Gossip: Fashion Face-Off: Michele Bachmann vs. Sarah Palin

Will we ever see the sartorial elegance of the male candidates compared at The Hollywood Gossip website: Fashion Face-Off: Michele Bachmann vs. Sarah Palin
Michele Bachmann and Sarah Palin are happy to agree on their preferences for low taxes, strong faith and the need for Republicans to take back the White House in 2012.

But there's one area in which the new Presidentual candidate may bristle when compared to the former Vice Presidential nominee: fashion.

In a recent interview, in fact, Bristol Palin said Bachmann has taken the look that her mother popularized, telling Pop Eater: "I think she dresses a lot like my mom. But a lot, a lot of women have done that the last few years. I do think it's odd, you know, seeing people with red blazers with their hair up with glasses."

Compare the style choices of Bachmann and Palin at a recent event and decide: Who looks better?

Blog: Sarah Palin is a Hypocrite & A Hillbilly

Tuscson Citizen.com: Arizon'as Unapologetic Liberal: Sarah Palin is a Hypocrite & A Hillbilly

Every time I turn the television on, there’s Sarah Palin. Prancing around for the camera, making a completely arse of herself. However that’s not good enough for Sarah, she’s now dragged her kid into the media manipulation game. As most know by now, Bristol Palin has written a book. She’s twenty one years old, an unwed mother, has accomplished nothing in life and has no education to speak of, and she writes a book. Obviously she’s riding on mommas coattails, wait, let’s clarify that, Palin has grabbed Bristol by the hand and is dragging her along the political highway. You know, the world of soundbites and twenty four hour news cycles.

What’s important to understand is that if this snot nosed privileged kid named Bristol had her druthers, she’s be at home watching TV or out shopping for clothes. Keep in mind, she’s no more than a dressed up Alaskan hillbilly fresh out of Wasilla and following momma hillbilly’s lead.

Palin complains about the media and yet prances around on stage blurting out broken sentences and popular right wing slogans that stir up the conservative extreme right fringe base. For a person who supposedly hates the media, Palin sure is enamored with them. I guess there truly is a fine line between love and hate. Without the so called “lame” stream media, Palin would be nothing. So Palin should stop complaining and start thanking that “lame’ stream media.

I can’t wait till the day that Palin slips into obscurity, my stomach turns every time I see her trying to act like a major player amongst serious politicians. Palin should be immortalized and placed on a poster as an example of what a politician should never be, inept, uncouth and unintelligent. A lethal combination when combined with someone who paints her face, dresses up like a respectful woman and calls herself a politician.

Boy howdy, we here in Arizona must be blessed to have the modern day Clampets moving into the neighborhood. I can just see hear the song now.

Come and listen to a story about a woman named Sarah
A poor mountaineer, barely kept her family fed,
Then one day she was shootin at some moose,
And up through the ground came a bubblin’ crude.

Politics that is, black gold, Alaskan tea.

Well the first thing you know ol’ Sarah’s a millionaire,
Kinfolk said Sarah move away from there
Said Arizona is the place you ought to be
So they loaded up the truck and moved to Scottsdale.

Hills, that is.
Swimmin pools, conservative voters.

The Alaskan Hillbillies!

Well now its time to say good-bye to Sarah and all her kin.
And they would like to thank you folks fer kindly droppin in.
You’re all invited back again to this locality
To have a heapin helpin of their hospitality

Hillbilly that is. Set a spell. Take your shoes off. Y’all come back now, y’hear?

Carlos E. Galindo is a radio talk show host & political analyst conducting radio shows in both English and Spanish on four radio stations in Arizona. Mr. Galindo is a weekly contributor to KPFK 98.7 FM Los Angeles and has appeared on CNN, Univision and Telemundo as a political analyst. Mr. Galindo is also an Op-Ed columnist on Prensa Hispana Arizona. www.nospinonair.com/http://www.carlosgalindo.com
Listen to our live radio broadcast every Friday from 5-7 PM on The JOLT Tucson 1330 AM or via the web on www.nospinonair.com

Palin's PAC offering donors copy of 'The Undefeated'

Is this really "news" worthy????

The Hill: Palin's PAC offering donors copy of 'The Undefeated'

Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin's (R) political action committee is offering supporters a copy of a pro-Palin documentary film in exchange for their financial support.

According to the SarahPAC website, donors can receive an "early-release" DVD of "The Undefeated," which made its debut in Iowa this week, if they contribute $100 or more.

"Taking back control of the House last year was only the first step. Now you and I must fix our eyes on 2012," Palin writes on the site. "I’ll be supporting commonsense conservative candidates in crucial off-year elections and doing all that I can to ramp up our preparations for 2012."

