation.
Cervantes
That’s really weird, actually. I thought alcohol was against her religion. Evangelicals I know consider it sinful even to enter a bar.
FLILF Hunter
(full disclosure: I’m a Californian)
The CA Repubs NEVER liked him. They wanted uber-winger Tom McClintock.
I’m pro-union, generally. But the Prison Guard’s union so desperately needs to be busted. They’re a huge part of the problem in the state. And the “recall” they’re trying to mount has no support with the public (with our without the backing of the wingers).
Absolutely true. And considering the budget “compromise” the Dems and Repubs came up with would’ve bankrupted me in less than a year, I’m effin’ glad he threatened the veto.
He’s termed-out, AFAIK — unless he’s eligible due his first “term” not really being a full term. And I’m not sure how widely he’s actually despised. Sure the wingers (on both sides) hate him, but I’m not so sure about the middle. He’s good on gays, immigrants, environment — good not great — so I’m not so sure about “zero” chance at a senate seat. I think if it’s an open seat (i.e. Feinstein retires), he’s got a shot.
Regardless, I’m pretty sure he’s going to run, whatever his chances.
Martin
I just want to note – when you’ve shielded your candidate from the press to such an extent that the political rags read like People Magazine, you are so ultimately fucked when they finally get a chance to ask a question, because once they get their shot they’re gonna go for broke and spend the next week parsing your answer because of all the pent-up frustration.
NR
How about this?
Really, I don’t know what else I can add here.
JL
NR, This is the most repulsive thing that I have read. Are they trying to do a Princess Diana thing.
Martin
Holy hell, it’s gonna pull ratings better than the Olympics. Between the wingnuts swarming her rallies and the other 70% of the country tuning in to see if she does, in fact, burst into flames, it’ll be the most watched VP debate ever.
McCain’s best tactic now is to lay off the theatrics for the next week and hope to hell everyone forgets that its on. I still don’t think Palin will show, but we’ll see.
Comrade Ivan Fookinov (fmrly: Conservatively Liberal)
Thanks SGEW, that is a pet peeve of mine. My wife’s niece (her brother’s daughter) was one of many people who had to bear this burden until her untimely death at 19 years of age. When you personally know people like her you can’t help but be offended when people use the ‘retard’ expression to describe blithering idiots like Palin. There is absolutely no comparison.
There is a big difference between birth defects and voluntary idiocy. The former live with what they were given, and the latter live with what they have created for themselves.
Holy shit, if they pull this marriage stunt it may just backfire on them. Anyone who is a caring parent would see that this would be nothing more than political exploitation of a child for personal gain.
IOW, child abuse.
John
Hey, a post which allows me to relate a personal anecdote, since I was actually right outside when this was going down.
First thing’s first – are people really defending Irish Pub as a good bar? It’s terrible – the worst kind of meat market (and I say this as someone who occasionally enjoys meat markets).
At any rate, we were having happy hour at Bard’s, which is the Irish pub right next to Irish Pub. Some of us were curious, and decided to go outside and see if we could see Palin going in. We were standing out in front of Bard’s, when a fat, 50-something white guy in a suit comes and starts ordering us around, telling us that we had to either go back inside or move somewhere else (including across the street, where there were protesters and other onlookers)
People were not particularly inclined to agree. When a British or Irish guy with a somewhat thick accent questioned the dude, the guy ordering us around replied, “I only speak English. If you need a translation, you’ll have to get that from someone else.”
Suspecting (or at least hoping) at this point that the guy was not Secret Service, I asked him who he was, and what authority he had to order everybody around. He tried to intimidate me, but seeing that I continued at it, he went and got a Philly policeman, who told us that, indeed, we had to move.
We decided to go across the street. Palin arrived shortly thereafter. (We booed her) We were standing right across from the front of the bar, so we actually could see her glad handing people in the front of the bar (although we missed her actually going in).
Soon thereafter, we decided we were sick of waiting, and decided to go back to the Bards to close out tabs and so forth. At this point we realized that they had taped off the sidewalk on both sides of Bards, and when I tried to go in, said goon came over and started yelling at me. Threatened to arrest me, and so forth (although he still would not directly state that he actually had the authority to do so). I had to come back several hours later to get my credit card and close my tab.
When I got back, I was talking to one of the bartenders at Bard’s, and he was seriously pissed – bar lost a ton of money from being, you know, blocked off for a couple of hours.
Anyway – the McCain campaign hires goons to push people around for no reason.
