Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Russian mouthpiece, go fuck yourself.

Republican also-rans: four mules fighting over a turnip.

I might just take the rest of the day off and do even more nothing than usual.

A norm that restrains only one side really is not a norm – it is a trap.

The press swings at every pitch, we don’t have to.

It’s pointless to bring up problems that can only be solved with a time machine.

Stamping your little feets and demanding that they see how important you are? Not working anymore.

I see no possible difficulties whatsoever with this fool-proof plan.

The line between political reporting and fan fiction continues to blur.

The gop is a fucking disgrace.

Never entrust democracy to any process that requires republicans to act in good faith.

Relentless negativity is not a sign that you are more realistic.

Fundamental belief of white supremacy: white people are presumed innocent, minorities are presumed guilty.

Since when do we limit our critiques to things we could do better ourselves?

Books are my comfort food!

When someone says they “love freedom”, rest assured they don’t mean yours.

Shallow, uninformed, and lacking identity

Just because you believe it, that does not make it true.

All hail the time of the bunny!

When I was faster i was always behind.

Cancel the cowardly Times and Post and set up an equivalent monthly donation to ProPublica.

Today in our ongoing national embarrassment…

If you still can’t see these things even now, maybe politics isn’t your forte and you should stop writing about it.

How any woman could possibly vote for this smug smarmy piece of misogynistic crap is beyond understanding.

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She caught the Katie

by | 193 Comments

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The Trumpocalypse appeared first as farce, with Sarah Palin in 2008. There shouldn’t be any debate about that. Palin was everywhere for about five years, but now that her logical conclusion has come to pass, establishment media is acting like there was no precedent for Trump, that he came out of nowhere.

Every now and then, I like to go back and revisit the mash notes establishment journalists were writing to Palin before the disastrous interview with Katie Couric. I had thought “Sandra Day O’Palin” was the ne plus ultra of this genre, but it won’t surprise many of you that there’s a McArdle piece that’s even better (via LGM):

She slides the stiletto in without either losing her femininity or coming across as catty, and given that she’s married to an eskimo, it’s going to be hard to fit her into the narrative of conservative closet racists trying to perpetuate white domination.

[….]

The Democrats are, as my colleague Clive Crooks notes, in trouble. Whatever you think of her as a potential president, she is a politically brilliant choice, and Democrats are going to have a very hard time finding traction to attack her.

[….]

I have no reason to think that she would be a particularly bad president. Obama hasn’t any more relevant experience than she has; he’s simply been coaching for the thing longer. If he can get up to speed to be president in 18 months, presumably so can she, and I think its reasonable to expect McCain to live that long. We do not elect presidents because they are experts on everything that will come up during their presidency–they couldn’t possibly be. We elect them because we think they have good judgement and values that match our own. Contra my Democratic friends, I’m not sure that voters will see “But McCain really might die in office!” as a bug, rather than a feature.

Heh to the indeedy.

“Married to an eskimo” is a nice, if irrelevant, touch.

Reader Interactions

193Comments

  1. 1.

    redshirt

    LOL. What a title.

    “All of them, Katie” is one of my favorite new catchphrases, and it’s applicable in so many different scenarios.

  2. 2.

    debbie

    We elect them because we think they have good judgement and values that match our own.

    Is there any way to ask McArdle about this quote now, 8 years later?

  4. 4.

    LAO

    @debbie: Not only is that quote ridiculous — McArdle misspelled “judgment.” (That’s my number one pet peeve.)

  8. 8.

    Trentrunner

    McArdle is an ignoramus.

    But I guarantee you we were all pretty fuckin’ scared after Palin’s convention speech. We saw only her strengths at that point and none of her weaknesses had been revealed. (Obviously her politics always sucked, but I mean as of her convention speech we didn’t yet know she was such a lazy stupid grifting idiot.)

  10. 10.

    boatboy_srq

    Sounds like McMegan expected La Palin to succeed a prematurely-deceased President McCain two years into his first term. Anyone who thought she was merely an accessory to his campaign please take note.

  13. 13.

    redshirt

    @Trentrunner: I wasn’t scared a bit. She was obviously ridiculous the moment she first spoke.

    My only concern in 2008 was if racism was enough to keep out the obviously more qualified candidate. It wasn’t!

  14. 14.

    Brachiator

    @Doug!: Yah, but can Trump shoot a bear and skin it?

    Good stuff.

    The GOP tried an Attention Deficit VP candidate, and now they want the same thing magnified, for the top of the ticket. These dopes never learn.

  15. 15.

    Villago Delenda Est

    She slides the stiletto in without either losing her femininity or coming across as catty

    McArdle has no fucking idea what any of these words mean.

  16. 16.

    LAO

    @debbie: I will admit to losing my shit when other lawyers misspell judgment — I mean really — who do they think they are? British?

  17. 17.

    SiubhanDuinne

    “Married to an eskimo” is a nice, if irrelevant, touch.