Palin is using the film to bolster her political standing as she contemplates a run for the White House in 2012.

The documentary's creator, conservative filmmaker, Stephen K. Bannon, has stressed that Palin and her team had no direct editorial role in the film. But the ex-governor's camp helped set the process of its creation in motion and Palin attended its premiere in Pella, Iowa this week.

The film paints her sometimes-controversial governorship in a positive light and frames her as a Reaganesque conservative savior for the GOP.

Sarah Palin says celebrity critics are 'full of hate'

Guardian.co.uk, Culture, Film, The Undefeated: Sarah Palin says celebrity critics are 'full of hate'
US politician Sarah Palin described her Hollywood critics as "full of hate" following the world premiere of her new documentary The Undefeated in Iowa last night.

Film-maker Stephen K Bannon's hagiographical portrayal of Sarah Palin opens with several minutes of footage in which various well-known figures in film and US television offer scathing, often expletive-ridden verdicts on the former Alaska governor and darling of the American right, who is said to be weighing up a tilt at the US presidency next year. Their angry comments are interspersed with news footage of an effigy of Palin being hanged. Among those to be represented are Matt Damon (who likens Palin to "a really bad Disney movie"), Madonna, comic Bill Maher and talk-show hosts David Letterman and Howard Stern.


Speaking to the Hollywood Reporter following the screening at a historic opera house in the small town of Pella, Iowa, Palin said it was the first time she had seen the footage. "It makes you want to reach out to some of these folks and say, 'What's your problem? And what was the problem? And what is the problem?'" she said. "What would make a celebrity, like you saw on screen, so hate someone that they'd seek their destruction, their death, the death of their children? What would make someone be so full of hate and, I guess, a sense of being threatened that they would want to see that person destroyed?"


Letterman describes Palin as "slutty" in the footage, while Maher calls her a "dumb twat" on his TV show. Madonna screams "Sarah fucking Palin" while performing at a concert and various other entertainers variously label her a "slut", "bitch" or use the term "hate" to describe their feelings about her. As the footage ends, a verse from the Bible appears on the screen: "By their fruits ye shall know them."


Palin herself is not interviewed as part of The Undefeated, though she did help Bannon, a former naval officer and banker, with access to some of those who were, and her voice is used to narrate several scenes. Another documentary with a rather different take on the politician's rise from "soccer mom" to 2008 US vice-presidential candidate has been shot by Nick Broomfield, the British documentarian behind films such as Kurt and Courtney and Biggie and Tupac. Currently seeking distribution, it features interviews with Palin's parents, friends and former Alaska colleagues, few of whom reportedly have particularly kind things to say about her.


The Undefeated is currently scheduled to open in fewer than a dozen US cinemas next month. Despite the frenzied media circus accompanying its premiere at the heart of the state which will host the US's first presidential primary next year, Palin has still not announced her candidacy.

Conservative blogger Breitbart sees Sarah Palin jumping into White House race

CBSNews: Political Hotsheet: Conservative blogger Breitbart sees Sarah Palin jumping into White House race
Conservative muckraker Andrew Breitbart said he believes former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin will throw her hat in the ring for the Republican nomination for president.

"My guess is yes," Breitbart said when asked by CBS News Tuesday if he thought Palin would run.

Breitbart, who is featured prominently in the newly released movie on Palin's political rise, "The Undefeated," attended the film's world premiere in Pella, Iowa, where he was greeted by Palin with a hug.

While he explicitly said he was not endorsing Palin, he did describe himself as a "defender" of the polarizing politician.

"She represents something defiant and fearless and righteous and decent," he explained, and said the two hour pro-Palin movie "represents vindication" from her detractors.

But it's not just vindication from the so-called mainstream media. Breitbart called out "establishment Republicans," accusing them of sitting on the sidelines, "watching [Palin] be devoured because they don't want to see her succeed."

Palin, whose dedicated supporters desperately want to see join the race for the GOP nomination, told reporters at the film's premeire that she is still undecided as to whether she'd join the fray.

"It's a big decision to decide whether to run for office or not," Palin told reporters. "I'm still contemplating."
The television commentator later said there were "months and months" left before she felt she would have to make a final decision.

Bristol Palin: Sarah Palin "Definitely Knows" What She'll Do in 2012

International Business Times: Bristol Palin: Sarah Palin "Definitely Knows" What She'll Do in 2012
Bristol Palin said today that Sarah Palin "definitely knows" whether she will run for president next year -- but she's not sharing what those plans are.

"She definitely knows. We've talked about it before. But some things just need to stay in the family," the younger Palin said in an appearance on "FOX & Friends," where she was plugging her book, "Not Afraid of Life: My Journey So Far."

