Speaking of morons, it appears that snowbilly Snooki decided she would try to copy the Obama England trip and get an audience with Margaret Thatcher:
Sarah Palin wants to show to the Republican right that she is the true keeper of the Ronald Reagan flame by meeting the late president’s closest ally on the world stage.
A meeting with Margaret Thatcher in the centenary year of Reagan’s birth would be the perfect way of launching her bid for the Republican nomination for the 2012 US presidential election.
This is what Palin told Christina Lamb in the Sunday Times:
I am going to Sudan in July and hope to stop in England on the way. I am just hoping Mrs Thatcher is well enough to see me as I so admire her.
It appears that the former prime minister has no intention of meeting the darling of the Tea Party movement. Andy McSmith reported in the Independent this morning that Palin is likely to be “thwarted” on the grounds that Thatcher, 86, rarely makes public appearances.
It would appear that the reasons go deeper than Thatcher’s frail health. Her allies believe that Palin is a frivolous figure who is unworthy of an audience with the Iron Lady. This is what one ally tells me:
Lady Thatcher will not be seeing Sarah Palin. That would be belittling for Margaret. Sarah Palin is nuts.
Thatcher will show the level she punches at when she attends the unveiling of a statue of Ronald Reagan outside the US embassy in Grosvenor Square on Independence day on 4 July.
I bet the people handling Palin go to bed every night thinking about just ending it all. Every time she opens her mouth, she makes herself look like a clown.
JPL
Well, the good news is they didn’t call her batshit crazy so that counts for something.
Villago Delenda Est
Now, now. At least they didn’t say Sarah was “mental” or “touched” or, as JPL points out in comment 1, “batshit crazy”.
So, it’s a win for Sarah!
PurpleGirl
Why is Palin going to Sudan?
Steve in Iowa
The whole “She’s/He’s just not that into you” trope is perfect for Palin followers because it takes a certain level of gullability to not understand signals that are being sent in relationships. Sometimes being nice and politely declining really means, “I can’t believe you would ever ask me to be seen in public with you.” But the gullible party just thinks the other person is being nice. Unfortunately, you will always need to spell things out for some people. And even that doesn’t work sometimes.
scav
Doesn’t one just love it when that stiff upper lip unbends ever so slightly.
lamh34
@PurpleGirl:
Psst..Sarah…there are ALOT of Black people there!/snark
Maybe she thinks she’ll get to meet George Clooney
kindness
John are you suggesting we send Sarah Palin’s ‘people’ nice working shotguns so they can review their lives properly at the end of the day (life). And if so, which County Fair Gun Show can we go to and buy these generous gifts so that evil Mr. Law Enforcement doesn’t come knocking on our doors afterwards asking us questions we don’t want to talk about with him?
MonkeyBoy
Thatcher won’t meet with Palin because Mags is afraid she will come off looking inferior to Palin, in fact this is proof of how totally awesome Palin is, also too. (yeah, right)
TooManyJens
I’m 38 years old and in good health, and I’m not well enough to see Sarah Palin.
Villago Delenda Est
@MonkeyBoy:
OK, you leaked the line that the Palinistas are going to be editing into Wikipedia…
Jim, Foolish Literalist
one of the most depressing things about our current politics is that, with the exception of the full-on nativist-nationalist knuckle-draggers, the right-wing in most industrialized countries has a firmer grasp of reality than half the Democratic Senate caucus.
Omnes Omnibus
@TooManyJens: That’s some catch, that Catch-22.
Alex S.
@Villago Delenda Est:
No wonder her baby is retarded. It must be genetic. There, I said it! Someone had to!
Amir_Khalid
An audience with Margaret Thatcher would be pointless in any case: she has senile dementia, and wouldn’t even remember who Sarah Palin was the next day. If Palin knows this, it is heartless of Palin to talk about wanting to meet her.
I have read that every morning, Margaret Thatcher asks for her husband Denis. Every morning, someone must remind her that Denis is dead. And so, every morning, she grieves for him anew. As much as I disapprove of her and politicians like her, I wouldn’t have wished such a torment on the poor woman.
MikeJ
Rumproast links to an amusing freeper thread on this.
BGinCHI
@PurpleGirl: Sudan rejected her request to come to her.
Jay B.
Tramp the dirt down. Squared.
