This blog will recount only facts, no opinions. It will provide links to Sarah Palin's activities on a daily basis, and the news reports on those activities. As the Presidential race heats up, the activies of all Presidential candidates will also be detailed here.

Friday, July 30, 2010

July 30: The Atlantic Wire

PBS Formally Defends Totally Benign Palin Joke

In a media atmosphere where mocking Sarah Palin is practically a national pastime, PBS has made the somewhat odd decision to launch an earnest, full-throated, and probably unnecessary defense of a totally benign and sedate Palin joke made by one of its contributors. Andy Borowitz, appearing on PBS's Need to Know, mocked Palin's recent use of the non-word "refudiate," joking, "Here's what you need to know about a Palin presidency. Her first official act will be to cancel the agreement between nouns and verbs. Next, she'll replace the English language with Palinese, a language known only to her."

PBS ombudsman Michael Getler scrambled to respond when, as he says, "several people wrote to say they took offense." He reproduces six such emails, including one by Herb Myers who fumes, "The Need to Know broadcast shown about Sarah Palin was horrible for a public-owned system. No value to ridicule to discredit."

But Getler ultimately sides with PBS and agrees with the defense of Need to Know producer Shelley Lewis, who wrote, "Is a little joking about Ms. Palin's penchant for malaprops really such a big deal? Last week editorial cartoonist Steve Brodner was pretty tough on President Obama, and we heard plenty from Obama fans about how unfair we were, how rightwing we were, etc. We do try to have some fun at both sides' expense."

July 30: Chrisian Science Monitor

Sarah Palin anoints a new 'mama grizzly': Does it make a difference?

A photo and a paragraph:

Wyoming State Auditor Rita Meyer sits with Matt Mead, a former U.S. Attorney for Wyoming, and Wyoming House Speaker Colin Simpson in a forum for candidates seeking the Republican nomination for governor in Cheyenne, on June 15. Former Alaska governor Sarah Palin endorsed Meyer as a ‘mama grizzly’ Thursday.

July 30: Palin and Johnston break up again

An article appeared in several newspapers today, July 30, saying that Bristol Palin had broken off her engagement to Levi Johnston again, because he had another girlfriend whom he'd made pregnant.

July 30: Washington Post: Why did publisher postpone Palin biography?

Why did publisher postpone Palin biography?


A blog entry by Stephen Livingston of The Political Bookworm (reviewer of books on politics)

Our sister publication, Slate.com, tries to answer the question. It reports that Christian publisher Zondervan has removed "Speaking Up" from its fall lineup and taken the biography for young readers off its Web site.

It's unclear why Zondervan has taken the action; the publisher isn't explaining. And Slate, which got an advance copy, can only wonder: "The relentlessly reverential book is not modeled after Kitty Kelley's takedowns but rather on those quickie tween biographies of Justin Bieber and Zac Efron churned out for adoring fans. It is a stronger reputation-burnisher for Sarah Palin than Going Rogue was."

The Slate piece by Ruth Graham adds: "Viewed forgivingly, "Speaking Up" is a laudable effort -- a biography of a woman for a young evangelical audience that focuses primarily on its subject's professional accomplishments. Viewed less forgivingly, it's a hilarious one. At one point, within the space of three paragraphs, Palin is compared favorably to Taylor Swift, the apostle Paul, Larry Bird, Magic Johnson, and Eunice Kennedy Shriver -- in that order."

Thursday, July 29, 2010

July 29: Staten Island Live: Former VP candidate Sarah Palin endorses Michael Grimm for Congress

Former VP candidate Sarah Palin endorses Michael Grimm for Congress

STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- After earlier snagging the top of the 2008 GOP presidential ticket, Republican Michael Grimm is now two-for-two, with former vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin yesterday backing his candidacy for Congress.

Ms. Palin, the former Alaska governor, lauded Grimm's military and law enforcement background, saying he'd fought in the Gulf War and had taken on "organized crime and Wall Street corruption."

Sarah Palin is backing Michael Grimm in his quest to represent the 13th District in the House of Representatives.
"He'll represent New Yorkers with just as much integrity and courage as he defended them in the FBI and the Marine Corps," Ms. Palin said in a statement released by the Grimm campaign.