Stuck in the Fun House
What it’d be really cool, would be to have Dustin Hoffman show up and start banging on the church window, yelling something inaudible.
FLILF Hunter
Gotta love that support for small business owners.
KT
George Bush proved executive experience doesn’t matter.
ibid
Comrade Mary, Would-Be Minion Of Bad Horse
Perfect!
Delia
Where are they now? What happened to that wingnut boy wonder blogger at the Repug Convention who claimed he was the one who started the movement to draft Sarah Palin as VP? He certainly got his fifteen minutes and was quite pleased with himself and seemed to think he had himself a bright future in gooper politics, but I wonder how he’s doing now. I figure either they’ve quietly had him shot, have set him to useful work building that Alaska Pipeline, or perhaps they’ve set him to minding Levi Johnson, making sure the young thug doesn’t run off before the wedding.
Fern
Well, there is one potential drawback to a pre-election wedding for Bristol and whatisname – I think they’ve already gotten married.
Martin
So? McCain went to Washington to help broker a deal that was already done.
I almost hope SNL does a skit on this just to prevent the campaign from wrecking the lives this couple any more than they already have.
NR
Well, Bristol will be eighteen by then, so it’s not technically child abuse. I can’t help but wonder what the reaction would be to seeing Palin pimp out her own daughter for political gain, though.
Just Some Fuckhead
Who are they reaching out to with a shotgun wedding? Second ammendment enthusiasts?
DaveInOz
Hot Of The Press!
McCain dumps Palin and replaces her with Carey Torrice, County Commissioner in Macomb County, Michigan.
El Cid
Is this really what Democrats think of as getting tough, as dealing with the massive revolt they’re playing with for this hundreds of billions they’re about to give away to Wall Street at Bush Jr’s request?
? ? ? “Could” be assessed after 5 years?
Is this really what Democrats like Pelosi think is the “A” game? What the hell is this nonsense?
Why can’t we, as Thom Hartmann suggests, bring back a small (I think he suggested 0.25%) transaction fee on all stock trade and financial transactions to raise money directly from Wall Street for the bailout?
Does anyone seriously believe in a 5 year tax time bomb approach? Does anyone believe it represents anything but a dodge, because everyone knows it would be repealed before it came due?
Comrade Josh Vondoktorpepper
It’s not a shotgun wedding, it’s a Freedom Marriage(tm)
Comrade Josh Vondoktorpepper
It’s not a shotgun wedding, it’s a Freedom Marriage(tm)
cyntax
OK, this is just stupid:
WTF? So because Palin’s at Cheney’s undisclosed loation ABC wouldn’t give Biden air-time?
lampwick
There are reports at dkos that Palin is going to make a surprise appearance on SNL tonite.
And now I read this rumor about an Alaskan shotgun wedding.
I guess the McCain strategy for dealing with Palin’s idiocy is to double-down on her ridiculousness.
Comrade Ivan Fookinov (fmrly: Conservatively Liberal)
Now that’s change you can believe in. The polls are already rising! Ok, poles, but they is a’risin!
kth
the wedding of her pregnant teenage daughter to her ice-hockey-playing fiancé before the November 4 election.
That’s awesome. I have an idea: the bridesmaids’ dresses, and the groomsmans’ ties, cummerbunds, etc., should be in the colors of the high school they haven’t yet graduated from!
Comrade Ivan Fookinov (fmrly: Conservatively Liberal)
If that is true I wonder if it was calculated to detract from the commentary on the debate and the ‘cancellation’ of the Train Wreck Express tour that never happened? Or maybe a final lowering of the bar prior to the veep debate?
IMO putting Palin on SNL would be a disaster, which means that the McCain campaign is probably doing it.
gbear
Christ. Maybe while they’ve got the press up there they can induce labor too. Everybody loves babies. What a twofer that would be.
NR
Why would it be a disaster? It’s not like she’ll be facing any tough questions. All she has to do is go out there and say the line or two they give her, and that’s it. If she can handle a big speech at the RNC, she can surely handle that.
Rosali
That’s a great idea but, as a Floridian, I’m hoping he picks Charlie Crisp and someone comes out the week before the election with Crisp pictures.
Rosali
So McPain couldn’t do Letterman’s show because we’re having a financial crisis but Palin can do SNL 3 days later?
McMartin
Was that Ross Douthat? I recall following some links from here (I think through Sully) that ended up to him repudiating that with a line like “This is why nobody will ever, ever pay me to advise a campaign.”
