When’s he going to get around to fixing that economy?

Here’s what I don’t understand about Goldberg: why is he making a living off conservative punditry when he could be making billions selling the interdimensional transporter that takes him to the alternate universe where Palin is an object of fear to liberals and embarrassment to feminists.

For Gawdzakes get that woman a teleprompter!

Seriously, if you were going to give a speech explaining your reasons for making a devastating, surprise political move of this magnitude, don’t you think you should have an actual, I dunno speech prepared? I mean, jeez, I could write this thing for her–no snark, no irony–straight up, in, what? ten minutes?

blahblahblah after careful consideration, soul searching and prayer, blahblahblah I have come to the difficult decision that it is in the best interest of my family, myself and the state I love so much, blahblahblah, the baselss accusations and political attacks against me and my family have become too much of a distraction, blahblahblah, I will continue to fight for the things we believe in, blahblahblah, It is with a heavy heart, but the conviction that this is the right path for me, blahblahblah…

I mean, she tried to deliver more or less this kind of message, but really, how many of us could do this off-the-cuff? No, we’d end up sounding as disjointed and bizarre as she did.

I really think this move came as almost as much of a surprise to her as it did to everyone else.

Here’s my theory: Someone came to her this morning–or maybe even early this afternoon–and said, “Look. We’ll make it easy on you. If you agree to step down right now, today, we will agree not to release the photos/sex tape/evidence/story/whatever. Otherwise, we go straight to the media. Either way, your political career is over. Get out now, and you can slink away with some small shred of your dignity intact.

I suspect that person was a Republican. Whether they will keep their end of the bargain remains to be seen.

Time for one of your specialty videos, D, featuring Jonah doing a sassy hip rotation for Miss Taupe Support Hose Under Running Socks.

“We know we can effect positive change outside government at this moment in time on another scale and actually make a difference for our priorities.” Sarah Palin

Either she hit some of that high grade Wasilla blow before her resignation speech or Palin has missed her calling as a Kafkaesque bureaucrat.

Can’t wait for the scandal to break. Whatever it is, I hope prosecution and a jail sentence are involved.

This should be fun

An upcoming book about Sarah Palin, coming on the heels of a damning Vanity Fair profile of the Alaska governor in the magazine’s August issue, will chronicle the tensions between her and officials in Republican John McCain’s campaign for president last year.

In advance of their book, CBS News’s Scott Conroy and special contributor Shushannah Walshe released an example of a battle between Palin and Steve Schmidt, McCain’s top campaign strategist – this one over Todd Palin’s involvement in an Alaskan secessionist party.

Palin, angry that the media was asking questions about her husband’s seven-year association with the Alaska Independence Party, fired off an e-mail to Schmidt claiming Todd Palin had only mistakenly identified himself as a member of the party while filling out a voter registration form.

Schmidt challenged her on her apparent attempt to mislead not just the public but the McCain campaign – just one episode in a series of disagreements that continued right up until election night.

“The statement you are suggesting be released would be inaccurate. The inaccuracy would bring greater media attention to this matter and be a distraction,” Schmidt wrote back. Palin didn’t respond.

In the Vanity Fair piece, writer Todd Purdum paints a picture of a stubborn woman who won’t take direction and has transformed many former friends into foes.

He writes of onetime associates who believe Palin suffers from narcissistic personality disorder.

“How could John McCain, one of the cagiest survivors in contemporary politics – with a fine appreciation of life’s injustices and absurdities, a love for the sweep of history, and an overdeveloped sense of his own integrity and honor – ever have picked a person whose utter shortage of qualification for her proposed job all but disqualified him for his?” Purdum writes.

shortblah blah:
“How dare liberals make fun of you for being politically inept, by the way honey you might want to read a book or two.”

Palin, angry that the media was asking questions about her husband’s seven-year association with the Alaska Independence Party, fired off an e-mail to Schmidt claiming Todd Palin had only mistakenly identified himself as a member of the party while filling out a voter registration

She thinks she’s some saavy political genius right here. I think she’s proof that the blame-the-media schtick is never gonna work for conservatives again. Ring that martyr bell all you want, crazies are the only ones who will here it.

Let’s hope the crazies are still the majority of the republican party in 2010 and 2012.

soooo, if sarah had only realised how central Jonah was to the fight against commie/blackitude/priusdriving nazidom she would have willingly become his sex slave and he would have been her svengali and the world would have been saved its’ dhimminitude!

I’d still bang her.

Five.:

I wouldn’t. She’s probably a total squib in bed, and I sure as hell wouldn’t want to have to listen to her gibbering.

Dear Governor Palin,

You’re blowing it.

Only in Doughy’s dreams.

With all the rampant speculation about Palin’s motives going around, this the first I’ve seen it theorized that she quit because Jonah Goldberg ordered her to fellate him.

If true, that would make Palin either less ambitious than I suspected or more sane.

Then again, she may have realized that gratifying Jonah orally may not be the best path to the Presidency. Which makes her smarter than I suspected.

No, we’d end up sounding as disjointed and bizarre as she did.