July 29: Another HuffPo piece: Sarah Palin's Secret Dictionary

Sarah Palin's Secret Dictionary
Barry Bortnick, Journalist


Obama's thought thugs will arrest me for the following blog. But as a journalist, it is my duty to shed light in the darkness no matter the consequences.

As most of you know, short-time Governor and current conservative media starlet, Sarah Palin, got libs in a fluster after she channeled Shakespeare and coined a new word.

I happen to like refudiate, as in "You can refudiate all you want; you're still taking out the trash tonight!"


He then goes on to make up some words, and define them in an egregious way toward Palin.

July 28: Salon.com: Palin running fifth in New Hampshire poll

In order to find out if Sarah Palin is in the news today (since I started this blog there's been an article mentioning her every day) I do a google search on "Sarah Palin."

Several came up today. This one is just the result of a poll written by Salon.com, with people commenting on the topic in "Letters to the Editor".

Wednesday, July 28, 2010 02:45 PM ET
Palin running fifth in New Hampshire poll
A new poll raises more doubt about the ex-Alaska governor's appeal in the first-in-the-nation primary state

July 29: HuffPo talks about Palin again

Sarah Palin's Small Town Values
Robert J. ElisbergColumnist and screenwriter

Ever since she has hit the national spotlight, Sarah Palin has delighted in attacking the parts of America that aren't "small town America," "middle America," what she refers to as "The Real America." (As opposed to the rest of the country that is the Fake America.)

Never mind that this "small town America" - Sarah Palin's Real America - only makes up a tiny fraction of the United States. The number of fake Americans living in urban areas is 225.9 million, while Real Americans living in rural areas is only 59.3 million. (For those keeping score, that's 79.2% fake, 20.8% real. Even this overwhelms the Senate's filibuster-proof super-majority.)

Who would have imagined that small town America was really that small...?


I don't reproduce the rest of the article.

Wednesday, July 28, 2010

July 28: Huffington Post mentions her in a blog

Gary Shteyngart On Sarah Palin And 'Super Sad True Love Story' (VIDEO)

You've probably seen Gary Shteyngart in the news lately. That's because his new novel, "Super Sad True Love Story," just came out yesterday from Random House. The Huffington Post recently sat down for lemonade with Shteyngart, who is Russian, who told us about the likelihood of Sarah Palin being able to see Russia from her house/ getting elected to the Oval Office.

Check back for more Shteyngart videos throughout the week!


To see the video go to the website.

July 28: Sarah Palin in the Miami Herald

Sarah Palin posted a Twitter post in which she said "Refudiate" instead of "Repudiate," and like Vice President Dan Quayle's Potatoe-potato or Bush's various Bushisms, it doesnt look like the liberal papers are going to let it go. (Although they never grasped, let alone had to let go, of Barack Obama's mispronuncatoin of corpse-man, his belief that there were 57 states in the Union (although he may have been including territories with States, that'd make 57) and various other gaffes.)

Anyway, only two articles mentioning Sarah Palin today.

One from the Miami Herald:
'Refudiate': Why Sarah Palin's Twitter flub may outlast her
By John Austin
Fort Worth Star-Telegram
Pundits jumped on Sarah Palin when she recently tweeted that people should "refudiate" plans for a New York City mosque near Ground Zero.

"Ground Zero Mosque supporters: doesn't it stab you in the heart, as it does ours throughout the heartland? Peaceful Muslims, pls refudiate," Palin tweeted.

The tweet was quickly deleted, and refute replaced refudiate, but the clips of Palin using the word on Sean Hannity's Fox News show have not gone away. Nor has the flap over how the former governor and vice presidential candidate let her linguistic slip show.

Still, while Palin is no Shakespeare — a famous coiner of words — it may be wrong to misunderestimate refudiate too quickly.

"In English, the tradition is words bubble up from the people," said Paul J.J. Payack, president of the Global Language Monitor in Austin. "If it's used, it's accepted as a word."

George W. Bush's notorious use of misunderestimate is a good example of how what's called a portmanteau word can find acceptance.

Like an old-fashioned portmanteau traveling case that opens into two compartments like a book, portmanteau words such as refudiate combine two other words in form and meaning.

" Misunderestimate did start as a joke word. It was a good joke five years ago," Payack said. "Now we're seeing it all the time. Now it's just out there."

What counts is whether a new word meets a need that the old ones don't.

