Kathleen Parker thinks Hamilton 'wrote the constitution'

Disturbing...
*
Faux conservative Kathleen Parker, who has repeatedly accused Sarah Palin of being "ignorant," claimed on CNN's prime time ratings disaster "Parker-Spitzer" that Alexander Hamilton came to the U.S. illegally and drafted the Constitution:

"Let's remember...a lot of Americans did come through the back door such as Alexander Hamilton. He got off the boat from the West Indies, and all he did was write the Constitution and become the first Secretary of the Treasury."

Actually, it was James Madison who drafted the Constitution, and Hamilton landed in New York City in 1774, when New York was still a colony of the British crown. So he was hardly an illegal immigrant who "came in through the back door."

We find Parker's ignorance of American History... disturbing. She "don't know diddly." And speaking of Bo Diddly, he wrote a song about that kind of hypocrisy...

Eric Clapton - Unplugged - New Music - More Music Videos

- JP

More Quote of the Day Honorable Mention, Part 157

"Strength" Edition
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Julia Spitz at Spitz Bits:

"I’m not exactly outraged Bristol Palin is in the finals of 'Dancing with the Stars.' I’m not like the guy who shot out his TV when Tuesday’s votes were revealed. Bristol has shown poise and a willingness to learn. But she’s shown something else in her TV reality show run. She’s shown her mother’s surprising strength... The truth is, for whatever reason, Sarah Palin has captured America’s heart. No matter what. And her daughter is feeling the love."

Stacy McCain at The Other McCain:

"People can’t stand to see the Palins happy... I blame Andrew Sullivan, who has spent more than two years demonizing Sarah Palin."

Rush Limbaugh:

"Do you realize today how miserable the American left is over Bristol Palin making the finals of Dancing With the Stars? ... The reason they're upset is because they have done their best to make this Palin family persona non grata. They've tried to trash it, besmirch it, impugn it, and the American public is now en masse voting for Bristol Palin... She accepted the challenge. She's doing it. She's having her world turned upside down. She's willing to put herself out there, and she's in the finals, and the left can't stand it. The left can't stand this, and her mother's TV show on TLC's getting higher ratings than any cable news network show. They can't stand it. And throughout all of this character assassination, throughout every attempt to destroy this family, including having a reporter rent the house next to theirs in Wasilla to do a hit piece, [the Palins are] laughing, they're smiling, and they're having a good time. They're enjoying life as Alaskans and as Americans."

Roderic Deane:

"What scares the hell out of me is that the right-wing is figuring out how to game a vote. Hasn’t that always been the exclusive [province] of the left? No wonder the left is so upset."

Van Helsing at Moonbattery:

"Palin Derangement Syndrome has claimed another victim: 'Prosecutors say a Black Earth, Wis., man blasted his TV with a shotgun after watching Bristol Palin's Dancing with the Stars routine, sparking an all-night standoff with a SWAT team... He went to his bedroom and returned to the living room with a shotgun and blasted the TV, then pointed the gun at his wife, who managed to escape and call police. Tactical officers surrounded the house and finally managed to talk Cowan out Tuesday morning.' It may be a good idea to keep firearms out of the hands of moonbats during Sarah Palin's extremely successful TLC program."

Jon Stewart via The Washington Examiner:

"It’s Bristol Palin! She’s not running for anything... She’s not doing anything wrong. If you don’t like how far she’s going, don’t watch the show"

the blogprof:

"Since when do the underage children of politicians, or former politicians turned citizen activists, provide fodder for attacks on their parents? Excuse me, but I don't recall a whole lot of publicity about Al Gore's drunk-driving son Al the 3rd... Indeed. I don't recall TMZ pointing out politicians and media types calling tea partiers 'teabaggers' and certainly not piling onto their kids for using the dismissive homosexual slur. Just another case of Palin Derangement Syndrome."

Laura Donovan The Daily Caller:

"News outlets... have attributed anti-gay views and bigotry to Willow Palin, a minor, but none have questioned Facebook user Matt’s comments calling the Palin daughters a slur for a prostitute."

Rob Taylor at NewsReal Blog:

"It is perhaps a good sign that the Left suddenly recognizes parents’ role in their children’s behavior. The criticism of Willow Palin is overblown to be sure, and dishonest in its attempt to claim that every word written, shrieked or muttered by a teen has in some way been vetted by the child’s parents. But it’s a first step in the right direction. Perhaps after this we can get the Left to actually take responsibility for their children’s actions. Like when they’re hacking into emails, assaulting political opponents or trading child pornography. Granted those things aren’t as earth shatteringly awful as a teen calling another teen 'gay,' so I understand it the Left doesn’t get on board right away. But I remain hopeful that one day we will reach an accord, thanks to Willow Palin."

Ruben Navarrette at Recordnet.com:

"The smart thing for establishment Republicans to do right now is to stop complaining and extend a hand to Sarah Palin. She's not their enemy. And she can actually do them a lot of good by energizing the masses - the same people they like to think they represent but, in truth, barely recognize."