In her memoir, the 20-year-old takes shots at the family of Arizona Senator John McCain -- whose choice to make Sarah Palin his 2008 running mate catapulted her to political stardom -- and reveals how she drunkenly lost her virginity to Levi Johnston.

She also writes about being in the media spotlight when she was pregnant during the 2008 campaign, saying, "For some reason, I didn't realize the ripples my pregnancy would cause throughout the nation."

"Not Afraid of Life," written with Nancy French, was published last week by HarperCollins (272 pages, $25.99).

After a bevy of television and radio appearances today, Bristol Palin will have her first book signing tomorrow at the Mall of America in Bloomington, Minnesota -- with her mom, who will be signing her latest book, "America By Heart."

Sarah Palin has called her daughter's book "shocking, refreshing, honest, inspiring, and perfect." In a new statement, Sarah Palin said she is "so proud" of Bristol Palin and "thrilled to be joining her to kick off her book tour," according to the Associated Press.

Bristol Palin will then promote "Not Afraid of Life" at a Books-A-Million in Birmingham, Alabama next Tuesday, followed by what is sure to be a gabfest on "The View" on Thursday, July 7, according to HarperCollins.

News: Sarah Palin's Iowa Debut

Wonder Wall, Power Wall: Sarah Palin's Iowa Debut
It's Sarah Palin the movie star, not the presidential candidate, who will head to Iowa on Tuesday, but despite the quick visit, politics and the state's presidential importance are sure to play a bigger part of the visit than she may be intending.

Palin will be in the crucial first caucus state for the first time this year not to meet with operatives ahead of a presidential run but to screen the documentary about her life, The Undefeated, at the opera house in the scenic town of Pella. Although the Iowa trip is sure to ramp up speculation yet again that she will enter the 2012 race, all signs point to a flying visit to the Hawkeye State completely focused on the film's premiere.

Director Stephen K. Bannon said he is “ecstatic” and “elated” about the film's premiere, but as in The Undefeated—Palin facilitated the interviews for the film but was not directly involved in its making—she will just be a guest at the screening.

One of the reasons Gov. Palin wanted to come is because of the venue, the historic opera house in the little town of Pella. She can come see the movie and see it in a historic setting,” Bannon told The Daily Beast. “It's not about Sarah Palin. It's about the values she represents and that are in the film: tenacity, fortitude, and grit.”

When news broke Saturday that the former Alaska governor was planning to attend the screening in Pella, speculation was rife that she was going to kick off the second leg of her “One Nation” bus tour. The first leg ended in the first primary state of New Hampshire, and Palin insiders with knowledge of the tour had always stressed that the second leg would include Iowa, while the third would likely hit South Carolina, the first presidential primary state in the South. But on Wednesday she'll be at the Mall of America in Bloomington, Minnesota—without her bus—for a mother-daughter book signing at Barnes & Noble. Eldest daughter Bristol's memoir, Not Afraid of Life, was released last week and this will be her first book event. Sarah Palin's second book, America By Heart, was released last year

“In Iowa, in a caucus state, big-name operatives and consultants are overrated,” he said. “You need your county GOP chair and people willing to make phone calls and organize your neighbors. That's what caucuses are about. Those are the most important people she can meet, the people that are really Sarah Palin fans, not a potential campaign manager or potential caucus director. The people she will be mingling with are quite important.”

Palin will attend the premiere with husband Todd and longtime friend Kristan Cole, who also stars in the movie. The advance staffers rehired for the bus tour, Jason Recher and Doug McMarlin, will not be in attendance. Bannon said he believes Palin will not be traveling with staff.

“I never talked to SarahPAC about the premiere. No one in the PAC was invited. I invited Gov. Palin,” Bannon said. “The barbecue is for the people of Pella.”

The director said local politicians will be in attendance, but despite the film's goal—trying to reframe Palin's image as a bipartisan problem solver ahead of a possible run—big-name operatives weren't invited.

“The chief theme of the film is populism, Tea Party populism. I did not invite bigwigs in the Republican Party throughout the state. The film is not about that, it's about a simpler populist message. There will be no red carpet. The red carpet will be the red bricks that pave the front of the opera house,” Bannon said.

News: Why Michele Bachmann is no Sarah Palin

The Washington Post, Post Politics: Why Michele Bachmann is no Sarah Palin
Sarah Palin is in Iowa today. Michele Bachmann announced her candidacy there on Monday. For reporters, that’s a coincidence(?) impossible to resist; scads of stories are being produced comparing the two women.

The comparisons between Palin and Bachmann are, at one level, apt. Both are women (duh) who align most closely with social conservatives. Both are outspoken defenders of their chosen causes whose rhetoric occasionally gets them into hot water.