"The word ... doesn't necessarily add any additional meaning beyond what is found in other individual words," Laurel Smith Stvan, a University of Texas at Arlington linguistics professor, wrote in an e-mail. "But the new term is evocative as a blend because it resonates with repudiate, refute and refuse mingled together."

But Brad Lucas, chairman of Texas Christian University's English department, is dubious.

"It's an effort to elevate one's language to sound more academic, more scholarly," Lucas said. "I don't think I'd give her an A for anything."

On Friday there were 800,000 mentions for refudiate on Google, Payack said. Repudiate, a far older word, had only 2.4 million mentions.

"While Sarah Palin already has somewhat of a reputation for malapropisms, it seems to be the power of the blogosphere and Twitter coming into play that makes this term so controversial," Stvan said. "Its circulation on the Web both amplifies commentary on the perceived wrongness of the term, while also increasing the exposure, which might end up making it seem more acceptable."

The "ultimate deciders" — another George W. Bushism — of refudiate's fate are English speakers, not the experts, provided we love it.

"Refudiate — it's not even a week old," said David J. Silva, University of Texas at Arlington vice provost for academic affairs and a linguistics professor. "We don't have predictive power. We'll find out in 50 or 100 years."

Tuesday, July 27, 2010

July 26, 2010: Media-iate has article on Sarah Palin

Rather than reproducing articles written about Sarah Palin, I share only the first two paragraphs, for fair use. Anything more, you need to go to the source. However, I think it's valuable to see just how much in the news she is. Not a day goes by without some article about her, as we shall see as this blog progresses.

Journolist Founder Ezra Klein Defended Sarah Palin, Called Her a ‘Wonderful Mother’
by Tommy Christopher
Glynnis MacNicol noted that yesterday’s daily Daily Caller Journolist leak deviated from previous entries, in that it was simply a “dump” of emails on the subject of Trig Palin, with no accompanying editorial content. While the posting drew a sharp rebuke from Sarah Palin, it made me wonder why Daily Caller wouldn’t have hyped these more, since assaults on Trig figure to outrage pretty much everyone. A cynical person might say it was to avoid a headline like this.

The previous Journolist posts have all featured varying degrees of the hard sell, with headlines that didn’t quite deliver on their promise. The most “incriminating” emails have been from avowed partisans, yet are all lumped together as a mainstream media conspiracy.

July 26: Huff Po's Jeanne Devon Writes Article on Sarah Palin

Rather than reproducing articles written about Sarah Palin, I share only the first two paragraphs, for fair use. Anything more, you need to go to the source. However, I think it's valuable to see just how much in the news she is. Not a day goes by without some article about her, as we shall see as this blog progresses.

The following article appeared at the Huffington Post today:

Palin's Promise to Alaska Falls Flat One Year Later: Happy Anniversary

Here's the first paragraph:



DISCLOSE Act Faces GOP Filibuster In Senate
More in Politics: Obama's Hispanic Support... Pentagon's Wikileak Hunt... Pol Calls Islam A 'Cult'...
Portland Detectives Grill Al Gore Over Sexual Harassment Allegations
Social Security 'Under Greater Threat Now Than Under President Bush'
Medical Marijuana Approved For VA Clinics In 14 States
Arizona Governor Asks Judge To Throw Out Federal Challenge To Immigration Law
'Person Of Interest': Pentagon Looking Closely At Potential Wikileaks Source
Daughter Tells Voters: 'Do Not Vote For My Dad'
Your request is being processed...
Jeanne Devon ("AKMuckraker")Managing Editor of themudflats.net

It was one year ago today, when our ex-half-governor Sarah Palin stood in Fairbanks, Alaska and stepped down from the governorship. After first declaring herself a "lame duck," and then decrying the ineffectual nature of lame ducks in general, there was simply nothing else she could do. But she did take the opportunity on that day to explain to all of us what she'd be doing with all of her newly found and self-inflicted free time.

Because let's face it -- the only time we up here in Alaska were more surprised than when she accepted the nomination for VP was when she quit. So we were curious. And then she declared that she was going "to chart a new course to advance the state."

The rest of the 2-page article says that Palin did nothing to help the state of Alaska, but has rather spent her time writing a book and giving speeches.