I can’t imagine there are two more hateful fucking women on this Earth than Maggie Thatcher and Sarah Palin, I’m glad one already hates the other. They deserve each other.
Zifnab
She’s campaigning for fun and profit. Anyone along for the ride is just in it for a slice of the sweet, delicious wingnut pie.
Fred
Is there a Palin quota around here? I suggest you lower it to say less than a dozen per day because it seems you are already way over your limit.
Fuck me. Who give a flying fuck what that twat does or says. She’s a fucking twat. That is what twats do. The say and do stupid shit. Move the fuck on.
Brachiator
As poster Amir_Khalid notes, Lady Thatcher is seriously ill. That Palin or her people would talk about meeting with her is bad taste combined with typical Palin stupidity.
And it says much about Palin’s supporters that they believe that a retired prime minister is exactly the same as the standing Houses of Parliament and the Queen of England.
Ella in New Mexico
Amir_Khalid is right: As much as I’d love to think Maggie Thatcher thinks SP is a moron, she has severe Alzheimer’s disease. She has NO idea who the woman is. Someone caring for her would know, however…as well as want to put the dumb-ass in her place with a slam.
scav
Maybe the handlers were hoping that a side-by-side comparison of word salads would up the Divine Sarah’s intellectual ranking to better than the Eternally Worshipped Ron’s (the Iron Maiden being at best a breathing technical stand-in for the latter).
Jay B.
@Brachiator:
Fuck the honorific.
Well, like SP, the Queen is a figurehead to an idiot breed of citizens.
SpotWeld
For her handler’s, Palin must be one of those bosses you cannot tell anything.
The kind of boss around whom you cannot voice speculations, or rough guesses or ponder on hypotheticals. When you do, at some high level meeting, somehow everything you just said off the cuff becomes concrete fact, and you now have to deliver (to someone else’s timeline) these straws of reality all because your boss has a serious reality/wishful thinking confusion.
Amir_Khalid
@Fred:
Please do not insult vaginas by calling Sarah Palin a “twat”.
Dan
“I am just hoping Mrs Thatcher is well enough to see me …”
“See ME?”
Normal people would say “I am just hoping Mrs Thatcher is well enough that I could possibly meet her.”
Like Thatcher is doubling up on meds so she’ll be healthy enough to touch the hem of Palin.
Villago Delenda Est
@Jay B.:
No, Thatcher’s handlers hate Palin. Thatcher has no clue as to who Palin is, as Amir_Khalid points out.
Thatcher’s handlers have good reason to want to protect her from that vile pageant-walking bimbo, who wants to use yet another human being as a prop in her summer of grifting tour.
JPL
@Alex S.: Actually you didn’t have to go there. It’s easy to criticize Sarah without bringing her child into it.
Villago Delenda Est
@JPL:
Her children are yet more victims of the snowbillie’s ongoing griftapalooza.
She’s been using her own children as props for years now. The tossing of Trig around like yet another balloon dropped from the rafters in Minneapolis, for example.
Oh, and parading her unmarried but with child daughter in front of the cameras as well…who has gone on to a lucrative career as a abstinence spokesbimbo…a chip off the old block.
Jay B.
@Villago Delenda Est:
I don’t give a shit. Like Reagan, Thatcher was an insufferable fuck when she was sentient, so I don’t particularly give a shit that she has to live with Palin’s affections. I don’t wish it upon her, but if she has dementia, she has dementia. It doesn’t whitewash the incalculable suffering she engendered previously.
Fuck her. It’d be a tender mercy then, if she just died altogether.
JPL
@Villago Delenda Est: so what..we don’t have to go there. IMO
Ash Can
I’m sure the official line of all the Palin fans will be that Thatcher actually would have loved to meet with Sarah; it’s all the fault of those nasty caretakers getting in the way, who are probably secretly French also too.
Villago Delenda Est
@JPL:
Oh, I’m supporting your contention that the children, themselves, with the exception of Bristol, who has openly chosen a public life, are off limits.
However, Palin’s use of them as props is fair game, because we’re talking about Palin’s actions.
cbear
In other news—Shit denounces stink.
Alex S.