Comrade Ivan Fookinov (fmrly: Conservatively Liberal)
And I bet she would still jumble her few lines…lol! If the skit involves anything but intelligence, that isn’t going to help her one bit either. If she does go on the show, I wonder if the McCain campaign will have any input on how she is portrayed. If they are allowed to control her performance/lines, it could come off as a total failure. Everyone knows that deliberate humor and Republicans have absolutely nothing in common. Their humor is usually unscripted on their part and people like us are the ones who get to laugh at them.
While it is true that they might gain something, IMO I think they have a lot more to lose with her appearance on SNL. It would be another Hail Sarah pass, and those haven’t worked out too well for McCain so far.
JL
ABC News Political Radar says that Palin might make a surprise visit to SNL tonight.
Martin
She’ll do great on SNL, actually. She’d come off looking good.
lampwick
Maybe she can tell the SNL audience her new joke: about how when she met Henry Kissinger this week, she felt above his ears and he didn’t have any HORNS!!!
gbear
What if they booo her? I would.
Comrade PeterJ
yet another jeff
This many posts and nobody is asking for Palin to be dropped in favor of Katherine Harris?
“star light, star bright, first star I see tonight…wish I may, wish I might…”
Comrade PeterJ
OT, but Charlie Cook got an article about the possibilty of the republicans losing nine senate seats no longer being implausable. And there’s a new poll out in Kentucky where the senate minority leader McConnell is tied with his democratic opponent, Lunsford.
Bill Arnold
Never explain something with incompetence when you can explain it in a convoluted conspiracy theory, involving Elvis
This is beautiful.
(Even without the dangling Elvis part it’s a Google original.)
Delia
Oh, please let Gordy Smith be one of the ones who falls. He’s been pretending he’s not a Republican, at least as far as the ad campaign goes. Not as bad as the goons in Washington state, who are listing their party affiliation as GOP Party on the ballot, since Republican has such a bad smell these days.
JGabriel
Dickie Moe:
You mean the same Sarah Palin who, just this week, told us:
FAIL.
.
JGabriel
London Times (via NR, above):
Kevin Federline and Britney Spears will be relieved to finally be out of the spotlight.
Does McCain really think that attending the shotgun wedding of a pregant teenager and a kid named after the inventor of blue jeans is really gonna enhance his perceived presidential demeanor?
Nothing good can come of this.
.
Davebo
Sweet..
Couldn’t happen to a nicer guy.
Stuck in the Fun House
Oh, please let Gordy Smith be one of the ones who falls
Stuck in the Fun House
And Comrade PeterJ. It would be of great benefit, if I read upthread just a little before posting.
JGabriel
GBear:
As would about 5 out of six New Yorkers. There’s a real possibility that could happen.
OTOH, the bridge and tunnel tourist contingent that frequents those things might not be as hostile.
.
Martin
They wouldn’t. Even in New York (I used to live there) they’re more respectful than that – and SNL gets a pretty big non-resident draw anyway. And the writers always leave a guest feeling good about being on.
I’m glad she won’t be on because I was afraid they wouldn’t skewer McCain as badly as I hope they will. I want to see Obama chasing McCain around on the debate stage trying to get him to look at him and McCain doing everything he can not to.
JGabriel
I keep wondering about this claim. I mean, what constitutes a “Tina Fey costume”? Palin’s already got the glasses.
Does she put on a sticker that says “HELLO, MY NAME IS: Tina!”?
Or does she just get a temporary brain transplant?
.
Laura W
There is a lot to be said for leaving this site for a few hours, catching up on the 2 days worth of taped Daily Shows, Colberts, and Mahers…Project Runway, a little dinner, some adult beverages, ice cream, and new Chris Rock* on HBO, interspersed with Suze ALARMIST Orman.
You come back here when you’re about ready for bed and find shit like this and it’s twice as funny as it would’ve been hours earlier. Phew. I almost choked on my laughter.
*Rock is so damn funny, and has a lot of election/Obama materiel in this one, as you would expect. I tried not to watch too much so I could tape it in full tomorrow night and watch it fresh on Monday, but of course I kept flipping back for the sheer laugh factor. Suze is such a fucking downer.
patroclus
The thing is – Biden simply CAN NOT MENTION any of the by-now well-known disqualifying features of Palin’s candidacy. He is going to have to rely on Gwen Ifill to do her job and he probably shouldn’t even comment (like Carter did once w/ Ford in 76) on any expected Palin inane response concerning one of her many many peccadilloes. He MUST stick to policy and personal anecdotes and he MUST NOT engage her with any back-and-forth whatsoever. I know he’ll be tempted to show how “smart” he is, but it won’t play well.