Roger L Simon at Pajamas Media:

"Harry Truman, the man so many seem to harken back to these days as a great president, was not known for spending his evenings reading Proust. (Yes, his daughter wrote mysteries and, yes, he played mediocre piano. But you know what I mean.) Obama — hailed as the greatest intellectual since Heraclitus — has made a botch of things. Does Palin have sufficient education and experience to be president? Compared to others who have held the office, realistically she does. But if she is nominated, look for the Times to keep raising the phony issue of her intellectual preparedness, just as they did with Bush and Reagan."

Jennifer at Cubachi.com:

"Lawrence O’Donnell got wee-wee’d up with the [New Oxford] dictionary for allowing Sarah Palin to ruin the English language, or something. He is also annoyed that for a woman, who he claims will not run for president, gets this much attention. Then why talk about her if she is so irrelevant?"

Matthew Continetti at The Weekly Standard Blog:

"Will Palin run for president? No one knows for sure—including, in all probability, Sarah and Todd Palin. What Draper's piece reveals is that, if Palin does run, she will campaign not only against the Obama Democrats but also against a Republican establishment that betrayed its principles and let down the country in the first decade of the 21st century. Fortunately for Palin, her sentiments jibe with widespread perceptions of the GOP... Palin sounds like a candidate in the Draper profile. Question is, do the other possible candidates know how to handle her? Does anyone?"

Shane Vander Hart at Caffeinated Thoughts:

"The term 'feminism' has been hijacked by the left and Sarah Palin wants to reclaim its historical roots, the forgotten history of pro-life women who fought for the 19th amendment."

Nathan Sass at The Dinner Table:

"Ronald Reagan. His name calls to mind the image of an almost invincible political force. His 1984 re-election over Walter Mondale ranks 5th all time in electoral college margin of victory at 525 – 13. That year, the entire map, save for Mondale’s home state of Minnesota and the District of Columbia were Reagan red. It’s all too easy to forget that only 6 years earlier, such a thing was seen as unthinkable. In fact, Reagan was totally dismissed by most of the punditry. (Sound familiar?) Most people 'in the know' seem to think the same thing about Ms. Sarah Palin, and I wonder if these people are oblivious to US political history."

- JP

CBS 'surprised' when Gov. Palin slaps media for promoting Levi Johnston

NewsBuster Kyle Drennen reports
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The Early Show on CBS (the network that touted made-up documents about George W. Bush's Air Guard service as "fake but accurate") had self-admitted liar Levi Johnson on as a guest half a dozen times, yet is surprised that Gov. Palin would criticize the lamestream media for promoting the crazy, mixed-up kid. Go figure:

On Friday's CBS Early Show, correspondent Nancy Cordes reported on leaked excerpts of Sarah Palin's new book, 'America By Heart,' claiming, "some of the topics she tackles may be surprising." One such topic was Palin's criticism of the media for promoting Levi Johnston: "It was disgusting to watch as his 15 minutes of fame were exploited by supposed adults taking advantage of a lost kid."

While Cordes found that comment "surprising," CBS, and the Early Show in particular, were chief among those who exploited Levi Johnston and his attacks on the Palin family. As has been detailed on NewsBusters, throughout 2009 and 2010, the CBS Early Show has featured six lengthy stories on Johnston, including three "exclusive" interviews.

At the end of her report, Cordes seemed disconcerted over Palin's criticism of the First Lady: "She even takes a swipe at Michelle Obama, dredging up that comment about being proud of her country for the first time when her husband started to win elections. This is going to be some pretty provocative stuff."

[More]

A New York Daily News columnist labeled it as more than just provocative, calling it "mudslinging." Because the left believes when a conservative directly quotes a liberal's own words, it's "mudslinging" or something...

Via Twitter Thursday, Gov. Palin made reference to the leaked excerpts:

"The publishing world is LEAKING out-of-context excerpts of my book w/out my permission? Isn't that illegal?MT @C4Palin http://bit.ly/cD6DOQ"

- JP

Dem Pundit Kirsten Powers Won't Rule Out Palin Beating Obama

"I think he's very weak right now"
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Pundits Kirsten Powers and Rich Lowry on Fox News discuss a possible 2012 Palin vs. Obama match up and the Democrats' push to let the Bush tax cuts expire:


- JP

Gov. Palin hopes to visit Israel, UK

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Now that the 2010 elections is history, Sarah Palin and her aides are turning their attention to what will be her next act on the political stage. An article for Real Clear Politics by Scott Conroy previews scenes such as travel abroad, a focus on issues and the prospect of a run for the White House:

Since resigning from office, Palin has proven time and again the primacy of her influence in the Republican Party, setting the tone and defining the parameters on issues ranging from health care to monetary policy. And she has done it by shattering the traditional rules of communication, using Twitter, Facebook, and her regular appearances on Fox News and conservative radio to bypass the traditional media to whom she and her staff have taken a special delight in deriding.