    It’s also a bit of a stretch. According to Wikipedia, Todd had a Yup’ik great-grandmother, so his ancestry is one-eighth Eskimo. For the rest, he is Dutch and English.

  21. 21.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @Trentrunner: What I really liked about that speech was she said that Todd was “a proud union member” and the crowd had no idea how they were supposed to react to that.

  23. 23.

    Joyce H

    The Palin candidacy was a perfect illustration of the old saw that if you want to know what Republicans are like, just watch what they’re accusing other people of.

    I remember midway through the 2008 campaign, the Republican claim was that Obama supporters fell for a guy they knew nothing about, just because he gave a good speech. This was after Obama had been running for almost a year and we’d had plenty of time to learn quite a lot about him.

    Then McCain picked Palin for his VP selection – and before she was announced, I’d bet you that 98% of Republicans would say, if you mentioned the name Sarah Palin, “Who?” So Palin comes out, a woman that nobody knows anything about, and she reads off a teleprompter a speech written by the McCain campaign for ‘Generic VP Pick TBD’, mostly written before she was even selected, though they threw in a few hockey mom jokes.

    And what did the GOP do? They fell for someone they knew nothing about, because of one speech.

    The Irony…

  24. 24.

    Kylroy

    Palin at least *started* as a single (horrifically, awfully, monstrously) bad decision by the McCain team. Trump was a team effort by the entire Republican establishment, in the sense that nobody really *tried* to stop him until it was way too late.

  25. 25.

    LAO

    @humboldtblue: I appreciate one thing about Palin — she is so unhinged, so angry and so genuinely despises President Obama — that there is no artifice to her. What you see is what you get. Those that find her compelling, on the other hand, that’s who I worry about.

  28. 28.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @Kylroy: They spent all their time sniping at each other to become the “establishment” GOP candidate, and missed the fact that the rabid base was fed up with the “establishment” which was why they were supporting Drumpf, who gave them the raw red meat they craved.

  30. 30.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @Joyce H: The entire “Obama is our savior” meme, implying that the Dems were succumbing to a cult of personality, is pure projection of the cult of the shitty grade Z movie star that is at the center of what passes for GOP political philosophy nowadays.

  31. 31.

    eemom

    Ah….I can never let this topic pass without fond recollection of pseudo-liberal asstwat Jane Hamsher, erstwhile Goddess of FDL, both of which have now sunk mercifully into well-deserved oblivion.

    Oh what a Palin-gusher was Lady Jane at the beginning — seeing her as the righteous wreaking of divine vengeance on Obama for failing to select Hillary as his running mate.

  32. 32.

    NorthLeft12

    Here is my favourite part;

    If he can get up to speed to be president in 18 months, presumably so can she,

    The “he” being Barack Obama. Yeah, lets just completely forget about that whole intelligence, temperament, intelligence, maturity, and intelligence thing. Hold it, did I forget to mention how much more intelligent that Obama is than Palin, or pretty much any other Republican office holder for that matter?

    If I worked with McArdle, I don’t think I would let a day go by without reminding her how wrong she was in this piece and when was she going to write a retraction?

  33. 33.

    Amir Khalid

    @LAO:
    “judgment” and “judgement” are acceptable in both British and American spelling. House style guides tend to prefer “judgment”, where they mention a preference at all, merely because it’s one letter shorter.

  34. 34.

    a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)

    @LAO: Perhaps she’s secretly British? They favour that spelling. I prefer how “grey” looks over how “gray” looks. I was cured of using that spelling when a friend who (before med school) taught creative writing told me that he told his students:

    if you’re going to spell gray that way, you’d better spell judgment with an “e” too.

  35. 35.

    Doug!

    @eemom:

    I’d forgotten all about that. It was amazing. It’s yet another example of how the Bernie bros, despite H. A. Goodman’s best efforts, will never reach the level of derp achieved by the PUMAs in 2008.

  36. 36.

    WaterGirl

    Was it Palin who wrote something on her hand as a cheat sheet in a debate? Seems like there was something like that…

  37. 37.

    Mike in NC

    Clive Crook! I remember reading The Atlantic online and deciding he was another smug Village douchebag. Don’t really care where he is now on the wingnut welfare circuit.

  40. 40.

    raven

    And left me a mule to ride
    She caught the Katy
    And left me a mule to ride
    Now my baby caught the Katy
    Left me a mule to ride
    The train pulled out
    I swung on behind
    Crazy ’bout her
    That hard headed woman of mine

  41. 41.

    LAO

    @Amir Khalid: You are one of the few commenters I agree with 100% of the time. I afraid I must report, that is no longer the case. It’s a sad day for me.

  43. 43.

    cmorenc

    That’s almost cheating to post a McArdle piece as a paradigm of analysis appearing clueless-in-hindsight, since the only reason McArdle isn’t the paradigm example of always-wrong is that she pontificates in the shadow of the greatest wrong-way pundit of all time, Bill Kristol.

  45. 45.