Sadly, no. I bet most of the elitists here could say something off the cuff like Steerpike’s swift & boilerplate but essentially true if there is no scandal looming talking points. (Misanthropes & the nervous excluded, but give anyone here 10-15 minutes & …)

Let the almost-ex Gov. loose & you see her mind doesn’t even have talking points rattling around in it, just dog-whistling, which leads me to think that her “base” are about as intelligent/trainable as the average dog, w/ none of the good points of the canine community.

Moratorium on the hate-fucking, please?

TBogg has the director’s cut of her resignation speech.
http://tbogg.firedoglake.com/2009/07/03/so-long-and-thanks-for-all-the-moose/

I’m flabbergasted.

I thought she didn’t blow J DoPants.

Two pages of heart-broken bloviaton, finished by a sentence ending with a preposition.

Give, Jonah, give.

Erick:

“this is kind of like Ben Kenobi letting Darth Vader strike him down.”

I’m flabbergasted.

The fact that ‘flabberghastly’ is not yet recognised by the dictionary is a sign of the political agenda shared by lexicographers.

Nasal sex may result in rhinoghasty.

From Erickson’s RedState post:

Unfortunately, by resigning, I think the left and national media will be emboldened to ritualistically engage in the metaphorical gang raping of conservative politicians, particularly those who are female and have children.

Who resigned exactly and to do what now?

I like the Twitter version better:

I think the left and MSM will now be embldned 2 serially gang rape conservative politicians, particularly female ones and their families.

More grassrootsy and authentic.

If a Republican can’t run a place as GOP-friendly and recession-proof as Alaska without messing things up, then why would we want anything remotely like her in charge of the country? That woman in incompetent, corrupt, and proudly stupid.

It was a nice speech, however. Which WNBA team will draft her now that she’s declared?

Its like the end of “The Thing From Another World (1951)”:
“The danger has passed for now but..Watch the Wingnuts, everywhere! Keep looking. Keep watching the Wingnuts!”

“How could John McCain, one of the cagiest survivors in contemporary politics – with a fine appreciation of life’s injustices and absurdities, a love for the sweep of history, and an overdeveloped sense of his own integrity and honor – ever have picked a person whose utter shortage of qualification for her proposed job all but disqualified him for his?” Purdum writes.

Nice to see the putative Left allow the McCain hagiography parade to continue so long as the propaganda is also written with an eye toward embarrassing Palin.

Everything Mistress Palin ever did wrong was actually the fault of the librul media!

Erick turns to Star Wars? I would have thought he would have a good WWII analogy. Winston Churchill had to resign as Lord Admiral of the Navy after fucking up the shit of a couple hundred thousand Aussies and Kiwis at Gallipoli, if he could come back from such a fuck up, with her demonstrated oration acumen, Palin’s return as Prime Minister of Great Britain is all but assured.

Lord Churchill, if I were President I should flavor your coffee with poison.

Madam, if you were President I should drink it.

Point of order, Mr. Chairman: an overdeveloped sense of his own integrity and honor is no hagiography.

On the other hand, it is more fun to watch wingnuts search for 11-dimensional chess rationalizations of stupid decisions than to see liberals do it for Obama’s failures.

I think he meant “Hagee-ography”… the scholarly pursuit of trying to find exactly who the craziest person McCain cozied up to was.

Remember, kids:

Making fun of conservatives = RAPE!!!
Making fun of liberals = Very Serious Debate

Also, 8+ years of accusing Hillary Clinton of lesbianism, murder, etc? Never happened. Nuh-uh. You libs must just hate women. Not like us.

Al Giordano says, “Being an ex-governor is sort of like being a community organizer… except you have no actual responsibilities!”

Gallipoli was a WWI mess, Tragically Flip. Which I’m sure is central to someone’s point.

Oh, she’s assumed a very weighty responsibility. She’s resigned to spend more time with her ghost-written book.

And all those newspapers.

I wouldn’t. She’s probably a total squib in bed, and I sure as hell wouldn’t want to have to listen to her gibbering.

not unless you get the handcuffs and gag out…

Point of order, Mr. Chairman: an overdeveloped sense of his own integrity and honor is no hagiography.

Yeah, ok pedantic guy. But why has the left, putative and imputative alike, stopped worrying about McCain? It’s almost like they think he’s now irrelevant or something.

Just what I would expect from someone who rates for Jerry.

Awww, it’s so cute when he thinks his life’s work actually matters!

Half right. He thinks it matters that he carries water for Tom but there’s nothing cute about it.

Mice have their uses...

Moratorium on the hate-fucking, please?

Concur.

Someone upthread forced me to consider the possibility of a flabbergasm. I fear I am now unable to unconsider it.

I’m sure she was going bareback to show everybody just what they’re losing, and to issue a stinging rebuke to Obama, who we are assured can’t brush his teeth without a teleprompter saying “Up,” “Down,” and “Spit.” And I’ll bet she thought she did just fine, especially with that ringing round of applause from the entire population of Wasilla there at the end.

Besides, if there’d been a teleprompter, it would have gone down in transformer smoke. The technology is good, but there are limits.

Unable to comment before now due to chronic glee … hot damn, not even her beauty-pageant flute solo was nowhere near as surreal as that speech.