[...]

Now that the midterms are over and the campaign before the presidential campaign has begun, Palin is making some adjustments, fully aware that she cannot tweet, Facebook post, and Sean Hannity her way to the White House. She recently granted extensive interviews to the New York Times and ABC News, and her SarahPAC staff intends to make a more concerted effort to highlight to the media her prepared remarks on the frequent policy speeches she gives.

Meanwhile, Palin's ratings-shattering TLC show, "Sarah Palin's Alaska," will continue to show millions of American homes the kinder, gentler side of Palin's personality each Sunday night for the next seven weeks.

Palin's outsized influence on the midterm elections and her most recent pronouncements about her presidential intentions have caused the D.C. narrative to shift in recent weeks, as Beltway logic now holds that Palin is indeed seriously interested in running for president and could be a strong contender to win the Republican nomination.

[...]

A visit to Israel is high on Palin's current to-do list, and her staff is still hoping to arrange a trip for her to meet with one of her political heroines, former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher.

Palin has taken a particular interest in the European debt crisis as of late, and SarahPAC recently hired Joshua Livestro - a Dutch newspaper columnist who has also contributed to the pro-Palin web site Conservatives4Palin.com - to research the topic for Palin on a freelance basis.

Palin's second book, America By Heart, will be released on Tuesday and is a near shoo-in to join her first title, Going Rogue, as a quick bestseller. Unlike Going Rogue's biographical focus, Palin's new book is mostly philosophical in nature and reads as a series of essays on well-travelled topics ranging from the role of faith in the public sphere to the concept of American exceptionalism.

[...]

Palin's challenges remain numerous as she comes to a decision on whether to run for president. If the answer is indeed "yes," one of her first big moves will be planning the official announcement of her campaign-a date that one Palin confidante privately agreed will likely come later in 2011, after her lesser known opponents launch their own runs and she can assess the field.

[More]

- JP

Day By Day (November 19, 2010)

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Good Morning! It's a wonderful life if we just take it Day By Day.



Support Pro-Palin Day By Day

- JP

Quote of the Day (November 18, 2010)

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Donald Trump to George Stephanopoulos:

"She's very interesting. And don't underestimate her. I mean, I see what she does. Do not underestimate Sarah Palin."

- JP

Sarah Palin: 'Refudiation' of $600 Billion Printed Out of Thin Air

*
The Wall Street Journal has published this letter to the editor from Gov. Palin:

While on a United Airlines flight from New York City to Los Angeles this week, a fellow passenger handed me a copy of the The Wall Street Journal Nov. 15 op-ed by Alan Blinder—"In Defense of Ben Bernanke"—and suggested that I write a letter to the editor if I disagreed with the Princeton University professor's claims. Having read the piece, I told the passenger over my shoulder, "You bet I will."

Prof. Blinder seems blind to the clear and present dangers of QE2. Instead of seriously discussing these dangers, he takes us on an excursion to a Keynesian utopia, a mythical land in which endless government spending is an amazingly effective job creator and investors' confidence in U.S. Treasury bonds somehow increases as we sink ever deeper into debt while the Fed has its printing presses working overtime.

Here are some cold, hard facts from the real world: The first is the 8.7% 2012 unemployment rate predicted by the Survey of Professional Forecasters of the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia. It seems the Obama administration's record spending binge won't result in job creation, but in unacceptably high long-term unemployment. The second fact is that long-term interest rates have actually gone up following the Fed's recent QE2 announcement. The markets took one look at the Fed's pump-priming plans and decided they had to increase interest rates—probably in order to compensate for the expected rise in inflation.

None of this should come as a surprise. Blinders off, common sense engaged, it's time for us to "refudiate" the notion that this dangerous experiment in printing $600 billion out of thin air, with nothing to back it up, will magically fix economic problems that were caused in large part by the government's interfering with our free market system in the first place, and then made worse by the government's reckless spending experiments with our children's fiscal future. Instead of the tired, old Keynesian ideas behind Obamanomics, we need to turn to time-tested practices that are pro-free market rather than pro-big government. Some call this "free-market populism." It's based on the realization that the best way to get the economy moving again is to get government out of the way, let the free market dictate winners and losers, and allow the private sector to grow our economy one job, one paycheck and one American dream at a time. It's the only way we can restore much needed confidence and certainty in our economy. This is the only way we will all be able to soar from New York to Los Angeles and throughout the heartland.

Sarah Palin

Wasilla, Alaska

- JP

Ron Futrell: Is This About DWTS or Something More?

"No duh. It’s a popularity contest."
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Ron Futrell at Big Journalism is enjoying the meida hysteria over the success of Bristol Palin on ABC "Dancing With the Stars." He finds it "much more entertaining than the show could ever be":

Wherever you turn there are comments about how horrible it is that Bristol is winning this “competition.” Breaking news here, DWTS is not a real show, nothing real about it. It’s fabricated to get female viewers for ABC and it’s working much better than I ever thought it would.