    Ray Ingles

    My favorite paean to Palin. It’s so funny because the guy so clearly thinks he’s much wiser than most folks, that his viewpoint is obviously correct, and anyone who really thinks for any length of time will come to agree with him. Also worth noting is the flood of violent imagery he uses while earnestly declaiming that “the intrinsic violence of the left is always bubbling under the surface”.

  46. 46.

    gindy51

    @Trentrunner: If you had pals in Alaska you did They told me about her and her husband, who was a shadow governor while she shopped and stayed home.

  47. 47.

    a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)

    @humboldtblue: Holy cannoli:

    “OBAMA IS A SPECIAL KIND OF STUPID,” she exploded. “Enough is enough, Mr. President. There’s no ‘due respect’ due you after pulling this stunt.”

    Link
    Decorum is a concept that eludes her. I wonder if she knows what any of those long words mean? Maybe “concept.” But then, Dick Cavett noted that she speaks English like a person who has no first language. Or course he said it much better, but I’m too lazy to look up the quote.

  48. 48.

    Kylroy

    @Villago Delenda Est: Ayup. Palin was an (unintentional) warning shot to the GOP insiders that they had no idea what their base wanted, and failure to notice has gotten them the Trumpster fire.

  49. 49.

    gvg

    @Trentrunner: No I wasn’t scared. you must have tuned in late, the convention speech was awhile after her selection and we already knew quite a bit about her. I hadn’t heard of her when she was announced, by the end of the next day, people had already started to laugh, especially women voters. It pointed out again that the old white men running the GOP really thought everyone voted on tribal identity not positions and all they had to do to get a bunch of democratic voters, was to put a woman on the ticket. They also thought all blacks voted democrat because Obama was, ignoring that all Democrats going back a ways had gotten about 92-96% of the black vote for the same reasons as Obama (how he votes and what his policies would do for them) compared to say Alan Keyes.
    Palin had enough history that as soon as she was announced, people dug it up and put it out to be known. Women rejected her for her known positions fast. McCain didn’t do due diligence on her. Which reflected worse on him, and plenty of people have never forgotten that.

  50. 50.

    a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)

    @raven: Taj Mahal! Fun fact I heard in an NPR interview years ago – he was an ag major in college, then found his calling. Go figure

  51. 51.

    Corner Stone

    @Trentrunner:

    But I guarantee you we were all pretty fuckin’ scared after Palin’s convention speech.

    Tell that mouse in your pocket to buck up, little buddy. Outside of you and your trousers no one on the D side thought Palin especially scary, except in the non-zero chance she could have ever been one heart beat away from the presidency.

  52. 52.

    Jeffro

    @NorthLeft12:

    Yeah, lets just completely forget about that whole intelligence, temperament, intelligence, maturity, and intelligence thing. Hold it, did I forget to mention how much more intelligent that Obama is than Palin, or pretty much any other Republican office holder for that matter?

    Amen…it’s amazing how Republicans think that the job requirements have somehow shrunk just because Obama hadn’t been in office for two decades. (Which they only would have used against him anyway, but still). The guy has been a real gift to the country.

  53. 53.

    a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)

    @LAO:

    @Amir Khalid:You are one of the few commenters I agree with 100% of the time. I afraid I must report, that is no longer the case. It’s a sad day for me.

    It’s sad for me also, too.
    @Amir Khalid: I’ll defer to your expertise as a journalist, but I’m never going to accept judgement in American English.

    I have been remiss, and thus late to wish you Ramadan Mubarak.

  54. 54.

    Kylroy

    @gindy51: I’m always skeptical of claims that any woman is just a public sock-puppet for their husband; it’s so often just used by people who can’t believe a mere woman could *really* be so accomplished.

    But with Palin…I’m mostly having trouble believing her husband was doing anything, given her general ¯_(ツ)_/¯ approach to governing during her half-term in Alaska.

  56. 56.

    Corner Stone

    @Villago Delenda Est:

    She slides the stiletto in without either losing her femininity or coming across as catty

    Just on their own they make no sense. I honestly have no idea in what venn diagram these word salad choices exist.

  59. 59.

    raven

    For those of you who heard about the horrible situation my friend’s family had in Urbana, we raised over $15,000 in one day to help with the expenses.

  60. 60.

    a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)

    @raven: I haven’t, and I always trust your recommendations. I can share a funny moment from the Jason Isbell concert if you want to hear it – or think anyone will. I’ll admit up front that it features my wit.
    @raven: That’s impressive.

  62. 62.

    RaflW

    Horrible person Matthew Continetti, who fluffed Palin plenty, has a sad:

    In 2012, Barack Obama’s campaign transformed Mitt Romney from a mild-mannered technocrat into a soulless tool of capital. On Thursday Clinton began her television campaign against Trump, spending millions of dollars in swing states that will define the New York real estate developer as a risk to the nation’s economy and security, a misogynist and bigot, an ignoramus and doofus. She won’t be wrong.

  63. 63.