The article is well-worth reading. Alaska apparently does have a lot of problems:
The last great wild salmon run on the continent in Bristol Bay is threatened by the looming specter of a huge copper and gold mine at its headwaters. The potential for environmental disaster from the Pebble Mine is epic, and would arguably affect the nation's seafood supply more than the current Gulf tragedy.

Domestic violence, sexual assault, alcohol and drug abuse, incest, and the desperate and tragic migration of Native Alaskans from village life into big cities all continue to plague our state. Our high school drop out rate is astronomical. Each of these issues and so many more could benefit from a powerful national voice speaking up for those who can't.

One could argue that solving these problems is the job of the new governor, as well as other politicians in Alaska. But has Palin addressed these issues at all?

Monday, July 26, 2010

July 26: Guardian: Bristol Palin's fiance to star in music video about interfering mum

Guardian UK: Bristol Palin's fiance to star in music video about interfering mum

Levi Johnston, fiance of Bristol Palin and bane of Sarah Palin's existence, is about to share his 15 minutes of fame with an unknown singer. Johnston will take time out from feuding with the Tea Party flag-waver to shoot a music video with R&B singer Brittani Senser. And what's the video about? A loony interfering mum.

The song is called After Love, a lukewarm ballad that has Senser asking if she will "ever learn". It's taken from her debut album, released last July to little fanfare. "It will give [Levi] an opportunity to act a little bit in front of a camera," Johnston's attorney, Rex Butler, explained to the Associated Press. It will also give his future mother-in-law a headache.

In conceiving the video, director Evan Winter admitted that he "riffed off [Johnston's] real-life situation". It shows a couple sharing "tender moments before they are driven apart by the young woman's mother", the Associated Press reports. "Unaware that her mom's interference forced her boyfriend to go, she throws herself into her mother's arms. She tells her mother that she was wrong about Levi."

In 2008, Johnston was an important accessory to Sarah Palin's US vice-presidential campaign, proof of the "power of family over adversity". Although Palin disapproved of her daughter's pre-marital pregnancy, the couple declared their engagement and the handsome high-school drop-out was ushered into the photo ops. After Barack Obama's election win, and the birth of a son, Tripp, in December 2008, the couple broke things off – and Bristol later sought sole custody. Johnston consoled himself by posing for Playgirl magazine.

Earlier this month, Johnston and Bristol Palin announced that they were back together and getting hitched. Sarah Palin – a rumoured contender for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination – has yet to endorse the betrothal. Or the music video. "I don't think we're going to be concerned about what governor Palin would want," Butler said.




[I know I have said this would be a news blog, not an opinion blog, but really Bristol Palin needs to be slapped and disowned.

"How sharper is a serpent's tooth," I thought when I read this. Bristol Palin sure does seem to ready to capitalize on her fame as a Palin, while at the same time shooting down her mother. She doesn't seem to realize that people would look at her with nothing but contempt if her last name wasn't Palin, since she's a teenage girl with not enough brains to have her boyfriend wear a condom when they have sex. ]

July 26: CBS News: Liberals Want Sarah Palin to Be 2012 GOP Nominee, Survey Says

CBS News: Liberals Want Sarah Palin to Be 2012 GOP Nominee, Survey Says

If former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin decides to jump into the 2012 presidential race, liberals would be thrilled, an unofficial poll released today shows.

In a straw poll of attendees at the Netroots Nation conference in Las Vegas over the weekend, 48 percent of respondents said they'd like to see Palin as the Republican Party's 2012 nominee. Rep. Ron Paul came in a distant second, at 11 percent. Ten percent voted for Rick Santorum, 9 percent for Mitt Romney and 8 percent for Newt Gingrich. Seven percent chose Tim Pawlenty, while 5 percent said Mike Huckabee, and 1 percent said Rep. Mike Pence.

One name not on the list was Sen. John Thune of South Dakota. While he may not be on everyone's radar for 2012, DNC executive director Jennifer O'Malley Dillon said at the Netroots conference this weekend that Thune was the potential 2012 GOP presidential candidate who scares her the most. "John Thune is somebody that I have nightmares about," O'Malley Dillon said. "He has his head down and is doing some policy stuff."

More than 300 conference goers participated in the Netroots straw poll.

