And in other news, Sarah Palin is not running for President.
Yeah, I know. We know this. But confirmation keeps coming in from one angle or another. This time, TPM reports on a new memoir by a disaffected former Palin aide that describes (among much else) Palin’s love of the act of governing:
a leaked copy of the manuscript Friday, describes the book by Frank Bailey “opens with an account of Palin sending Bailey a message saying ‘I hate this damn job’ shortly before she resigned as Alaska’s governor in July 2009.” The manuscript, the paper says, “goes on for nearly 500 pages, a mixture of analysis, gossip and allegation.”
TPM’s story focuses on Bailey’s description of what look like pretty clear election law violations. But the take home for me was exactly what lots of people have been saying for a while. Palin is smart enough not to want to work for the money.
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Seeming to run for President is OK–great even; watch the cash register go ka-ching! But the whole theme of her half term governorship was an aversion to actually doing the job.
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With each new reminder that this was so, it becomes ever more clear that there’s not a bunny’s chance in a greyhound kennel that she’d ever actually put herself in the way of having to go around presidenting. This latest story is just the next reminder that we’re watching a long con.
And why not? It’s been good to Team Palin for a while now.
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In a way, I guess, this does make John McCain a job creator. Who else could have turned the Palin enterprise into such a profit center?
Image: Guy Pène du Bois, The Confidence Man, c. 1919. (I may have used this one before over here, in which case, I’ll refund your admission cost.)
Rick Taylor
It is stunning to me this woman could have become a role model to so much of the right wing.
joeyess
On every occasion that someone talks about Palin and her know-nothingness, I can’t help but think of this now.
Pooh
She’s “running” the same way Trump is.
JonF
She almost has to at least try to run. If she doesn’t her base will follow Minnesota Palin, Trump, Newt, etc and she can’t make money off of them. And if she gets creamed in the primaries or the general, she can start the cycle of grievances to raise money off of.
Omnes Omnibus
@Rick Taylor: Stunning as in surprising or stunning as in “Wow, what a perfect distillation of all that is wrong with the GOP?”
comrade scott's agenda of rage
Newsflash: the sun rises in the east and sets in the west.
Phyllis
Worked with others like her.They love the idea of a position; when they discover there’s actual work they’re expected to do, their perspective changes very quickly.
quaint irene
“I’m not a president, but I play one on tv!”
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I’m always amazed that her supporters just ignore the fact that she couldn’t even get through one term as governor. And part of her rambling reasons seemed to be that her detractors were being too mean to her.
sukabi
It was clear from the beginning that Palin had no interest in actually doing the work required for any job… this hasn’t changed from her good old college days… she’s looking for attention and a payday, nothing more.
Villago Delenda Est
@Pooh:
Also the same way Newt has been for the last 6 or so years.
It’s all about the contributions rolling in, and then announcing that it’s not enough to go on…but is enough for a trip to Aruba…
dmsilev
@comrade scott’s agenda of rage: And of course, after she resigned she was completely free of petty grievances….
dms
rikyrah
it’s work running for President and she’s nothing but a grifter
aimai
I’ve pretty much thought this from the start. The only way Palin would ever actually run for President is if enough of the big money boyz had thought she might make a good figurehead, in which case they would put up the money and the talent to run her show and she’d just relax, choose the Cheney they put up for her, and run baby run. But there was no way, once it became clear how difficult and hot headed and lazy she was, that she was going to be a good enough figurehead (a la bush the lesser) to be worth the money. So there’s only one correction, tom–its a short con, not a long one. She’ll be playing small flea markets and swap meets in tertiary markets before long.
aimai
Punchy
My two greys just nodded excitedly in agreement. Then went to look for the bunny you mentioned. And will likely look for another hour or three.
Steve M.
I’m not sure. As governor of Alaska, you get to oversee gas pipelines and moose hunting regulations. As president, you can be Caligula if you choose. At the very least, you can be Nixon, changing the course of history and plotting the ruin your enemies. I think the idea of that (not the dull stewardship-of-the-nation stuff) appeals to Palin.
dan
I’ve always loved the “liberals are afraid of her” line. Oh, yeah? Who? Name one.
dan
I’ve always loved the “liberals are afraid of her” line. Oh, yeah? Who? Name one.
licensed to kill time
It’s clear that a Palin presidency would break the Nixon scale of paranoia and dirty tricks, cranking the knob past eleven in record time.
Tom Levenson
@Punchy: Heh. Persistent critturs, aren’t they.
Tsukune
Palin loves the campaigning, and I think she’ll do the pseudo-running for prez as long as she can, then find an excuse to back out before the primary season starts. She’ll endorse a front-runner in exchange for the proper level of grovelling to the Holy Grizzly Mama. Then she’ll hit the campaign trail again for her candidate, and probably find a way to get her appearances paid for by the campaign or back-room wingnut-welfare programs.
alwhite
Yeah, a lot of us have been saying that for a very long time. But she has a very real problem that the other con men running this scam don’t have. She is not seen as “serious”. Oh, she was when she was in the fold but now they have left her hung out to dry & she has no friends in the media any longer. The wingnuts will not give money indefinitely and she has not built the money machine like Newt did. Without the ability to shovel bullshit and have the media pretend it is manna from heaven the income will dry up soon enough.
She’ll have to go back & run for mayor again
feebog
@ Tsukune:
Me thinks the primary season is upon us. The first Republican debate is scheduled for May 10. That may not feature the entire cast of clown car candidates, as the Huckster and Mama Huckster are going to hold on to their Faux Noose gigs as long as possible. Ditto Trump, who will drop out as soon as his show is reupped. We should have a pretty good idea of her intentions in the next two months or so. Personally, I don’t think there is a chance she will run, but a guy can dream, no?
Yutsano
@feebog:
And Obama has already started working on his re-election campaign. Which is definitely the one thing I have every confidence in him doing right.
Stefan
The manuscript, the paper says, “goes on for nearly 500 pages, a mixture of analysis, gossip and allegation.”
I think “a mixture of analysis, gossip and allegation” has to be one of the new Balloon Juice tag lines….
JGabriel
Tom Levenson @ Top:
Doesn’t Palin have to run for the nomination at some point, just to maintain enough relevancy to keep the con going? Maybe Palin can wait until 2016, but eventually her base will move on to more active pastures if she never runs (Hello, Michelle Bachmann!).
And then Palin can use the credential of having been a presidential primary candidate, or even the nominee, to keep the long con going for decades.
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JGabriel
@Stefan:
We don’t gossip or allege; we snark and attack.
What’s the difference, you ask? We say fuck a lot.
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Phoebe
@Tsukune: What he or she said.
OR!
She’ll run anyway, because if she does win, she can always quit!
No one of Importance
@quaint irene:
And the same supporters still trot out the line that she has more executive experience than Obama. Even after he’s now well past the same period of time she spent as governer, and doing a harder job than she could imagine with her pea-sized brain.
Whenever I see someone going on about Palin and Obama’s comparative experience, I know to ignore everything they say. It’s obvious they live on Planet Wingnuttia and are deaf to all but the dogwhistles of like-minded idiots.
Grumpy Code Monkey
@No one of Importance:
And W. had more executive experience than the two of them combined when he first ran in 2000.
How’d that work out for everybody?