[...]

No duh. It’s a popularity contest.

[...]

The vitriol is everywhere. This from the Orlando Sentinel, Chan Lowe, editorial cartoonist, “The Tea Party wing nuts, still excited about screwing up the country with the elections earlier this month, are now overloading ‘Dancing With the Stars.’ There can be no other answer.” Yep. Wing nuts win again.

Like Sarah’s show on TLC, the DWTS’ ratings are going through the roof. Wing nuts win again, while the incorrectly named “progressives” sit and stew in their misery knowing that one of their bastions of liberalism (prime time network programming) has been invaded by the enemy. I say invite Ed Schultz next season and let’s see how he does. See if his three viewers call in to vote for him. Maybe Overstuffed Eddie could show up on Skating With the Stars coming up soon on ABC.

The crew on Good Morning America was booing and hissing when it was mentioned the following morning that Bristol knocked off Brandy to make it to the finals. Seriously, you could hear the booing and hissing and Robin Roberts even referred to it. I don’t expect serious journalism from GMA and my low expectations are always met.

[...]

The activist old media shell game. Europe is broke, America is broke, our President refuses to see the threat of Muslim extremists (what is “jihad?”), and the media ignores the building wave on the internet that asks serious questions about Obama’s resume, and we get a Royal Wedding and a “Dancing With The Stars” “controversy.”

[More]

- JP

Douglas Mackinnon: Parker's Sad Envy of Sarah Palin

We may be on to something here
*
Douglas Mackinnon, who served as a writer for President Ronald Reagan, also worked in the Defense Department, both venues where the straightforward approach was the order of the day. It shows in his work as a Townhall.com columnist. Mackinnon doesn't BS his reader, as so many in the media do. Unlike most in the media who have written about Kathleen Parker, for example, he doesn't pretend that she's any kind of "conservative." Mackinnon prefers to call Parker what she is -- a liberal, as in his latest column for Townhall.com:

Embarrassingly for CNN host and liberal commentator Kathleen Parker, not only does she suffer from a severe case of SPDS (Sarah Palin Derangement Syndrome), but -- like a smitten tween trying to emulate her favorite actress in the Twilight series -- obvious envy and jealousy have prompted her to try and steal Palin's look based on the leather jackets Parker has been sporting of late on the air.

Ironic behavior to say the least when you consider that just last week, Parker loudly, proudly, and with a finger wagging, proclaimed on CNN that "I led..." the media assassination of Sarah Palin. That in response to filmmaker John Ziegler's accurate observation that Parker was partially responsible for the character assassination of Palin. Clearly, "partially" was not nearly enough credit for Parker. She wanted --- and her various insecurities demanded -- that she be credited with throwing the first bucket of mud which slimed Palin. Strange.

It's been asked numerous times by now, but what is it about Palin that sends wealthy, pampered, and elitist women like Parker and Maureen Dowd over the edge? Could it be something as simple as guilt? As in Parker and Dowd know full-well that they were in part -- very much like the Barack Obama they adore -- handed their status and title by the dictates of political correctness and affirmative action. Is that the truth which so enrages Parker and Dowd? That they were picked as columnists and commentators, not fully because of qualifications and experience, but because some white male editors needed to fill the "woman" space?

Before the predictable liberal attacks descend upon me, read what Parker herself once said on this very subject: "The way the market is set up, there has to be a left, there has to be a right, there has to be a conservative, there has to be a liberal, there has to be a man, a woman, a black, an Asian..." Whoops. There have to be token hires.

Okay. We may be on to something here...

[More]

- JP

Day By Day (November 18, 2010)

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Good Morning! It's a wonderful life if we just take it Day By Day.



Support Pro-Palin Day By Day

- JP

Quote of the Day (November 17, 2010)

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Shane Smith at TCU Daily Skiff:

"The more the far left hates Palin, the better off she will be in 2012."

- JP

More Quote of the Day Honorable Mention, Part 156

"Crazy" Edition
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Steele at Wild Citizen:

"It was voted 'The Biggest Lie of 2009' by the St. Petersburg Times 'Truth-O-Meter.' Sarah Palin’s Facebook article that claimed Obamacare would lead to rationing and the creation of Death Panels of bureaucrats to decide who lives and who dies. The Media and Blogosphere agreed. Sarah Palin’s article was an insane, right-wing, conspiracy theory. Death Panels were nonsense. They wouldn’t really happen. Besides, only a lunatic would actually want them. Fast forward to... 2010… Yesterday’s lies are tomorrow’s only real solution. Or so says insane, right-wing, conspiracy theorist, Paul Krugman of the New York Times... I guess lies aren’t what they used to be."

iOwnTheWorld.com:

"This Just Raised Sarah Palin’s Rating About 20 points..."