Martin
This is what people don’t see in Obama when he debates and gives rallies and such. And it’s part of what took Clinton down.
Now we know why McCain wouldn’t look at him. That’s badass…
Having read this, I wish Obama would have pressed him in a similar way in the debate. Having him follow up the moderator on the ‘would you vote for the plan’ question, repeating his own question from the day before: “What do you think of the plan, John?” I’m sure would have thrown him off for the rest of the debate.
zuzu's petals
Exactly ! In fact, I just asked this very question at another board…how in the heck does one “dress up” as Tina Fey?
Dennis - SGMM
For someone who is impersonating a vice-presidential candidate dressing up as Tina Fey is small potatoes. Palin saw Tina Fey, didn’t she?
Comrade Ivan Fookinov (fmrly: Conservatively Liberal)
That is supposed to be a joke?! It seems that Old McNasty is just an unmitigated asshole, through and through. He was clearly dismissing Obama, and when Obama put him on the spot I bet that just infuriated McNasty to the point that he could not respond without losing it and blowing up in front of everyone.
It is clear that McNasty believes that Obama is beneath contempt or recognition, and if I were Obama I would carefully work that angle to the point that McNasty blows up at the third debate. It is clear that McNasty has a temper and attitude problem and I hope that Obama can carefully blow his fuse out.
What. An. Asshole. But what else can we expect from the right? Assholes seem to be a product of the republican environment, and they luv them assholes while being one at the same time (see: Craig, Larry – Republican Senator).
El Cid
The New York Times officially becomes Daily Kos / Atrios / assorted lefty blogs, blasting Reaganite anti-regulationism for this entire mess.
28 Percent
You are all missing the TRUTH and that is that McCain and Palin will put an end to GREED just like our great President George W. Bush put an end to TERROR it is possible you just have to live the dream and BELIEVE.
Dennis - SGMM
In the speech before last, Bush said “the markets aren’t working properly.” I nearly fell over. The markets built castles in the air, valued them at inflated prices and then borrowed forty times that amount to invest in even bigger and better castles in the air. Like any Ponzi scheme, the wheels came off when they ran out of suckers. Well, not quite: there’s always the taxpayer.
TenguPhule
Palin’s stupidity and ignorance of the issues is the problem, Dickie.
She has the executive experience of a third rate CEO of a shitty company that survives only on handouts from others.
w vincentz
SNL….LOL!!!!
Barbar
SNL just replayed the Couric/Palin interview. Hilarious.
Gene
OK, slightly off topic, but too good to pass up …
Here’s Rich Lowry from the corner earlier Saturday evening:
Seeing as how I had a few beers, I had to read that like 4 times to make sure I wasn’t sleeping-in-the-gutter drunk. ‘Cause, I swear the last 15 or so years have been nothing but (D) = GI Joe villan.
I wish I could get away with being this friggin wrong at doing my job.
kth
It was great, and explains the trial balloon about the real Sarah appearing on SNL: obviously, the McCain camp was eager to head off the spoof, so they offered Palin if SNL would take the sketch off. SNL said NFW, and that was that.
TR
I don’t think Palin will be praising Fey’s performance anymore.
The saddest part was that a few of those answers that Fey’s Palin gave for laughs were about 80% faithful to the ones Real Palin gave to Couric.
kth
Fred Armisen’s Obama is terrible, btw: he does a lot of Obama’s mannerisms and tics, but he doesn’t capture Obama at all.
gbear
I feel the same way about the SNL guy who plays McCain. He kind of gets the voice, but he’s way too wooden. He also looks more like Billy Kristol than McCain.
comrade pseudonymous in nc
They could have acted out that transcript verbatim and people would piss themselves laughing. That would be pretty telling.
Armisen’s crap, and SNL’s writers can’t do good Obama jokes. Oh dear.
Delia
Oh, cry me a river. These guys have no shame at all. There must be some appropriate punishment for such bottomless self-pity, but I can’t think of it quite yet. Be creative, everyone.
Just Some Fuckhead
I thought the race card bit was funny.
TR
The Rezko stuff fell flat. If they’re looking for equal time, they should do what Stewart and Colbert do, and mock him for being a “hopemonger.”
That was a bit uneven, but I suppose they had less than 24 hours to write and rehearse it. The stuff about McCain’s maverick proposals was the funniest bit, I thought, and will likely be replayed a lot.