    Trollhattan

    Republican female response to Palin that I encountered was interesting. Older hard-core Republican women loved her feistiness and fashion…uh…sense (reminded them of themselves when younger?) while younger ones often seemed reminded of “That b!#$h in the dorm who got drunk and banged my boyfriend.” and were wary. Liberal women would literally yell at the tele every time she appeared. Fun!

    Again and not for the last time: Bless you, Tina Fey.

  64. 64.

    Shell

    ‘Married to a Eskimo ‘ Really? According to Wiki, he has some Yup’ik ancestry from a great -grandparent. Funny how nobody has ridiculed him with some kind of Pocohantas slur.

  67. 67.

    TriassicSands

    @humboldtblue:

    Palin’s latest tantrum is even more incoherent than normal.

    I’d suggest the use of the word “usual” in place of “normal.” After all, I’m not sure there is anything about Palin that can be considered “normal.”

  68. 68.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @Corner Stone: Peggy Noonan, of all people, called the election at the GOP convention. She didn’t mean to be recorded doing so, of course.

  72. 72.

    raven

    Missouri–Kansas–Texas Railroad: In its earliest days the MKT was commonly referred to as “the K-T”, which was its stock exchange symbol; this common designation soon evolved into “the Katy”.

  73. 73.

    bemused

    @LAO:

    Too funny! Was Continetti along with so many other Republicans in a coma when their party was scraping the bottom of the Beavis and Butthead voter barrel? These people can’t be this stupid. They act like they had nothing to do with the GOP ending up like this.

  79. 79.

    Turgidson

    @debbie:

    Even if there was, McMegan would just yammer on about how you can trace all of this back to Bork. And of course, badly fuck up any math that comes up during the conversation.

  80. 80.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @sm*t cl*de: Seriously, get me Mz. Lindsey’s fainting couch, I do believe that I’ve got a case of the vapors coming on.

  81. 81.

    Miss Bianca

    @LAO: I put the “e” in Judg(e)ment. Despise me if you must. However, I did not shoot the deputy. I’d just like to make that clear.

  83. 83.

    Corner Stone

    @Turgidson:

    Even if there was, McMegan would just yammer on about how you can trace all of this back to Bork.

    Bork got a vote.

  85. 85.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @Turgidson: No, I think she’d trace it back to Nixon and the Impeachment he dodged by resigning. She wouldn’t be too wrong…Nixon’s dependency on white resentment and racism is the basis for what we’re seeing now.

  86. 86.

    Turgidson

    @Trentrunner:

    I wasn’t. All her speech proved was that she could read zingers written by someone else off a teleprompter. There was no message, no substance, no inspiration. Just a bunch of canned applause lines for braindead Republicans.

    I wasn’t yet aware how much of a punch line she would soon reveal herself to be, but I wasn’t scared of her at any point.

  87. 87.

    a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)

    @Miss Bianca: Sorry, but you’re wrong about the spelling. Not incorrect, as Amir notes, but wrong nonetheless.
    I have a old video to post for you, where Lou Rawls describes Victor Wooten as “Miz Wooten’s boy.” First I’ll have to find the link, but it features POTUS on drums.

  92. 92.

    Miss Bianca

    @Trentrunner: “I guarantee you we were all pretty fuckin’ scared after Palin’s convention speech. We saw only her strengths at that point and none of her weaknesses had been revealed.”

    Speak for yerself.

  93. 93.

    Citizen Alan

    @redshirt:

    She was obviously ridiculous the moment she first spoke.

    I didn’t immediately know how ridiculous she was going to be. I do remember waking up to hear the news of her selection and thinking it astonishing that McCain would go with someone who at that time was facing an ethics inquiry and potentially impeachment over her using government resources to persecute her brother-in-law, but at that time I didn’t realize that she was profoundly stupid as well as venal.

    Of course, I had once taken pride in the fact that I’d never used the C-word in my entire life, but that ended with her convention speech, because by the time she got to the snide “community organizer” bit, I was screaming it at the tv so loudly that my roommate rushed in afraid I’d hurt myself somewhere.

  94. 94.

    JustRuss

    I wasn’t. All her speech proved was that she could read zingers written by someone else off a teleprompter.

    yeah, nothing to worry about there. BTW, who’s Ronald Reagan?

  95. 95.

    Runt

    If Trump should win, I predict these principled conservatives will soon be writing about how surprised they are to learn that he’s a statesman after all.

  97. 97.

    Iowa Old Lady

    Palin made me nervous not because she was such a great candidate, but because after W was re-elected, my faith in the electorate sagged even further. The next day, someone posted a map of the US labeling the parts that went for W “Dumbfuckistan.” I live there.

  99. 99.

    Ohio Mom

    @Trentrunner: Oh, I remember when the polls showed Palin giving McCain a big bump up and the absolute dread I felt. It didn’t last more than a couple of weeks — she began bombing pretty quick — but they were dark weeks.

    My main memory is walking into the mall that is a couple of miles down the street from me. An older AA woman was a couple of feet ahead of me. She was walking very slowly, as of the weight of the entire world was on her. I thought about making a comment along the lines of, “Sarah Palin sure is something,” or “I still think Obama can win,” but stopped myself because I knew I couldn’t presume she was radiating such discouragement for the same reason I was.