Dr. Michael Williams at Examiner.com:

"A New York Times Columnist, Paul Krugman, touched the third rail of Obamacare Sunday, while on ABC's 'This Week' when he made a statement confirming the need for 'death panels' as a means of containing health care costs. Krugman is not the first person who has advocated the use of 'death panels' and yet liberals excoriated Sarah Palin for pointing out that the Obamacare bill contains what many on the left have said needed to be done..."

Ethel C. Fenig at American Thinker Blog:

"Sarah Palin can see Washington DC from her house..."

iusbvision at The IUSB Vision Weblog:

"Those of you who think that Sarah Palin is stupid are going to get her elected by 'misunderestimating' her. Palin was a city councilman, a mayor, an energy regulator, a journalist and a governor. She held elected office for five years before Barack Obama ran for anything. She also owns a commercial fishing business. Her husband Todd is a champion racer and [was] an oil worker on the North Slope. The Palin’s position, and it’s one I share, is that the referee/government should be returned to its non-participatory and objective role. The dollar is the world reserve currency and the dollar is what is used in international oil transactions. Fish are also a commodity. Palin knows these businesses backwards and forwards... These are also the subjects that elite media journalists will never ask her about."

Rob Port at SayAnythingBlog:

"It wasn’t capitalism that caused the economic collapse. It was an unholy alliance of big business and big government... Palin’s position, and it’s one I share, is that the referee/government should be returned to its non-participatory and objective role."

Michael Suede at Fascist Soup:

"In the surreal Orwellian world of Keynesian liberalism, economics commentators view those who want to prevent a future collapse of the dollar as actually being responsible for a future collapse of the dollar. In an article entitled Will Sarah Palin and the Tea Party Cause Hyperinflation? resident Time Magazine economics idiot, Stephen Gandel, attempts to pin the coming currency collapse on lower taxes. I s___ you not.... There’s so much wrong with this idiotic nonsense that I’m having a hard time figuring out where to begin."

Rush Limbaugh:

"Sarah Palin has the intellectual curiosity to figure out that Obama is destroying the country and has to be stopped, which makes her more intelligent than Lisa Murkowski."

Stacy Drake at A Time For Choosing:

"As someone who FAILED her bar exam FOUR TIMES, Murkowski has the nerve to say that Governor Palin lacks 'intellectual curiosity.' Perhaps if Murkowski had any intellectual curiosity herself, she may have realized that daddy couldn’t hand her a law license... The notion that Governor Palin lacks the intelligence to 'craft great policy' is both insulting and bereft of fact. Murkowski, with no real policy accomplishments of her own, acts as though ACES and AGIA never happened. Lisa also doesn’t take into account the years Governor Palin spent as a City Council Member, a Mayor, and AOGCC Chair either. All positions which required more than just simple 'curiosity' to serve..."

mRed at Invincible Armor:

"Murkowski represents everything wrong in DC for many reasons, but her arrogant calculation to defeat (probably) the duly nominated Republican candidate Joe Miller, her feeling of self-entitlement and her snotty cat scratching at her opponents tell me that she hasn't a clue."

Matthew Balan at NewsBusters.org:

"[Roland Martin] was so proud of bringing his well-rehearsed label of Palin to CNN that he bragged about it on Twitter after the segment: 'Yes, quote me correctly. I did say on CNN's Anderson Cooper that Sarah Palin is the Kim Kardashian of politics. Rebroadcast at 11 pm est!' The next morning, Martin continued his self-marveling: 'Sarah Palin is the Kim Kardashian of Politics. A created celebrity who makes money for no reason whatsoever!' He also continued the attack on the Republican: '@sarahpalinusa needs to apologize to America for calling Obama a celebrity since she's one.' Actually, one could come to the conclusion that Roland Martin owes Sarah Palin an apology for comparing her to a porn star."

Guy Benson at Townhall.com:

"Absolutely nothing that Sarah Palin does seems to escape the Left's feverish, paranoid scrutiny. As they see it, her new show's ratings coup must not, and cannot, stand. She is undermined, derided, and accused of wrongdoing in virtually everything that she does, almost without exception. It's exhausting to keep up with, really."

Popgun at Popgun's World:

"I watched Sarah Palin’s Alaska the other night, along with a whole bunch of other people, which made it TLC’s number 1 launch event ever... It was a good show, and fun to watch. It was not overtly political, but I think it was a good move for Sarah Palin because it provides greater perspective on just who Sarah Palin is, how she and her family live, and how they think. You know what I mean: all the things we still don’t really know about Obama... I don’t know if Sarah Palin is going to run for President, now or later; but if she ever does, I will vote for her because we share most of our core values. But more, I would vote for her unreservedly because I think I know what I’m getting."