@JPL:
I am torn between arguing that I was a bit sarcastic and refering to the event when Sarah took offense at the use of the word ‘retarded’ even though it was not used in relation to her child at all, and arguing that even if I was totally serious, it would be alright. After all, just last week, she was at it again, using Piper as a prop during her bus tour.
JPL
@Villago Delenda Est: I definitely agree with your comment about Bristol being fair game but I know people who have children with down syndrome and it has nothing to do with the parents’ intelligence.
JPL
@Alex S.: I actually linked to the wrong person..Sorry villago..I agree with you about piper and bristol but I would not criticize her for carrying a down syndrome child to term if she did. There I said it.
Frank W.
Hey, Fred ~ for what it’s worth, I concur. I know we can’t bury our collective heads in the sand and pretend Pinhead Palin does not exist (that would be too risky, frankly), but I find my worser angels thinking dark thoughts about this woman… I mean, really, bad things do happen to people everyday! Is it too much to ask the Flying Spaghetti Monster to visit a pox and a plague upon this family of grifters?
Must we read about every little utterance and twitch of her baby toes as though it is important news? Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know, here I am reading and commenting upon the woman yet again… Is there a 12-step Palin recovery program I might enter?
Maura Cavaleri
Just because she exploits her children, doesn’t mean we should sink to her level. Children, regardless of parentage, should never be fair game. Unless, of course, they seek the attention out – ie. Bristol. She’s grown, she’s a mom and she has put herself out there, so…. As far as the use of “retarded”, my sister is disabled and is horribly offended by that term. It isn’t nice.
Villago Delenda Est
@JPL:
It’s not her carrying it to term that I’m critical of…although the story of that pregnancy, what with the flight from Texas to Alaska and all, is just bizarre.
It’s using the poor kid as a prop…which applies to Piper as well.
Martin
Is she planning on driving the RV there?
Amir_Khalid
I’m sure that Sarah Palin wouldn’t dream of having a historic (to her, anyway) meeting with Margaret Thatcher without that all-important media coverage. If video of Palin pestering an elderly Alzheimer’s patient were to make the world news, she would come out looking — well, not good.
Frank W.
Funny comment, Amir… Curious word, too, “twat”… Its use strikes me as being akin to calling the male member a “dinky”… belittling and a bit juvenile, but not the most offensive word, to be sure.
JPL
@Villago Delenda Est: That’s fair game.. lol
There is no way a doctor would have approved her trip especially with a child at risk. It’s my understanding that in order to receive oil funds that are entitled to citizens of Alaska, you must be born on state soil. Take that with a grain of salt because I read it years ago on Sullivan’s blog.
edit…to say…her trip was irresponsible and it proves she is bat shit crazy. Thatcher NOW has more sense then Palin.
Jazz Superluminar
@Amir Khalid
As someone who has to live in the godforsaken shithole Thatch left, I think she totally deserves to put up with Palin.
cbear
That parrot is not dead, he’s only sleeping.
Villago Delenda Est
@cbear:
Lovely plumage.
maus
Do you think MTV execs care what happens to the Jersey Shore cast? Hell no, as long as they’re still breathing and paying the checks. It’s not as if it’s tough to sell Palin’s fans on anything, and why bother explaining her poor understanding of history and general dis-interest? She’s someone you could have a beer with. Though, really, i think most of her fanbase just want to grab her boobs on top of her parroting all the right ideology. This is (along with Two and a Half Men and the Victoria’s Secret catalog) is the closest the Tea Party set gets to porno.
Calouste
The milk snatcher, with all her Alzheimer’s, would still make more sense than the half-term half-wit.
Calouste
@PurpleGirl:
The question is, when she is in Sudan, why is she leaving?
slightly_peeved
@Amir_Khalid:
To paraphrase some commenters on the knitting forum Ravelry, Sarah Palin should not be compared to a twat because she lacks the depth and the warmth.
Litlebritdifrnt
@Jay B.:
Scuse me but Fuck you. That “idiot breed of citizens” has been your first and best ally in every conflict since who knows when. Seriously dude, way to insult an entire fucking country and culture.
Corner Stone
Fuck Margaret Thatcher.
Unless she wrote a really amazing letter to her grandkids after Obama was elected? For that is the true measure of a right wing leader.
Amir_Khalid
@slightly_peeved:
This is also true.