    I mean, my fellow citizens had recently elected GW twice. Why wouldn’t I be scared they’d fall for Palin?

  101. 101.

    Patricia Kayden

    @Trentrunner: I was scared after her initial rollout speech. My friends and I thought she was the perfect draw for all the PUMAs. By the time of her convention speech, I believe Andrew Sullivan had started posting about her lies. If I recall correctly, she started going downhill not long after the Republican Convention and McCain never bested Obama in any polls.

    @Trollhattan: I have a co-worker who used to be Republican but cannot abide even hearing the name “Palin” without severe cringing and embarrassment. She now votes straight Democrat.

  102. 102.

    Citizen Alan

    @James E Powell:

    The thing I remember most about the Palin Creature’s convention speech was that she only felt the need to directly quote one person, and out of all the world, she choose Westwood Fucking Pegler, a fascist sympathizer who cheered for the assassination attempt against FDR and the successful assassination of JFK. That was when I knew for sure that the GOP would never again be something I could support in my lifetime.

  103. 103.

    Miss Bianca

    @Shell: Or pointed out “Eskimo”” itself is considered a slur. “Inuit” would be the perferred term by the folk themselves.

  104. 104.

    Punchy

    Fuck you Jones! Now that damn song is stuck in my head! Good song, natch, but continues to play on autoplay. May need to beer it out of there.

  105. 105.

    WaterGirl

    @redshirt: Thank you! Someone here, maybe jefferyw, posted a hilarious photo of the hand with writing on it, but I can’t recall whether it was the real thing or some mockery of Palin. Good times!

  106. 106.

    Patricia Kayden

    @redshirt: You remind me of my sister who lives in Canada. When I told her that I stayed up all night fretfully watching the 2008 election results, she scoffed that she went to bed early because after she saw Palin, she was confident that Americans weren’t crazy enough to elect McCain. LOL! We still laugh about that.

  107. 107.

    Trollhattan

    On first learning of Trap and Tank and Trigger and Torque and Preggers and Li’l Duffel along with Tawd and his snow mashines, I understood we were in the presence of the inverse of greatness. Then when her time at the helm of Wasilla and the state capitol became known it really cratered, because we knew we were witnessing the zenith of a gigantic grift.

  108. 108.

    Turgidson

    @JustRuss:

    I’m not saying reading a speech successfully isn’t a nice skill to have. I’m just saying that’s all her convention speech actually proved about her. Which by itself isn’t much.

    And Reagan’s speeches had themes and inspired a lot of people. What he advocated was quite terrible, but it was substantive compared to the “lol community organizers amirite?” nonsense Palin’s speech was crammed full of. Reagan was an empty suit, but still far more thoughtful and gifted than Caribou Barbie could dream of being.

  109. 109.

    OGLiberal

    The bottom line is that this woman from Wasila had less experience and qualifications to be president than a third-runner up in a PTA president race in a town with 8,500 people. Or vice president. Or the stock boy at the local Shop Rite. And in each comparison I am offending the roles I mention.

    She gave a good speech at the RNC – fully scripted, of course. Anything remotely off script was a disaster. And anything she has done since has sounded/read like Ann Coulter without both a copy editor and a brain. That she was even that close to the presidency is insane.

    And actually, she wasn’t that close, because Obama destroyed McCain in the general election, which is why war hero boy will align himself with a guy he hates…because he hates that uppity brown boy even more.

    Mitt Romney is an out of touch rich boy who really hasn’t said shit since he lost – actually, he has…and it’s been bad shit about Trump. (I am not putting the man on a pedestal – he’s the 47% guy, after all) McCain is a self-important military brat who has a claim to fame only because he got caught. (and yes, even though he did standard “evil american” stuff when captured he put up with a lot of shiite and came out alive – that, and only that, is commendable…dude was a pilot not out of sense of duty but because dad was a military man and dropping bombs out of planes miles up in the stratosphere was a lot safer than fighting on the ground) This man is just flat out despicable and it’s not because of any hard-felt ideology but because he’s a sore loser. I’d actually respect disagreement/disrespect out of ideology much more than this dude’s petty school-yard resentment. Like Cole said – fuck him.

  110. 110.

    a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)

    @Ohio Mom: Howdy, neighbor! A friend of mine is running for county prosecutor, if you have any interest in promoting a local candidate. Adam or AL could give you my info if you want to connect off site w/r/t to the campaign. He needs some meet & greets in our neck of the woods.

  113. 113.

    Chris

    Whatever you think of her as a potential president, she is a politically brilliant choice,

    My God, there was a time when people actually believed this.

    and Democrats are going to have a very hard time finding traction to attack her.

    Fortunately, we didn’t have to. She did far more to discredit herself than any opponent ever could have.

  114. 114.

    redshirt

    Have we all forgotten the stress Joe Biden had to deal with in not being able to honestly criticize Palin for fear of looking sexist? He just had to take it.