JoyfulChristian:

"I suspect that ['Sarah Palin's Alaska'] will go a long way towards helping her reach out to people who have a negative view of her based on the bizarre attacks lobbed at her from the right. "

Caroline Galea at The Malta Independent Online:

"Palin... will now have to be considered as a front runner for Republican presidential candidate in the 6th November elections of 2012. Leading political journalists are now likening her stance to that of another popular Republican President, Ronald Reagan. Reagan remains synonymous with his particularly easy style, charm and populist approach to politics. Things become even more complicated when one understands the Palin effect. Many are considering this an electoral victory for Sarah Palin rather than a Republican Party victory. Evidently, it was mainly Palin’s backed candidates that wrought most havoc on the Democratic Party dominance since 2008... This new set of political appointees are now seen to be in debt to Sarah Palin’s energetic efforts during this political campaign both on the ground and in the media."

- JP

Sarah Palin to Barbara Walters: I Could Beat Obama

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Gov. Palin has said in two high-profile interviews this week that she is seriously considering becoming a candidate for the White House. She replied, "I am," to reporter Robert Draper's question asking if she was considering a 2012 run.

"I'm engaged in the internal deliberations candidly, and having that discussion with my family, because my family is the most important consideration here."

Draper interviewed the 2008 GOP vice presidential candidate for a New York Times Magazine cover story to be printed Sunday.

Gov. Palin also told ABC's Barbara Walters that she is seriously weighing a run, and she believes she could beat President Obama in 2012:

"I'm looking at the lay of the land now, and ... trying to figure that out, if it's a good thing for the country, for the discourse, for my family, if it's a good thing," Palin said in an interview scheduled to air in full Dec. 9 on ABC as part of Walters' "10 Most Fascinating People" of 2010.

Asked Walters: "If you ran for president, could you beat Barack Obama?"

"I believe so," Palin said.

The full Sarah Palin interview will air Dec. 9 at 9PM CST on "Barbara Walters' 10 Most Fascinating People" special.

- JP

What Alicia Colon Doesn't Like About Sarah Palin

*
The author of this Irish Examiner opinion piece eventually admits that her title was conceived to snare Palin-haters into reading her pro-Sarah article. Once lured into her clever trap, Ms. Colon hits them with both barrels:

I can't recall in my long life so many Hollywood and television celebrities opining so fiercely about a political candidate as the following did on Sarah Palin: Matt Damon, Robin Williams, Whoopi Goldberg, Bill Maher, Chevy Chase, Lindsay Lohan, Susan Sarandon, and many, many more. Then of course there was Tina Fey on Saturday Night Live whose line, "I see Russia from my window," was falsely attributed to Palin.

Most of these intellectually challenged celebs have based their negative opinions on Palin on falsely attributed quotes that were generated by a satiric blog- www.unbearablebobness.typepad.com.

This site claimed that Palin's church believes that dinosaurs were on earth 4,000 years ago and that Palin does not believe in evolution. The blogger then wrote "Disclaimer: She didn't actually say these things - I made them up. But thanks for all the visits."

The fake stories persist along with the criticism that Palin is not very bright which is laughable. Matt Damon may have played a genius in the film, Good Will Hunting, but I doubt he's accomplished as much as Sarah Palin.

Alaskans share in the oil revenue and that state is one the richest in the nation with a huge surplus in its treasury.

Each Alaska resident gets an annual rebate from state oil revenue, and in 2008 Palin added $1,200 more to the $2,100 check each person received.

Contrast that efficiency to the state of California where most of these celebrities live and is nearing bankruptcy.

[More]

So what is it that Ms. Colon does not like about Gov. Palin? She thinks Mama Bear tends to growl a bit too loudly at Tea Party events. Otherwise, the author writes, Sarah Palin is "absolutely magnificent."

- JP

NY Times Magazine: The Palin Network (Updated)

"In truth, few are underestimating Sarah Palin anymore."
*
There's a long look at Gov. Palin and inside her inner circle in the New York Times Magazine by Robert Draper. Consider the source: more attention is paid to those candidates the governor endorsed who lost than won, for example. But it doesn't sink to the level of the sort of anti-Palin agitprop we've come to expect from the Times either. At least it isn't an overt hit piece in the sense of something that would appear in Vanity Fair or on a gutter website like Gawker. Gov. Palin apparently consented to allow Draper to interview her and also to talk to her key aides, so it's worth the read, with the usual caveats about the lamestream media's warped view of all things beyond New York City and Washington, DC. Here are a few excerpts:

“I am,” Sarah Palin told me... when I asked her if she was already weighing a run for president. “I’m engaged in the internal deliberations candidly, and having that discussion with my family, because my family is the most important consideration here.” Palin went on to say that there weren’t meaningful differences in policy among the field of G.O.P. hopefuls “but that in fact there’s more to the presidency than that” and that her decision would involve evaluating whether she could bring unique qualities to the table.

“Yes, the organization would have to change,” Palin said during an hourlong phone conversation. “I’d have to bring in more people — more people who are trustworthy,” she clarified. Palin said that her experience as John McCain’s running mate was for the most part “amazing, wonderful, do it again in a heartbeat.” But she added, “What Todd and I learned was that the view inside the bus was much better than underneath it, and we knew we got thrown under it by certain aides who weren’t principled” and that “the experience taught us, yes, to be on guard and be very discerning about who we can and can’t trust in the political arena.”