Dennis - SGMM
Do you have any really young children? If so then this is familiar. “Why do I always have to clean up my room?” “Why do I always have to do my homework?” Republicans are very much like a pack of little kids, absent even their impulse control and grasp of reality.
Dan
Eww, eww, ewwwwwwwwwww.
Comrade Mary, Would-Be Minion Of Bad Horse
The Tina Fey skit had some moments, including the cornered adorability routine and the near-verbatim answers, but the hick jokes about the UN and cab drivers were weak.
The debate skit was almost a total waste. You know, there are ways to make fun of the MUP, but those Rezko/Chicago machine/race card jokes appeared tacked on to avoid charges of bias. And they totally didn’t take up the obvious suggestion of making the entire skit about McCain avoiding looking at Obama, settling instead for some dumb remark about Lehrer trying to make them uncomfortable by making them look at each other.
This is why I catch 30 Rock every week it’s on and usually avoid SNL.
Kat
Warning: Swallow liquids before reading.
McCain camp prays for Palin wedding
September 28, 2008
McCain camp prays for Palin wedding
The marriage of the vice-presidential candidate’s pregnant teenage daughter could lift a flagging campaign
In an election campaign notable for its surprises, Sarah Palin, the Republican vice- presidential candidate, may be about to spring a new one — the wedding of her pregnant teenage daughter to her ice-hockey-playing fiancé before the November 4 election.
Inside John McCain’s campaign the expectation is growing that there will be a popularity boosting pre-election wedding in Alaska between Bristol Palin, 17, and Levi Johnston, 18, her schoolmate and father of her baby. “It would be fantastic,” said a McCain insider. “You would have every TV camera there. The entire country would be watching. It would shut down the race for a week.”
There is already some urgency to the wedding as Bristol, who is six months pregnant, may not want to walk down the aisle too close to her date of delivery. She turns 18 on October 18, a respectable age for a bride — and the same age as Barack Obama’s pregnant mother when she married his Kenyan father. The Democrat has already declared Bristol’s private life off-limits as far as his campaign is concerned.
The selection of Palin, 44, the moose-hunting governor of Alaska, as his running mate was one of McCain’s biggest gambles. It paid off handsomely at first, but she could benefit from a fresh injection of homespun authenticity, the hallmark of her style, provided by her daughter’s wedding after appearing out of depth away from her home state.
[…]
The Republicans’ Palin “bounce” ended last week as concern for the plunging economy mounted. Obama ended the week four points ahead of McCain on 48% to 44% in the RealClearPolitics poll of polls. A Rasmussen survey showed that McCain’s lead among white women voters slipped to two points, as opposed to 14 points for George W Bush in 2004.
However, Palin has a remarkable ability to galvanise the evangelical voters and social conservatives who form the Republican base. The party boasted last week that it will probably surpass its fundraising goal of $100m for September and October. Much of it is because of the grassroots enthusiasm for Palin, boosted by her decision to have Trig and to support her pregnant daughter.
McCain is expected to have a front-row seat at Bristol’s wedding and to benefit from the outpouring of goodwill that it could bring. “What’s the downside?” a source inside the McCain campaign said. “It would be wonderful. I don’t know that there has ever been a pre-election wedding before.”
More at the link…
The Moar You Know
Calling Republicans unpatriotic is OK? FUCKING SWEET!
CT
Obama’s just hard to make fun of-he’s so even keeled. If they’d wanted to tweak Obama, they could have had him respond to all of McCain’s bizarre suggestions with “John’s right that…” (
Delia
How on earth is the shotgun marriage of a six months pregnant eighteen year old to a kid who’s an obvious jerk a WIN for McCain? Is there something I’m missing here?
rob!
What country is the McCain campaign operating in? The “entire country” doesn’t watch ANYTHING, not even the Super Bowl.
Maybe if, in the middle of the wedding, they reran the last episode of MASH?
Dennis - SGMM
This isn’t a campaign, it’s a hallucination.
Liz
Anyone catch this? Someone taught McCain how to use a phone!!! Hilarious. He doesn’t get away with letting the ‘urgent business’ in Washington cancel his debate, so he hangs out at home and works over the phone today.
TenguPhule
McCain crossdressing as Palin, complete with plastic boobs and wig…forever.
TenguPhule
And the Acid was bad.
OriGuy
Every time a TV sitcom starts to fall in the ratings, they throw in a wedding or a funeral. That’s usually the sign that there won’t be a next season.
handy
So would the McCain campaign replacing Palin with Ted McGinley in what the media will no doubt chyron as a “Very Special Episode” of Election 2008.