Arundel
I’m no fan of Thatcher’s, to understate it. But in the twilight of her years and her quite impaired mental state, I approve on humanistic grounds absolutely barring Palin from ever gettin near her. The baroness deserves her dignity, and Palin strips dignity from everything she gets near, she makes the idea a mockable concept, she degrades what she touches. Doesn’t know the meaning of the word. Allowing her to glad-handle and manhandle a demented Thatcher for a photo-op would be an international incident and disgrace. Just get away, you awful woman.
slightly_peeved
I’m not sure exactly when, but I think it was after 1812 :)
Agreed on the general point though. Said “idiot breed of citizens” are generally aware that the Queen is a figurehead and plays no role in politics. Sounds a hell of a lot smarter than electing, say, Dubya to a non-figurehead version of the same post.
Tsulagi
Would have thought the same about Bush II’s people. But then new millennium Rs love their tards.
If she does run, like Bush she’ll need professional help. Rove knew his tard getting him to keep his mouth shut other than to answer “tax cut!” to anything. Millions voted for that idiot. Palin could go a little deeper building on that foundation by answering something like “tax cuts, also too starbursts!” to everything. R-baggers would eat it up.
Triassic Sands
American History 101 with Professor Palin:
John Puma
So Mama Grifter has a petroleum anchor baby?
Jay B.
@Litlebritdifrnt:
They loyally followed us into Iraq which helped ruin their own country, dumbass gits. But, regardless, if you actually read what I said, its that the Queen is a figurehead, if you don’t understand what that means, its that she’s a media celebrity, who has the same practical impact as Palin does. This is what I wrote:
The people who really follow the respective figureheads are both idiot breeds of citizens — why do you disagree? Crypto-monarchist? Pro-colonialist? Just the same, I don’t begrudge Brits for wondering why elected TWO different Bushes. Different kind of royalty, for sure. But idiots worshipped them just the same.
So go back to your fainting couch and wonder why brutish Americans are soooo mean to the Queen. If only there was some reason to give a shit about their idiot inbred institution.
Tehanu
A Brit friend of mine once told me that his favorite nicknames for Mrs. Thatcher were “Hitlerina” and “Attila the Hen.” Horrible though she may have been, I agree with whoever said that even she doesn’t deserve to be used by SnowSnooki.
Villago Delenda Est
@John Puma:
I guess you could say that, yeah.
The ostensible reason was to insure that the child was born on Alaskan soil for AIP (Alaska Independence Party) cred, as her husband was formerly a registered member, which you will recall was a point of contention between Sarah and the McCain Campaign, who insisted that the Palins come clean about this, and Sarah kept insisting that Todd was never a member, even though it was documented that he was.
Drove McCain’s campaign manager Steve Smith nuts, it did.
Linda Featheringill
@PurpleGirl:
Why is Sarah going to Sudan?
I agree. Does she know what’s over there? Does she know who is over there? How does that help her achieve her ambitions. Very few voters in the US really care all that much about Sudan anyway. And Sudan’s problems would take more than a short visit to fix, anyway.
So what is up?
Jazz Superluminar
I sort of feel like I should defend my country’s honour here, but we’re talking about Thatcher and the Royals, so flame away.
Comrade Misfit
And Dr. Kevorkian has just up and died on them.
Linda Featheringill
Something about Sudan [courtesy CIA World Factbook]
Contagious diseases:
degree of risk: very high
food or waterborne diseases: bacterial and protozoal diarrhea, hepatitis A and E, and typhoid fever
vectorborne diseases: malaria, dengue fever, African trypanosomiasis (sleeping sickness)
water contact disease: schistosomiasis
respiratory disease: meningococcal meningitis
animal contact disease: rabies
note: highly pathogenic H5N1 avian influenza has been identified in this country; it poses a negligible risk with extremely rare cases possible among US citizens who have close contact with birds (2009)
Mnemosyne
@Amir_Khalid:
This is why, after a certain point, we started telling my grandmother that my long-dead grandfather was on a fishing trip. It was just too torturous for all of us to have to make her re-live that grief over and over and over again. Because, for her, she was learning about his death for the first time every time they told her.
I’m not sure that’s a fate I would wish on anyone, even Margaret Thatcher. It might even be too cruel for Stalin.
Comrade Misfit
I bet that they have this song as their morning alarm ringtone.