[...]

It’s a curious feature of Palin World that none of its charter members knew her before 2008. (Her two longtime Alaska aides, Kris Perry and Meghan Stapleton, left amicably but wearied by the demands involved with working for an overnight celebrity.) Van Flein met Palin in the summer of 2008, recruited by Todd Palin to give legal advice on the Troopergate controversy. He now divides his time between his Anchorage legal practice and his position as one of Palin’s four lieutenants. The others are Andrew Davis, the political director who resides in Sacramento; Tim Crawford, the group’s elder statesman at 58, whose political experience extends back to Goldwater and who in early 2009 was forced out as the R.N.C.’s interim finance director, by which time John Coale had already recruited him to be the treasurer of SarahPAC; and Palin’s 36-year-old Los Angeles-based cybermessenger, Rebecca Mansour. Palin’s broader circle also includes Jason Recher and Doug McMarlin, who handle her travel logistics from, respectively, New Orleans and Columbus, Ohio; Pam Pryor, who works with Crawford at SarahPAC as the liaison to the evangelical and Christian community; and Randy Scheunemann, a prominent neoconservative and former McCain foreign-policy adviser. Crawford, Pryor, Scheunemann and two occasional speechwriters, Chriss Winston and Lindsay Hayes, all live in or around Washington. Among the D.C. consultants, however, only Crawford interacts with Palin on a regular basis. More than once in our discussions, Van Flein referred to “those people who are of the Beltway and those who aren’t” — a binary worldview to which Palin obviously adheres. (Press reports variously name Fred Malek; Bill Kristol, the editor of The Weekly Standard; and Kim Daniels, a conservative lawyer, as key advisers, when in fact Daniels has not worked for Palin for several months and Malek and Kristol are seldom in contact with her. “It’s nearly every single day we learn a lesson about a person who claims to speak for us or work for us,” Palin told me. “Seems 9 times out of 10, Todd and I look at each other and say, ‘Who is this speaking for us?’ ”)

[...]

There are few spouses in politics as hard-working as 46-year-old Todd Mitchell Palin — a native of Dillingham, Alaska, who married his Wasilla High School sweetheart and dropped out of college and eventually found work in the North Slope oil fields. He handles her travel. He is at times her sole accompaniment to events. He is — with apologies to the mama grizzly — the family’s chief protector, who has been known to nix interview requests from publications that have previously, in his view, made fun of his children. It has fallen to Todd to mollify alienated aides, interview potential speechwriters and help prep his wife for an interview by Googling subject matter on his BlackBerry. Referring to the ongoing communications in Palin World, Thomas Van Flein told me, “Todd is always part of the information chain.” In the external world it is widely understood that when sending Sarah Palin an e-mail “the best idea is to copy Todd on it,” according to Malek.

[...]

Palin became testy when I asked her about the books I heard she had been reading. “I’ve been reading since I was a little girl,” she snapped. “And my mom is standing 15 feet away from me, and I should put her on the phone with you right now so she can tell you. That’s what happens when you grow up in a house full of teachers — you read; and I always have. Just because — and,” she continued, though in a less blistering tone, “I don’t want to come across sounding caustic or annoyed by this issue: because of one roll-of-the-eye answer to a question I gave, I’m still dealing with this,” she said, referring to her interview with Katie Couric. “There’s nothing different today than there was in the last 43 years of my life since I first started reading. I continue to read all that I can get my hands on — and reading biographies of, yes, Thatcher for instance, and of course Reagan and the John Adams letters, and I’m just thinking of a couple that are on my bedside, I go back to C.S. Lewis for inspiration, there’s such a variety, because books have always been important in my life.” She went on: “I’m reading [the conservative radio host] Mark Levin’s book; I’ll get ahold of Glenn Beck’s new book — and now because I’m opening up,” she finished warily, “I’m afraid I’m going to get reporters saying, Oh, she only reads books by Glenn Beck.”

[More]

Update: At TWS Blog, Matthew Continetti judges Draper's NY Times cover story to be "an excellent piece of reporting that treats Palin in a relatively sympathetic manner." The key word there is "relatively."

- JP

Blood: Sarah Palin Kicks the Leftist Ant Hill and Goes for Gaia’s Throat

Conservationsists? Well, not really.
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The premiere of TLC's "Sarah Palin’s Alaska" has provoked a psychotic reaction on the political left, which is railing against not just Gov. Palin herself, observes Loran Blood at David Horowitz's NewsReal Blog, but against what they think she represents:

The criticism has only snowballed since Nov. 14. and has begun appearing in more specific guises. The Huffington Post reports that a “local Alaskan conservationist” has criticized her for violating “wildlife guidelines” during the show’s filming. The critic, one John Toppenberg, says the brief encounter with two dueling Grizzlies may not “send an appropriate message to large numbers of people that are not experienced at fishing in bear country.” An honest, non-political criticism? Just who is John Toppenberg and what is The Alaska Wildlife Alliance, the group he represents?