JGabriel
Patroclus:
Er, no.
Palin’s best bet is to come out as an attack dog on Obama – as Quayle did in ’92.
Biden needs to be prepared to do the same to McCain. In fact, it might be best for Biden to initiate it, so it looks like she’s imitating him.
I don’t expect Obama recommend that course, however. On the other hand, Obama may be the smartest politician I’ve ever seen, and may have already blocked out a strategy for Biden to deal with this. Guess we’ll find out on Thursday.
.
JGabriel
TenguPhule:
That’s mean. You could have save much insult, and been just as accurate, by simply pointing out that Palin has the same experience as George Bush.
.
Dickie Moe
Gee, why is it no one makes fun of Obams? Are people afraid of him and his lawyer posse? I know I’m not. But then, I’m obviously smarter than any of the idiots that would consider him a reasonable candidate for anything other than garbage collector. Or, perhaps college professor, but I repeat myself.
Dickie Moe
Gee, why is it no one makes fun of Obams? Are people afraid of him and his lawyer posse? I know I’m not. But then, I’m obviously smarter than any of the idiots that would consider him a reasonable candidate for anything other than garbage collector. Or, perhaps college professor, but I repeat myself.
Dickie Moe
Gee, why is it no one makes fun of Obams? Are people afraid of him and his lawyer posse? I know I’m not. But then, I’m obviously smarter than any of the idiots that would consider him a reasonable candidate for anything other than garbage collector. Or, perhaps college professor, but I repeat myself.
Blue Raven
Nonsense. When did she drive a major league baseball team into the ground?
Blue Raven
Saying it three times only works in magical spells and Heinlein novels.
JGabriel
Looks like Dickie’s OCD is acting up again.
.
Dickie Moe
Fascinating, or is it fascist-inating, that “protesters” would spontaneously show up at a pub in Philadelphia where the VP candidate who Obamy can’t match happened to be. Gee – wonders the average Joe – what kind of people would be so obsessed with a VP candidate, and have so much to “protest” over about her in PA anyway?
Could it be, perhaps, that the idiots that support a zero like Obamsie have to resort to hiring a mob to harass his opponent’s running mate and attempt to intimidate her supporters?
Goodness, no! That can’t be the case at all. In fact, I’m sure Obamy himself would agree with you, that such tactics are just too obviously staged and fundamentally wrong on main street as opposed to wall street, that he would not “go ahead, and think about” supporting that kind of thing. Nor would his astroturfing campaign manager ever resort to such. That would be terrific.
What a bunch of idiots. I mean, what more can one say?
JGabriel
Dickie Moe:
Sarah Palin:
Give it up, Dickie. All anyone has to do to rebut your pro-Palin talking points is post that Palin quote over and over again, because, you know what?
That never stops being funny.
.
Comrade Baron Elmo
Dickie Moe must have attended a very interesting college. Where might I obtain a brochure outlining their curriculum?
liberal
El Cid wrote,
I completely agree.
Of course, a lot of the lead Democrats like Schumer are on the take from the FIRE sector.
El Cid
I hate to admit it, but I honestly can’t think of anything about Obama I could mock or satirize him for. There are things I disagree with. And it’s not about him being a Democrat or liberal, I often find myself focusing on any other Democrat or liberal who has easily mocked tics.
If you don’t have the same crazy world view as the right wing freaks who think it’s funny to scream “arugula” in a sarcastic voice, then, well, I just don’t quite see it.
If I had to write a script for satirizing Obama, it would be all inside baseball, not based on any weird eccentrisms, but some actual disagreements with political choices, which would probably be mildly humorous to like 2 people and completely inexplicable to most.
Comrade Josh Vondoktorpepper
but I
repeatfellate myselffixt.
rob!
MyIQ2xu, now doing work as “Dickie Moe.”
Darkness
Nonsense. When did she drive a major league baseball team into the ground?
You misremember that episode. The question is when did she and her cronies cash out 150 million of taxpayer money they finagled to update their team’s stadium. Think about that, and then you won’t find it mysterious that he wants to again hand gazzillions of taxpayer money to his rich friends.
Comrade grumpy realist
Anyone catch Matt Tabbi’s take on the Republican Convention talk?
SamFromUtah
Why is it always OK for Democrats to call Republicans “unpatriotic”?
…because it’s not only OK but required for Republicans to call Democrats “traitors”?