Like any worthy wingnut, Jonah is partly correct – but she wasn’t really “blowing it” any worse than usual, & certainly not badly enough to walk away from the Governor’s Mansion more than a year early – in a state that recently re-elected a convicted felon.

This isn’t 11-dimensional-chess – it’s Russian Roulette with an automatic. NEVER quit until you’re absolutely forced to, or you get a rep as a self-destructing & potentially dangerous nutjob. The comedy of her stated reason for resigning is matched only by her failure of logic when she “explains” it. “I quit, ergo I win” gets laughed at even in primary-school … in politics, it’s suicide. I’m not sure there’s any scandal deeper than her own lack of contact with reality behind this, nor if the public will ever learn what it is if there is one.

But she looks like hell on wheels & sounds like someone who’s done waaaaaaaay too much meth to me, from the weird gaspy shit to the manic vibe of crazed euphoria that bears no relation to a resignation-speech to the total lack of both coherence & reason. I’d say she’s lost a good 30 pounds in the last 5 months, which for someone under 6 feet tall who wasn’t overweight to begin with is hincty as fuck – & it just doesn’t sync up with someone in their 40s who’s spent years in a well-paying desk-job; my one word of advice for Palin is Detox. Also.

Pull out the shishkebab-stick & stop turning her – she’s done.

At least the wingnuts still have T-Paw to get fired up over in 2012.

*guffaw*

(via TPM): Heh.

“She should also lead the nation’s mothers to oppose mandating replacement of incandescent light bulbs with the new mercury poison gas bulbs…if she does all that, the left won’t be making jokes about her any more, just like they stopped joking about Ronald Reagan long about 1984, and Newt Gingrich in 1994.”

The Left stopped joking about Ronald Reagan and Newt Gingrich? Some of my earliest memories as a wee Truc are of my mama talking about jelly beans and the Gipper. (I also remember when she said that she wished that Reagan had actually died from the attempt on his life, but that’s not really that funny). Hell, I think I still make jokes about him. And who COULDN’T make jokes about Newtie???

Actually, I think the jokes about Reagan were just starting to take on subtle and complex nuances around 1984, when it was discovered that not only was his office engaging in trading arms for hostages and funding right wing death squads, they were also doing it while he snoozed in the Oval Office, his brain growing more spongey every day.

Again, I feel compelled to point out that McCain choosing this creature as his running mate makes him look like an even bigger putz now thanks to this little train wreck…On the other hand, I suppose it’s now possible for him to point at Simple Sarah and screech that he would have won if it hadn’t been for her…

…it was discovered that not only was his office engaging in trading arms for hostages and funding right wing death squads, they were also doing it while he snoozed in the Oval Office, his brain growing more spongey every day.

And the country was being run by those thugs and Nancy’s astrologer.

Goddamn, I really can’t believe we’ve survived the last 29 years sometimes.

I think the jokes about Reagan were just starting to take on subtle and complex nuances around 1984…

Ah, that explains it. I don’t believe people who write for the Fox news website understand things that are “subtle and complex,” much less nuanced. In other words, there were definitely jokes, but they went over his head.

Goddamn, I really can’t believe we’ve survived the last 29 years sometimes.

Christ, I know. I’m pretty sure my almost-weekly nightmares about an apocalypse and/or social collapse and/or living in a totalitarian state have to do with living under Reagan and then Bush the Elder during my formative years. God knows what kind of dreams the poor little bastards born during the Bush administration will have.

Meanwhile, over on Malkin’s site, the commenteers are busily deconstructing this entire affair through the particularly illuminating lens of the classic Star Trek episode “The Corbomite Maneuver.”

No, really. I couldn’t make this shit up.

You can almost smell the mildew of Mom’s Basement in the posts there, as they all desperately fap-fap-fap to the thought that Palin’s resignation is really part of an elaborate political-judo ploy whereby she shall emerge TRIUMPHANT and VICTORIOUS (random capitalization being a characteristic both of Palin and of the wingnuts).

Erick Erickson: “Unfortunately, by resigning, I think the left and national media will be emboldened to ritualistically engage in the metaphorical gang raping of conservative politicians, particularly those who are female and have children.”

Sounds like someone needs to be gang-raped if he is ever to realize that it isn’t a very good metaphor for someone calling you mean names.

[vader] The crazy is strong in this one [/vader]

Tom eats mice, Palin eats moose. I’m just sayin’ that those who rate for Tom…

I think Our Gracious lady of the Tundra has moved from an actual political force to an eventual political force. She is always going to be coming to rescue the Republicans, always going to turn up at the last possible moment (Scott-Heron circa 1980) only to dash their little hopes and spark their salty tears. Martyred on the twin arms of the cross of desperation and self congratulation.

Jonah’s Townhall piece in question here was actually one of his most coherent in recent memory.

“Unfortunately, by resigning, I think the left and national media will be emboldened…”

The left and national media resigned? Why was I not informed?

John D @ 18:37: I always suspected that McCain chose Palin as his running mate to ensure his loss — a let-them-eat-moose meat geste d’absurdist..