Damozel & Nicholas | Nicholas covered the first part here. And, as Glenn Greenwald noted earlier today, it's getting kind of sad. We agree that it's sad. So sad.
In fact, apparently she's making the entire country, including all her supporters and defenders, sad. The Daily Intel, brings us a round-up of lachrymose punditry, along with a useful analogy.
The mood over Sarah Palin is changing. Her political naysayers used to delight in her floundering her way through interviews (okay, that one interview with Charlie Gibson). They enjoyed pointing out her lack of credentials. But her interview with Katie Couric over the past two nights has elicited a different response — like cringing. No longer is there joy in Palin's struggles.[continues after jump]
Watching her has become like watching one of those hopeless singers trying out for American Idol: First you laugh. Then you laugh some more. Maybe after that you laugh a little bit more. And as the talentless contestant soldiers on, despite the judges' derision, you recognize that this person, despite their best efforts, doesn't even realize that they don't have what it takes. And that makes you kind of sad. (Daily Intel)
Not to mention aghast.
Robert Schlesinger has an idea:
It’s like a talking points machine gone out of control. Or magnetic poetry that you have on your fridge—in fact, you can try it at home. String together key words and phrases like “shore up the economy,” “reduce tax rates,” “healthcare reform,” and “trade” and see what kind of Palinisms you can create.
Good idea. It'll give us all something to do while civilisation crumbles round our ears.
Via Ambinder, this partial transcript of the second part of the interview:
COURIC: You've cited Alaska's proximity to Russia as part of your foreign policy experience. What did you mean by that?
PALIN: That Alaska has a very narrow maritime border between a foreign country, Russia, and on our other side, the land-- boundary that we have with-- Canada. It-- it's funny that a comment like that was-- kind of made to-- cari-- I don't know, you know? Reporters--
COURIC: Mock?
PALIN: Yeah, mocked, I guess that's the word, yeah.
COURIC: Explain to me why that enhances your foreign policy credentials.
PALIN: Well, it certainly does because our-- our next door neighbors are foreign countries. They're in the state that I am the executive of. And there in Russia--
COURIC: Have you ever been involved with any negotiations, for example, with the Russians?
PALIN: We have trade missions back and forth. We-- we do-- it's very important when you consider even national security issues with Russia as Putin rears his head and comes into the air space of the United States of America, where-- where do they go? It's Alaska. It's just right over the border. It is-- from Alaska that we send those out to make sure that an eye is being kept on this very powerful nation, Russia, because they are right there. They are right next to-- to our state. (Marc Ambinder)
And don't get us started on her comments concerning the bailout.
Here is a partial transcript, also via the valuable Mr. Ambinder, from the third part:
Couric: You met yesterday with former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, who is for direct diplomacy with both Iran and Syria. Do you believe the U.S. should negotiate with leaders like President Assad and Ahmadinejad?
Palin: I think, with Ahmadinejad, personally, he is not one to negotiate with. You can't just sit down with him with no preconditions being met. Barack Obama is so off base in his proclamation that he would meet with some of these leaders around our world who would seek to destroy America and that, and without preconditions being met. That's beyond naïve. And it's beyond bad judgment.
Couric: Are you saying Henry Kissinger ...
Palin: It's dangerous.
Couric: ... is naïve for supporting that?
Palin: I've never heard Henry Kissinger say, "Yeah, I'll meet with these leaders without preconditions being met." Diplomacy is about doing a lot of background work first and shoring up allies and positions and figuring out what sanctions perhaps could be implemented if things weren't gonna go right. That's part of diplomacy.
Ambinder laconically observes: "Note that CBS verified Kissinger's position -- that he favored diplomacy with Iran without preconditions, although not directly with Ahmadinejad."
And, as he points out, she answered the question about how she would spread democracy by saying....she would spread democracy. Good to know.
She's even making the foreign correspondent for the UK's (conservative) Telegraph, sad. At The Telegraph, Alex Spillius does a little punditing for the benefit of UK Tories:
We are way past the Palin-excites-the-base phase. The reasons for that are clear and fair: she is a likeable, everyday, gutsy, church-going mum with a gun. And nor is her performance defensible with the liberal-media-witchhunt argument.
This is about readiness, and John McCain's incredible gamble on Mrs Palin. With six weeks to go before the election, it might be prudent to recall that if elected she will be a heartbeat away from the presidency. On this showing she simply isn't qualified for the job.
Just for the record, we don't think there's been a "liberal media witchhunt." We think people have simply been trying to understand McCain's choice of successor. Anyway, any actual witchhunt is guaranteed to fail, since it would seem, from this footage, that Palin was inoculated (absolutely literally) against witches and witchcraft via her Wasilla Church.