Conservationsists? Well, not really. The Alaskan Wildlife Alliance is, as a working knowledge of their website and issue positions will make clear in no time, a leftist environmental activist group who’s primary concern is the ending of the culling of wolves and other predators to preserve prey species populations and to support the reintroduction of large predators to areas in which they have been long absent. There may or may not be good scientific arguments for further limitations on such culling by state biologists and private hunters, but the Alaska Wildlife Alliance claims in its mission statement that its purpose is to “protect Alaska’s natural wildlife for its intrinsic value as well as for the benefit of present and future generations.”

[...]

Sarah Palin is accused of fomenting a “massacre” of wolves and their pups while in thrall to “the corporation and special interests”. Palin, Pablo Escobar-like, runs a “wildlife cartel” that represents the “greatest circumnavigation of ethics, truth, science and morality ever perpetrated on the people of Alaska by their government”.

Not to be outdone, the AWA newsletter Echos speaks of a “war on wolves and bears” in which “barbaric cruelty” describes the motives and methods of those with whom the group disagrees. Field Marshal Palin is responsible, we learn in an Audubon Magazine.org article for “surprise air strikes” against wolves (no doubt John Kerry was in the area at the time, and now has this incident “seared — seared — in me.” Toppenberg himself is quoted in the same article in reference to Palin’s “war”.

Wolves are described in one article as “one of Earth’s pinnacles of intelligence, sentience, and sociality” Perhaps so, but one suspects that local moose, who have little symbolic political value, were not consulted regarding this observation.

[More]

Blood will get no argument from us. We've expressed similar opinions on this subject a number of times, including here, here, here, here and here.

- JP

S.E. Cupp: Sarah Palin is happy, and her enemies know it

Liberalism needs to imagine an unhappy populace.
*
We've lost count of the number of op-eds and blog posts written on the subject of why liberals hate Sarah Palin. Many of the authors of those pieces say it is because she is pro-life. Some contend that it is simply because she's a conservative woman. Still others cite the way she relates to ordinary Americans as the reason why elites on the left (and the right) spit their venom at her. In her latest column, S.E. Cupp offers a novel explanation for the left's anti-Palin hysteria:

It seems everyone wants a piece of Palin these days. Some are fans, some are hostile foes. But regardless, we just can't stop talking about her. Will there ever be a time when we decide that we've figured her out and there's nothing else to say?

And then it hit me. The reason Palin has become such a lightening rod, a kingmaker and a punching bag, a celebrity and a power player, is simple. It's because she's so gosh darn happy.

For her fans, like the ones I had the pleasure of meeting in Chicago [at a C4P meetup], she's refreshingly upbeat and resilient, the bubbly friend from childhood who was always great at cheering you up and cheerleading you on.

But for her detractors, nothing raises the ire of cynical liberals more than a happy-go-lucky, totally unburdened, freethinking and self-assured conservative woman who has everything she wants and then some.

[...]

Liberalism, after all, needs to imagine an unhappy populace. Passing sweeping entitlement programs and convincing voters that big government is the answer only works if people are frustrated with their stations in life.

Thus Palin is a real threat to front-office operations.

And Sarah Palin, more than almost any other public political figure, represents the "can do" rugged individualism and self-reliance that liberals fear most. She's not just running her household. She ran her state! And in her new documentary series, we see that independent streak clear as glacier water. Whether she's casting for salmon or scaling the rockface at Denali, she's smiling - and just won't quit.

[More]

Cupp may be on to something here. After all, it was Sarah Palin herself who said, in reply to Jeff Jenkins' request for a response to one of NY Times character assassin Maureen Dowd's many attacks on her:

"I encourage the other momma grizzlies to keep smiling as we work hard to put America back on the right track. We are going to stay happy and may we always be happy and may our enemies know it."

Oh, they know it all right. And that, says Cupp, is what drives the left right up the wall.

- JP

Day By Day (November 17, 2010)

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Good Morning! It's a wonderful life if we just take it Day By Day.



Support Pro-Palin Day By Day

- JP

Quote of the Day (November 16, 2010)

Why should the GOP choose between heart and mind?
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Paul Greenberg at Townhall.com:

"New York Times... columnist... Matt Bai... wasted no time asking what approach the newly empowered GOP should take: 'One could argue that the most fundamental choice facing the new Republican House majority, in particular, is whether to stand on cultural or intellectual dissent -- or, to put it another way, whether they want to cast themselves principally as the party of Sarah Palin or the party of Rep. Paul D. Ryan.' Or as the equally simplistic headline above his column summed up his message: 'Emotional or Cerebral: Republicans Face a Choice in How to Oppose.' Mr. Bai... failed to raise a second, much more obvious question: Why choose between heart and mind? Together, they're said to make a powerful combination. As an early Republican named Abraham Lincoln well knew."

- JP