Opinion piece: Why Sarah Palin's a fairweather conservative

Alaska Dispatch: Why Sarah Palin's a fairweather conservative

Peter Rolf is an idiot. I do not say this lightly, and it is not an exercise in name calling. We have too much name calling in the media these days, and I don't like it.

The statement that "Peter Rolf is an idiot" is simply a sad summation of facts. "Idiot: A foolish or stupid person."

I don't know if Peter Rolf is foolish or stupid, but it is one or the other.

Who is Peter Rolf, you now ask. Well, according to his bio at usnews.com he "is a contributing editor at U.S. News & World Report. A former senior political writer for United Press International, he is currently a senior fellow at the Institute for Liberty and at Let Freedom Ring, a non-partisan public policy organization."

You would think from this that he might be a man of some intelligence, but then he writes this sort of nonsense.

"The elites -- and not just the liberal ones -- fear (Sarah Palin). Where (sic) she a Democrat, she would be a national hero, but because she is a Republican, and a conservative one at that, there has been a concerted effort to turn her into a national joke."

If Sarah Palin is a conservative, I am a five-legged duck. As governor of Alaska, Palin oversaw the imposition of near-draconian taxes on the oil industry. State estimates are that she and House Democrats netted the state an extra $4 or $5 billion the state didn't need. It was a government taxation windfall in a state where the government taxes the oil industry so it can handout annual checks to Alaska residents simply for living here.

Conservatives do not do this. Palin has never protested this. In fact, she went farther then just endorsing the PFD handouts. When she was governor, she added to the handouts with a $1,200 energy rebate. In the history of America, there has never been a state that engaged in the redistribution of wealth in the way in which Alaska has done.

Alaskans who have been here since the first Permanent Fund Dividend was handed out in 1982 -- a group which would include Palin -- have now collected more than $32,500 in direct cash payments from the government for doing nothing. N-O-T-H-I-N-G. She was a happy member of Alaska's socialist collective. It does not take a lot of research to find this out.

Or is this what Rolf thinks good conservatives do: Sit around and collect hand outs from the government without ever saying anything? And, if elected to power, increase the handouts? That's idiocy.

Now, I admit, I don't know why Rolf thinks Palin would be a "national hero'' if she were a Democrat. But he is entitled to his position on this. The same for whether the "elites" fear Palin, although one must wonder who the elites are these days. Are they Americans who know enough about Paul Revere to recognize that his famous ride involved lighting lights, not ringing bells? I guess that would make me an "elite," which I find hilarious.

Then again, maybe I'm not an elite because I have no more fear of Palin as president than of Obama as president or Bush or Clinton or Reagan or the rest. American government is what you might call a "well buffered'' system. No matter how much presidential candidates talk about change, it is difficult. Obama is finding that out now. Palin discovered much the same thing as governor of Alaska.

The job got too tough, so she quit. Is that what is done by a "Republican, and a conservative one at that?"

One of my heroes is Gen. George S. Patton. He was probably a conservative. I don't know if he was a Republican. I do know he wasn't much on quitting. He was blunt. He, too, would have recognized as an idiot anyone who claimed to be a fellow at "a non-partisan public policy organization" who wrote "where (sic) she a Democrat, she would be a national hero, but because she is a Republican, and a conservative one at that, there has been a concerted effort to turn her into a national joke."

Let's see, judging Palin by her periodic misstatements about history on the basis of whether she is a Republican or a Democrat is "non-partisan?" What can fairly be said about someone who thinks that?

Only one word: Idiot.

Peter Rolf is another lamestream media idiot who knows nothing about Palin, and I am tired of it.