We've said all we have to say about the sheer unbridled ignorance and naivete of this woman.
Take it away, other bloggers and pundits!
Conservative commentator Andrew Sullivan:
The days when Republicanism meant actual responsibility and judgment and experience and realism have been replaced by gimmicks, pure politics, Fox fem-bots, and constant, random gambling with the most dangerous things imaginable.
We're both in the same general age bracket as Andy, and we can't recall those days, so we see this more as "the scales fall from Sullivan's eyes," but all right. He's right about the constant, random gambling and the dangers.
Melissa McEwen: "I just don't even know what to say anymore...."Not ready for primetime" doesn't begin to cover it."
TBogg knows. "Sweet Jeebus in a moose costume."
John Cole: "This isn’t even funny anymore. I am now feeling bad for this moron, she is in so completely over her head." Though he'd like to know how the right wing blogs are going to spin this.
Semidi: "Looks like the McCain camp should’ve kept her under wraps for a few more days. Forty of them."
My friends, Sarah Palin knows how to fight terrorism:
Palin was asked if she thought the U.S. presence in Iraq and Afghanistan was helping to mitigate terrorism.
"I think our presence in Iraq and Afghanistan will lead to further security for our nation. We can never again let them onto our soil," she said.
I...uh...huh?
In her defense, she can't see either Iraq, Afghanistan or terrorism from Alaska.
The Seventh Sense says, as someone surely ought to, "Oh, Give It Up Already, Sarah."
Daniel Larison is similarly at the end of his tether: "Make it stop....Please, please, make it stop.":.
Steve Benen: "[A]t this point, it's almost unfair for McCain to set her up for this kind of fiasco."
Even the cold-hearted bastards at Gawker think it's gone too far: "John McCain should be ashamed of himself." We agree: for choosing her in the first place, subjecting us to her, and subjecting her to the media. She's like a baby moose in the headlights, or in her own gun sights.
GOP pundit Ross Douthat joked bleakly: "But hey, maybe it's all just effing brilliant rope-a-dope for the Biden debate ...." [1] You keep telling yourself that, son; [2] What Biden debate?; and [3] Don't we all want to see that comedy play out?
Fallows levels judgment. Ross is dumbstruck. Well: he sure tried to give her a chance. Douthat, Greenwald and Dreher have now all reversed themselves in the face of ... the evidence. A sign of sanity in a political world that has gone crazy.
Douthat self-justifies (and rightly so; we're not saying not):
The belief that populism has a place in American politics does not require a belief that every populist candidate should be uncritically supported; and the belief that one can acquire political wisdom outside Washington does not absolve an outsider candidate of the obligation to demonstrate that they have wisdom, as well as talking points, to fall back on....
[S]upporting "Great Commoners" when they appear, and pining for them when they don't, doesn't mean that any candidate who happens to be a commoner and a conservative merits automatic support from right-wing pundits (which is more or less the subtext of a rant like this one, which takes a sledgehammer to "northeast corridor conservatives" for their Palin-skepticism), or that conservatives are hypocrites - and snobs who just don't want to admit to the designation - if they support the idea of candidates like Sarah Palin while remaining skeptical about Palin herself.
And, finally, Kathleen Parker at The National Review says: "It was fun while it lasted... If BS were currency, Palin could bail out Wall Street herself....If Palin were a man, we’d all be guffawing, just as we do every time Joe Biden tickles the back of his throat with his toes."
RECENT POSTINGS
When I heard the bailout comments, my first thought was that poor miss teen South Carolina babbling about AIDS in Africa.
When Palin was first named to the ticket, the comparisons were made to Quale. The better comparison was always Spiro Agnew - an inexperienced governor with a history of corruption. But now, the best analogy appears to be James Stockdale, at least insofar as she is a trainwreck when unscripted.
Posted by: Adam | September 26, 2008 at 04:28 PM
Todd Palin says it best when describing Sarah Palin's qualifications for being mayor in this Youtube video that was taken by a younger Bristol Palin right after Sarah Palin won the mayoral election in Wasilla - "Miss Whale Blubber 1996 is now the mayor!" and "You tell me honey, how does a woman go from hunting moose? She's a moosehunter honey, your Mama's a moosehunter, you know that honey. ... City Council, yes ... but mayor???"
See for yourself:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MIwpg_QsYnc&feature=PlayList&p=7CF89749F5AA97FF&index=1
Posted by: Cindy | September 28, 2008 at 08:22 AM