While some liberals have expressed dissatisfaction with President Obama and Democrats over the past year, those surveyed in the straw poll gave the president a strong approval rating of 84 percent. Sixty-eight percent named health care reform Mr. Obama's top accomplishment so far. Another 13 percent said the stimulus act was most important.

Nearly three-quarters said job creation should be the top priority for Congress and the president. Fifty-three percent said the economy is in a serious, long term decline, while another 33 percent said the economy will correct itself. When asked whether there should be more government investment, or cuts to government spending and taxes, in order to create jobs, 93 percent said more investment.

Sunday, July 25, 2010

July 25, 20210: Washington Post article praises Sarah Palin's successor at her expense

Alaska gov restores calm after stormy Palin tenure

By BECKY BOHRER
The Associated Press
Sunday, July 25, 2010; 3:20 PM

JUNEAU, Alaska -- Perhaps Sean Parnell's greatest accomplishment so far as governor is that he's not Sarah Palin.

In the year since inheriting the job when Palin resigned, Parnell has quietly gone about restoring a sense of calm that many Alaskans craved after the storm-that-was-Sarah. Barring any major missteps, that alone may be enough to help him carry next month's GOP primary and win the office he wasn't expecting hold.

Parnell is not considered particularly vulnerable, according to the non-partisan, Washington, D.C.- based Rothenberg Political Report, despite challenges from Republicans Ralph Samuels and Bill Walker and a Democratic contender this fall. The report's political editor, Nathan Gonzales, said the race would be much higher profile had Palin stuck around, with lots of cash being raised from outside the state.

"I don't think anyone outside of Alaska knows who Sean Parnell is, and that's a good thing for him," Gonzales said. "As long as he's doing his job and people have a positive opinion of him, I think being under the radar is a good position to be in for him."

Flashy and brash he's not. Parnell can walk among the tourists in Juneau without notice, a sharp contrast to Palin. He's not known as a fiery orator. He can declare his "passion is for people" in the same tone he uses to lay out policy points. He maintains his allegiance to Palin, in a state still bitter over her departure, while not exploiting his ties as other candidates have.

And supporters and critics alike offer similar words to describe him - competent, cautious - in different contexts, of course.

"When I first became governor, my intention was not to be different" than Palin, Parnell said, but it was "to be who I am." Parnell said. "I do have great respect for Gov. Palin and for her leadership here. (But) I have set a course with my own initiatives."

During the last legislative session, Parnell scored partial wins in advancing his agenda: getting the $100 million he wanted for deferred maintenance projects; advancing the concept of a merit scholarship plan; gaining broad support for an initiative to curb domestic violence and sexual assault - an effort rooted in Parnell's own family experience. He talks about an abusive grandfather and how his father ended the cycle of violence.

There've been several controversial Parnell vetoes, as well as a dust-up over his hiring of a former state lawmaker to a newly created military affairs adviser's post.

Parnell rejected expansion of a state-sponsored health insurance program for low-income pregnant women and children, saying he'd only recently learned the program paid for abortions. Democrats accused him of playing politics with children and families.

Attorney General Dan Sullivan took the heat on the hiring issue, saying there were shortcomings in the legal analysis and advice Parnell received.

Overall, though, Parnell has largely avoided the limelight, maintaining relatively high favorability ratings in the process, according to pollster Marc Hellenthal.

There've been no real crises on his watch. The unemployment rate has begun to fall, and oil prices haven't fallen far, allowing Alaska to avoid the steep budget cuts that other states have faced.

But major challenges loom.

While oil remains king, its revenue largely responsible for funding the state's operation, production is expected to keep declining. There are no firm answers for how best to stem those revenue losses.

One long sought project that could help is a major natural gas pipeline.

Samuels and Walker have aggressively gone after Parnell's approach to building the line.

Parnell remains committed to the process championed by Palin, which she said would spur competition in bringing North Slope gas to market. Two competing projects are currently seeking shipping commitments and gauging interest. Parnell cites this as proof the market will win out.

But Samuels said the state is really no further ahead than it was several years ago in realizing a line.

Walker favors an "all Alaska line" that he says would put put Alaska, not oil and gas companies, in the driver's seat. He said Parnell has shown no leadership on the gas line.

While polls have favored Parnell and several analysts see the race as his to lose, the public is just starting to pay closer attention to the Aug. 24 primary.