  115. 115.

    a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)

    @Miss Bianca: Total slur. I think he had a great grand who was Yup’ik, and either they or Inuit folks would not be honored by “Eskimo.”

  116. 116.

    Jeffro

    @OGLiberal:

    The bottom line is that this woman from Wasila had less experience and qualifications to be president than a third-runner up in a PTA president race in a town with 8,500 people. Or vice president. Or the stock boy at the local Shop Rite. And in each comparison I am offending the roles I mention.

    The sheer stupidity was and is astounding. But not every political party values competence, principles, or decency, I guess.

  117. 117.

    catclub

    @bemused: Continetti wrote a BOOK about how great Palin was and how she was stabbed in the back by the establishment. Which makes it all the more ironic that he writes the piece in the Washington Free Bacon that started this whole foofaraw.

    he last paragraph of that piece in the bacon is particularly free of self knowledge.

  118. 118.

    Patricia Kayden

    @humboldtblue: Palin has been nothing but disrespectful to President Obama so this latest verbal diarrhea is not surprising. She and McCain are truly two peas in a pod vis-a-vis their hatred of the Kenyan in the White House. No wonder he thought she was qualified to be his VP.

  121. 121.

    Miss Bianca

    @a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q): ain’t you the funny one, parsing the differences between “incorrect” and “wrong” (as in Monty-Pythonesque big hammer coming down “WRONG! WRONG! WRONG!”).

    You caught the reference to Victor Wooten’s mom! After I heard his first solo album I wanted to be born retroactively into the Wooten family – his love for his folks was just spread all over it.

  123. 123.

    a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)

    @WaterGirl: Real thing! It was at a RWNJ forum after the election where she sat in a wing chair and held forth on the failures of Pres. Obama. Camera caught the ink on her hand.

  124. 124.

    Chris

    @raven:

    Language is dynamic, there is no right or wrong.

    Yakka foob mog. Grug pubbawub zink wattoom gazork. Chumble spuzz.
    /https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/41/32/72/4132727be2c271ec7bde0d19492b4be3.jpg

  125. 125.

    redshirt

    @Patricia Kayden: I was worried about Palin for like a day, basically the day McCain named her as VP. Sitting governor, attractive, must be capable I assumed. That might be tough. But then she spoke, and kept speaking, and all fears and worries disappeared. By the time of the Convention I thought we all (BJ’ers) understood she was a joke, and McCain a joke for picking her.

  126. 126.

    catclub

    @Citizen Alan:

    she choose Westwood Fucking Pegler

    I doubt she wrote the speech. Now, if Phyllis Schlafly or Ann Coulter wrote it, that would explain the Pegler reference.

  129. 129.

    Glidwrith

    @LAO: My dad once had the nerve to compare me to her; said he saw her like a second daughter. I nearly threw the phone across the room. He had no idea I would regard that as a mortal insult.

  131. 131.

    redshirt

    Hey LAO and anyone else who’s going to moderation for including links.

    I just did a test. A “naked” link, AKA just a pasted link, got sent to moderation.
    The exact same link posted using the FYWP link button went through just fine.

  132. 132.

    MattF

    Speaking of stllettos– I recall when La Noonan slid the knife into Palin– O, those open mics are so treacherous… Speaking of Noonan– has she said anything about Der Trump? I don’t recall anything, myself.

  133. 133.

    Corner Stone

    @Chris:

    Yakka foob mog. Grug pubbawub zink wattoom gazork. Chumble spuzz.

    Insightful. Powerful. Thank you for sharing.

  135. 135.

    a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)

    @Miss Bianca: He is a very nice guy. He plays with POTUS on drums here. That’s actually JD Blair, who still looks like Obama and is a very nice guy as well. We had a snack with him after their show near here. Longish story.

    We saw Jason Isbell Tuesday ( a gift of tickets to the sold out show!) at a gorgeous local venue.

    Mr. Q: that guy that walked by, I caught Van Zandt on his t-shirt. I wonder which one? Townes?
    Bella Q: At this show, it could be any of them – how was it spelled? Did you see? But the least likely would be Miami Steve.
    Mr. Q: I think I saw “Texas” on the shirt too, so probably Townes

    It cracked me up.

  136. 136.

    Corner Stone

    @Glidwrith:

    My dad once had the nerve to compare me to her; said he saw her like a second daughter. I nearly threw the phone across the room. He had no idea I would regard that as a mortal insult.

    Wait…what? Your dad said what?

  137. 137.

    Chris

    @WaterGirl:

    Can you imagine the laugh President Obama is having at the idea of Sarah Palin pronouncing Barack as – not just stupid – but a special kind of stupid?

    I think he knows that she, like McCain, is sour because she knows she’ll never sit in his office. Or even be the deputy of the person sitting in his office. That probably makes him smile all the more.

  138. 138.