Observer
FTR, that’s an unsourced, anonymous quote. In other words, cowardly gossip.
Just don’t complain about “assholes” when the shoe is the other foot. And don’t complain when various media operatives say “both sides do it” because….both sides do it. You folks are just oblivious when it comes from your side.
That is all.
cbear
@Arundel:
Well of course she does, the poor dear. Hopefully the household servants are not too distracted by the austerity measures in the kingdom that they allow the great lady to linger overlong in her piss-soaked, shit-stained nighclothes. That would be simply dreadful.
Southern Beale
Can’t remember if it was the Guardian or the Independent but one of those articles says Thatcher’s only scheduled public appearance is the unveiling of a statue of Ronald Reagan outside the U.S. Embassy in London in July.
I also noticed that Sarah Palin says she is traveling to Sudan and hopefully England in July.
What do you want to bet that she shows up at that event? I mean God, how can she not? It’s Reagan … and she’ll bully her way up to Thatcher to shake her hand. What do you want to bet?
Gin & Tonic
@Mnemosyne:
No. There is no imaginable punishment which would be too cruel.
maya
@Amir_Khalid:
Why not tell her: “Denis is in the loo, mum.”
Valdivia
WTF is she going to be doing in Sudan???
Evolved Deep Southerner
@Fred:
Take your own advice, you tiresome, tiresome, TIRESOME twat.
maus
@Linda Featheringill:
Do you seriously think she’s going to stay at anything but the finest available and see anything outside the most touristy spots? Well, finest/safest/most touristy for the Sudan, at least. She’s not there to actually DO anything, but just to mark on her book of “places she’s been so she can claim a life of experiences.”
Alex S.
@Observer:
But if you are complaining about this, why aren’t we allowed to complain?
Arundel
@cbear: I KNOW. Believe me, my sympathy was just for the human dignity that yes, she would’ve gladly denied others. I’m coming from a place and family history where I’m being very magnanimous and taking the high road there.
@Observer: I have no idea what you’re on about. Both sides do what? Shoe on what foot for whom? What? Oh, but saying Sarah is nuts apparently gets you indignant here, as if that weren’t obvious. And it took a sensible reaction from abroad- no, she will never get near Thatcher- to pop a little of the fucking reality bubble that right-wing Sarah fans live in. Yes, here is how ridiculous she is to the world, presuming she’s a national figure on par with Thatcher here. Palin is a crackpot nobody to the rest of the world, they are mystified by the wretched stupidity here that’s enabling her. Deal with that reality.
Jay B.
@Jazz Superluminar:
I appreciate that, and maybe I wrote it the wrong way, but I wasn’t mocking the entire UK electorate, at least I didn’t mean to. Just the people who worship royalty (and Thatcher, a lot of overlap there), much in the same way I loathe people who listen to Sarah Palin.
Evolved Deep Southerner
@Jay B.: I was wondering when we’d get the Elvis classic referenced here.
Jay B.
@Evolved Deep Southerner:
Not having kept up with Maggie, I was wondering just this morning what would happen when she died. And I thought of that song.
I can’t decide if that or Positively 4th St. are the most bitter songs ever written. Not being able to comment on the Dylan/Baez relationship, I like Elvis’ for his pure righteousness.
Whiskey Screams from a Guy With No Short-Term Memory
Godzilla vs. Mothra. Two monsters.
Thatcher was a murderer and a criminal just like her BFF Reagan. She deserves to burn for eternity in real live Hell, but failing that, she can find a bit of time in her long days of staring at the wall to sit a while with Word Salad. It’s not like she could understand her anyway, although in fairness, none of us can.
mclaren
Every word of these two sentences (except “she” and “her” and “herself”) applies to the most popular American president of the last 30 years, Ronald Wilson Reagan.
Reagan gibbered non-stop drivel, and he’s now the most beloved ex-president of the last 2 generations.
“Ladies and gentlemen, the president of the united states — Sarah Palin!”
And people will surge to their feet and applaud until their palms are raw.
Mark S.
Geez, the British sure are assholes. And after Paul Revere was nice enough to warn them with his bell.