Some Alaskans, like Elbertha Anker of Anchorage, like Parnell and think he's done a good job but aren't sure yet whether they'll vote for him. Others, like Beverly Ward, who said she recently hosted a standing-room-only fundraiser for him in her home, are resolute in their support.

And there are those who think the entire slate of incumbents should go.

"I lost interest when Sarah became governor," said Suzanne Hudson, 63, of Juneau, a longtime Republican who voted as a Democrat in the last presidential election and has grown frustrated with the entire process. "It doesn't do much good to pick a party or complain. They're not listening to the people. They're really not."

One potential and not easily measurable impact on the gubernatorial contest could be the state's U.S. Senate race and who turns out for it, said Stephen Haycox, a University of Alaska Anchorage history professor. That race features U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski against Joe Miller, a self-described "constitutional conservative" endorsed by Palin and supported by the national Tea Party Express.

A strong Murkowski vote should bode well for Parnell, he said.

Hellenthal, who's presently not working with any Alaska gubernatorial candidate, doesn't think there will be much drama.

Parnell "could do something stupid; predicting the future is something that's always hazardous," he said. "But it would certainly be amazing if he did. That's not his nature."

Saturday, July 24, 2010

July 24: Sarah Palin, Kate Gosselin & Kids Going Camping Together?

The Huffington Post ran this piece about Jan 23, today Peace FM Online is repeating it.

Sarah Palin, Kate Gosselin & Kids Going Camping Together?

Huffingtonpost : One reason to watch 'Kate Plus 8': Sarah Palin may be taking Kate and the eight kids camping in Alaska. Kate and Sarah, incidentally, were both named among Barbara Walters' ten most fascinating people of 2009. Palin's tv show will be airing on TLC, just like Gosselin's, so perhaps it's synergy at work.


Kate Gosselin is a woman who is apparently world-famous for having 8 kids, and several reality shows describing how she copes with having so many children. The reality shows began in 2005.

From Wikipedia:
Katie Irene Gosselin (née Kreider; born March 28, 1975) is an American television personality. Gosselin achieved national recognition on the reality show Jon & Kate Plus 8 which profiles her and her then husband Jon Gosselin as they raise their atypical family of sextuplets and twins.

Friday, July 23, 2010

Sarah Palin Facebook Post Deleted, Thanks to "Social Experiment"

Fox News has an article today on Sarah Palin:
Sarah Palin Facebook Post Deleted, Thanks to "Social Experiment"

The mystery behind a vanishing Facebook post by Sarah Palin that railed against a planned Ground Zero mosque has been cleared up. She fell victim to a “social experiment.”

Facebook's terms of service prohibit users from posting content that is hateful, threatening, incites violence or contains nudity or graphic violence. But that's not why a blogger called on readers to report a post by Palin, which described a mosque being built on Ground Zero in New York City as "an intolerable mistake."


What happened was, a Tweeter told all his friends to "report" Sarah Palin's Facebook entry as hate speech. Facebook got so many protests that they removed her post from Facebook.

(It has been replaced, and Facebook apologized to Sarah Palin, but the other blogger is still happy about what he had accomplished.)

Thursday, July 22, 2010

The Fix Article: Sarah Palin's New Hampshire problem?

Thursday, July 22, 2010

An article on Palin appears in The Fix (Political News & Analysis by Chris Cilliza) at The Washington Post, entitled: Sarah Palin's New Hampshire problem?

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/thefix/eye-on-2012/-is-former-alaska-gov.html

First paragraph:
Former Alaska governor Sarah Palin's decision to endorse former New Hampshire attorney general Kelly Ayotte in a contested Senate primary earlier this week immediately set off speculation about what it all meant for the 2008 vice presidential nominee's 2012 prospects.

The primary is being held on Sept. 14.

The article goes on to point out that Palin's endorsement included the sentence that Palin knew the New Hampshire-ites were a lot like Alaskans.

Those critical of her in the state are focusing on this statement. They say she may have gotten to know Ayotte in 2008 when she was a vice presidential candidate, but she has not spent time in the state since then so can't know what New Hampshire-ites are like.

The article is several hundred words long, and discusses other issues facing Palin as well. I do not cover it all here.

Wednesday, July 21, 2010

Manifesto

The activities of Sarah Palin - and other would-be Presidential candidates, as the next Presidential election draws near.