    OGLiberal

    Palin became governor of Alaska because 114K people voted for her vs. 97K people who voted for her Democratic challenger. 114K people. Mayoral of Houston race, 2015:

    Dem dude: 108K
    Independent dude: 104K

    So she only got 6K more votes in a statewide race than a mayoral candidate in the 4th largest city in the US. That Houston is the 4th largest city is impressive. (I never knew) That the statewide candidate for office in Alaska only got a few more votes than Sylvester Turner (raise of hands – do you know how this dude is?) is not exactly impressive.

    In her Senate race in 2004 in Alaska, favorite daughter Murkowski got 150K votes. Her Dem challenger that year got 140K….26K more than Governor Shit for Brains got her governors race in 2006. So impressive.

    That woman is a stain on everything that is American. It’s not-OK for us to have folks like Ann Coulter or Peggy Noonan with the readership numbers they have as representatives of the US intellegentsia. It is out of hand that one of two parties in this country allowed this moron to be their VP candidate.

  139. 139.

    Miss Bianca

    @chigail: Very true – which is why I had an “oopsie” moment when I was trying to be all PC. That ol debbil irony will dog my heels!

  142. 142.

    Mike G

    Whatever you think of her as a potential president, she is a politically brilliant choice

    The essence of today’s Republican Party right there. “Would she be a disastrous President? Who give a shit! It’s all about my football team beating the other team. She pisses off libruls, that’s all that matters. Foam finger number one!”

    The shitty mediocre “news”-pablum product turned out by these assclowns given columns in major outlets is a sad indictment of corporate media.

  144. 144.

    germy

    WaPo: Dozens of GOP delegates launch new push to halt Donald Trump
    The new campaign is being run by the only people who can actually make changes to party rules, rather than by pundits and media figures who have been pining for a Trump alternative.

  146. 146.

    OGLiberal

    @a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q): You saw Isbell? Do tell. That man is one of the few reasons I still have hope for music. (and I am far from a country music fan – although folks like Kacey Musgraves, Caitlin Rose, and Mr. Isbell have challenged me on that front in recent years)

  147. 147.

    Chris

    @germy:

    Full credit to LGM poster Sleepyirv for the following comment:

    “It’s incredible to watch the GOP continually fail at outsmarting Trump. Like Wile E. Coyote failing to trick Elmer Fudd.”

  149. 149.

    Corner Stone

    @Miss Bianca: Cartoon or real life Trump?

    Yosemite Sam: I got it licked, rabbit. I don’t get mad no more. Watch this.
    [His servants kick him, throw a pie at him and bash him with a rolling pin]
    Yosemite Sam: See? Ha ha. I can take it. Ha ha ha!
    Bugs Bunny: [to camera] I ain’t got the heart tell him he’s used up all the money.

  155. 155.

    VOR

    @Mike G: Yes. The selection of Palin really put the lie to their slogan of “Country First”. No seriously, this is the best person for the entire Country to be a 72 year old, cancer survivor’s heartbeat away from the nuclear button? Even my Republican family got quiet when I brought that up.

  159. 159.

    Miss Bianca

    @Omnes Omnibus: OK, are you trolling me or was there a “real” Gabby Johnson? ‘Cause, remember, when you look in the dictionary under “gullible”, my phiz is there.

  160. 160.

    Glidwrith

    @Corner Stone: He thought of Palin like a second daughter, in that fatuous sort of voice that doting papa’s get when gushing about their daughters. And compared me to her.

    Let’s just say in terms of my profession, education, family life and beliefs, he has no friggin’ idea of who I am.

  161. 161.

    a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)

    @OGLiberal: How about Gillian Welch? She’s got maybe the best acoustic guitar player that’s playing as her partner. “When did you first start listening to Americana music,” a reporter asked her. She said she told him “I guess when they started calling it that.”

    I confess that I preferred the show from when he toured behind Southeastern, as it was very much an Americana show – Holly Williams opened. It was before the Americana Music Awards Southeastern sweep as well, so we had 2d row pit seats from the box office the week before.

    This week’s show sold out a month or two ago and we missed the sales. A second night was added and I just forgot to get tickets. A friend gave me his after he noticed he had a conflicting medical conference in Excelsior Springs MO, which he didn’t account for when he bought them.

    This tour is very different – totally rock and loud! The interesting thing was how many people were there for the opener – Frank Turner (never heard of him, either of us). Lots of people left during the set change and the people in front of us talked loudly like they were at a restaurant during the show we were there for. Until I glared pointedly at the one man, and suddenly they wanted to have more beers outside the balcony seats instead of by us.

    It was a great show, and we were glad we didn’t have pit seats for this one.

  164. 164.

    Gelfling545

    Off topic but I wanted to mention that our local classical music station will broadcast a memorial tribute to the victims of the Orlando shooting beginning at sunset tonight (Buffalo time) and ending at sunrise tomorrow.
    WNED.org if anyone is interested in tuning in for a bit.

  165. 165.