SmallAxe
@Linda Featheringill:
Sudan Trip = Bright Shiny Object out of the country when those 50,000+ emails hit the intertubes shortly. That and $’s from Billy Graham’s troglodyte of a son are the reasons she’s going to Sudan. Pure distraction, just like the bus tour just happened to be starting after two nasty books hit. She’s Ignorant not Stupid… big difference, a much scarier difference IMO
gogol's wife
@Gin & Tonic:
I agree. I was trying to think of one and couldn’t.
Evolved Deep Southerner
@Jay B.: When England was the whore of the world, Margaret was her madam.
Cervantes
@Arundel:
How do you figure that? What dignity did she ever possess?
Dream On
Thatcher can have her. She deserves no better.
Lysana
Thatcher was a lying, hateful cad of a Prime Minister. The only reason it’s a good thing the IRA failed to kill her is that it would’ve set back the peace process even further had they managed to take her out. But even in the throes of Alzheimer’s, which I really don’t wish on her because she deserves to see what she did to the UK and mourn her own stupidity, she doesn’t deserve to be used by Sarah Palin.
Villago Delenda Est
@mclaren:
“So this is how liberty dies, with thunderous applause.” – Senator Padme Amidala
El Cid
Hasn’t Sudan suffered enough?
Mack Lyons
@Fred: I don’t think anyone here cares what you think.
Do yourself a favor and get the fuck off of this blog. Now.
Mack Lyons
@Fred: You might want to reconsider your choice of words, buddy. I doubt anyone here genuinely cares what you think.
Arundel
@Cervantes: @Cervantes:
I think every person deserves dignity, especially when they are elderly, frail, and suffering from dementia. Like my grandmother in Northern Ireland years ago when Thatcher’s policies were still in brutal effect there. Every human person deserves dignity and care, and even if I disagree with Thatcher’s immensely cruel and destructive policies, in the UK and abroad, I would never inflict a crazed jabbermouth like Palin on her in her mentally impaired state. Clear enough?
Ken
@TooManyJens: What the hell is with SP’s British affectation of ..”as I so admire her”? Not going to get you the invitation, honey.
DougL
I get a kick out of the fact that someone made a custom shortener for the link to that Guardian story:
http://bit.ly/shesnuts
bjacques
Can’t we all get along and agree to split the difference re Lady Margaret
Sinking the Belgrano
There is no such thing as society
BFF of Pinochet and the “Chicago Boys”
Clause 28
Supporter of apartheid South Africa
Oppressor of North Ireland
Thatcher
and not find joy in her senility, but neither be overly saddened about it either?
NinjaGoat
Sarah Palin’s coming to England?
Please, PLEASE, BBC, book her on Have I Got News For You.
Or Question Time.
Or Newsnight.
Or, you know, just have her talk to people.
Because if she thinks she’s been gotcha’d now, wait until the British public shows up to point and laugh.
Jebediah
@Southern Beale:
I will not take that bet; I’m not crazy. But I would really LOVE to see her reaction if Thatcher-people politely but firmly physically block her. I would pay to see that!
Lola Getz
@Litlebritdifrnt:
Amen, Britty.
WereBear
That’s just sick. The “enlightened” approach is to say he’ll be along in a little while.
This is not rocket science.
Tuttle
Sorry Sarah, that lady is not for turning.
Nemesis
Sarah “Lady Ca Ca” Paylin moved to AZ for a reason. She’s going to run for govenor there.
Has there ever been a less serious, more laughable political personality in this country? Pat Paulson anyone?
jim filyaw
too bad. i’d love to have known what simple sarah would have discussed with madam thatcher.
zizi
WHY IS PALIN GOING TO SUDAN?
Southern Sudan is gaining its independence officially in July. this is the culmination of tortuous negotiations that Pres. Obama and Special Envoy Scott Gratian put a lot of sweat into.
Grifter Palin is going to hog the spotlight along with her the Franklin Graham-esque evangelical fundie tour guides who ply in the three curses — homophobia, Islamophobia, and capitalist greed. These fundie groups are circling these war weary African counties like vultures eager to swoop in for the monetary and ideological killing on poor desperate people.
Palin, STAY THE HELL AWAY FROM SUDAN!!!!!!
DPirate
Lol. Thatcher appears to be the clown here, in my opinion, if she had anything to do with that sycophant’s comment about being belittled. What an ass.
And England putting up a statue of Reagan outside of America. I suppose she’s on hand to shine his nob again…