    Miss Bianca

    @Omnes Omnibus: Duuuude…! Evidently not. But at least I was suspicious enough of you to *ask* I’ve learned rt555555555tggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggg that much.

    this comment was brought to you by the numeral “5”, the letter “g”, and Pancho Kitty.Thanks, Pancho! He, like Lady Catherine de Bourgh, insists on having his share of the conversation.

  167. 167.

    catclub

    @VOR: I think Sarah Palin is excessively criticized because she is a woman.
    I bet Spiro Agnew was not a whole lot better qualified (or capable) than she was.

  169. 169.

    Blueskies

    @Trentrunner: Speak for yourself. Within two hours of learning of her nomination I’d learned about the financial mismanagement of Walisa and I knew about hubby’s ball-o-shit “lifestyle.”

    Teh Google is wunnerful.

  172. 172.

    ? Martin

    The Democrats are, as my colleague Clive Crooks notes, in trouble. Whatever you think of her as a potential president, she is a politically brilliant choice, and Democrats are going to have a very hard time finding traction to attack her.

    Tina Fey took her down by just repeating one of her interviews nearly word for word. Frankly, you couldn’t find an easier way to attack someone.

  174. 174.

    Matt McIrvin

    Andrew Tanenbaum, the computer scientist who runs electoral-vote.com, actually floated the idea of McCain picking Palin a day or two before it happened. His speculation ran pretty much to McCain’s actual motivation for doing it (a “game changer” that would make a big media splash at the convention). What followed, I don’t think he predicted.

  178. 178.

    Splitting Image

    @Trentrunner:

    But I guarantee you we were all pretty fuckin’ scared after Palin’s convention speech. We saw only her strengths at that point and none of her weaknesses had been revealed.

    I first heard about her a month or two before she was picked. Some blogger I don’t remember mentioned her as a dark horse candidate and I recall that the abbreviated version of her c.v. made her sound like a possibly good pick. Rumours about her incompetence and malfeasance in office wouldn’t necessarily have been a problem if McCain had vetted her and found that there was nothing to the accusations.

    Less than 24 hours after McCain picked her, it was obvious that he hadn’t done that. In fact, he hadn’t vetted her at all and had only met her once, for something like 15 minutes. I knew right then he was doomed. I spent the rest of the fall hooting merrily as the pair of them bumbled from one catastrophe to another. Remember when McCain suspended his campaign? When he couldn’t remember how many houses he had? When he said that American workers were too lazy to take $50 an hour to pick cabbages? Good times.

  182. 182.

    ingrediorum

    @catclub: Au contraire. I recall a laundromat “etching” across the street from the Maple Street Bookstore in New Orleans, ca 1971, of a crest with helmet and crossed swords that read: “Spiro T. slept here.” He was the brunt of similar etchings at Ft Benning, GA, in the summer of ’69 as well; Spiro T Who? was lampooned into the ’90s.

  183. 183.

    rikyrah

    As a Black person, you live with the theory of White Mediocrity, and the allowances given to it.

    But, to see it, living and breathing, in Sarah Palin, was a bit too much.

    Nobody Non-White could have given that Couric interview and still be considered a legitimate candidate for ANYTHING, let alone Vice-President.

  184. 184.

    Splitting Image

    @rikyrah:

    Nobody Non-White could have given that Couric interview and still be considered a legitimate candidate for ANYTHING, let alone Vice-President.

    Absolutely agree. The awful thing is that Palin may not even be the worst example. Rick Perry was still pushed as a viable candidate last year even after the “Oops” moment in 2012. And Rudy “Noun, verb, and you-know-what” Giuliani is still booked as a “terrorism expert” after saying on TV that there were no terrorist attacks in the U.S. during the Bush administration.

  185. 185.

    WaterGirl

    @redshirt:

    A White House aide has appeared at a briefing with the words “hope” and “change” written on his hand in a jibe at

    I am enjoying the Wayback machine!

  189. 189.

    r€nato

    @Villago Delenda Est:

    The entire “Obama is our savior” meme, implying that the Dems were succumbing to a cult of personality, is pure projection of the cult of the shitty grade Z movie star that is at the center of what passes for GOP political philosophy nowadays.

    also, too, pretty goddamn rich coming from the mouths of people who had just spent eight full years going apeshit with rage at the slightest criticism of Worst President Ever.

  190. 190.

    r€nato

    @eemom: oh really, when did FDL die its well-deserved death? I was just wondering the other day what came of that blog. Jane Hamsher was the cuntiest c#nt who ever cunted a c#nt on the left.

  192. 192.

    sneezy

    @Trentrunner:

    But I guarantee you we were all pretty fuckin’ scared after Palin’s convention speech.

    I don’t know who “we” is here, but when McCain announced Palin as his running mate, my first thought was “Huh. The old man’s giving up. I wonder why.” She was an obvious disaster from the get-go, or at least, that’s how I saw it.

  193. 193.

    Tripod

    Obama is polling pretty damn good. Is she carrying water for her old buddy John McCain? W was last seen trying to breath life into the zombie corpse of McCain’s political career. This is just sad.

    Insert fork – he’s done.

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