But, that’s where the similarities end. And, over the past few months, Bachmann has proven that she is different in important ways from Palin — differences that make her the more viable of the two when it comes to the 2012 presidential race.

Let’s look at the critical elements that differentiate Bachmann from Palin:

* Outside the inner circle: After the 2008 election, Palin was the hottest commodity in Republican politics. She briefly sought to expand her decidedly narrow inner circle — hiring on the likes of GOP fundraiser Becki Donatelli — but those relationships quickly frayed, leaving Palin on a bit of a strategic island. (Palin’s closest political adviser, according to everyone familiar with her, is her husband Todd.) Contrast that with Bachmann who brought in longtime GOP operative Ed Rollins to manage her presidential campaign and hired a well-regarded pollster she hadn’t worked with before in Ed Goeas. To be sure, Bachmann still has some longtime loyalists — former chief of staff Andy Parrish and fundraiser Guy Short — in her inner circle. But her willingness to look outside of her comfort zone for people with know-how at the presidential level is something Palin has never exhibited.

* Not debate-able: Palin has never squared off with other top Republicans in a debate format. Bachmann has — and she shined in the New Hampshire debate earlier this month. The ability to stand on a stage and look like you belong matters in a presidential race. Palin seems largely content to communicate with her supporters — and wade into political and policy fights — via Facebook and Twitter, two decidedly one-way conversations. Ultimately in an presidential primary (or any race), you have to show and prove to voters why you and not the other guy (or gal) should be party’s nominee. Bachmann has shown a willingness to put herself on the line — and win. Palin, since the 2008 race, hasn’t.

* The importance of Iowa: Every candidate needs a state early in the nominating process where she (or he) can score a win. That’s Iowa for Bachmann. Not only is she already in a statistical dead heat with former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney in a new Des Moines Register poll but she was also born in the state — a fact she mentioned no fewer than 400 times in her announcement speech on Monday. (Ok, it was slightly less than 400 but not by much.) Palin doesn’t sit in the pole position in any early state and, in a Register poll conducted in late February, her approval rating in Iowa had slipped from its heights in November 2009. Her situation in New Hampshire may actually be worse. Palin’s visit to the state earlier this month was her first since late 2008 and polling reflects a lack on enthusiasm for her. In a May WMUR/CNN survey, Palin took just five percent in a hypothetical 2012 New Hampshire primary ballot — well behind the frontrunning Romney who received 33 percent.

* Reaching out, not doubling down: The confounding thing for many political strategists who have watched Palin over the past few years is her seeming refusal to reach beyond her core supporters. The result is that people who love Palin really love her but that is not a large enough group to win her a single state much less the GOP nomination. Bachmann has similarly fervent support among those who identify themselves as “very conservative” politically but, rhetorically at least, seems to understand the need to grow beyond that base. In her announcement speech, Bachmann bear-hugged the tea party but she also sought to redefine what it meant to support the movement; “It’s made up of disaffected Democrats, independents, people who’ve never been political a day in their life, libertarians, Republicans,” said Bachman. “We’re people who simply want America back on the right track again.”

* Tabula rasa: The simple fact is that every Republican knows Palin and a significant chunk of them don’t like her. In a March Washington Post/ABC News poll, just five percent of respondents said they had no opinion of Palin. Of those who did have an opinion, 58 percent felt favorably while 37 percent felt unfavorably. Compare those numbers to Bachmann’s showing in a new Associated Press poll. Roughly one in three Republican didn’t know enough about Bachmann to have an opinion about her but among those that did 54 percent saw her in a favorable light while just 13 percent viewed her unfavorably. Those numbers mean that Bachmann has considerable room to grow as she gets better known to GOP voters. Palin, on the other hand, is, today, where she would likely end up by the time people start voting next year. There are a significant number of people who like her and a smaller but growing group that don’t. Because she is almost universally known, it’s hard to imagine her image changing in any meaningful way over the next year no matter what she does.

Sarah Palin in Iowa for premiere of 'The Undefeated,' a new chapter in the politics of documentaries

Los Angeles Times: Sarah Palin in Iowa for premiere of 'The Undefeated,' a new chapter in the politics of documentaries
Sarah Palin heads to Iowa on Tuesday, but whether or not electoral politics are involved is in the eye of the beholder.

Palin has to face jury duty in July in Alaska, but, according to the Christian Science Monitor, the former Alaska governor and her husband, Todd Palin, are first going to Pella, Iowa, for the June 28 premiere of "The Undefeated."

Filmmaker Stephen K. Bannon's documentary portrait of Palin and her political record goes into limited distribution by ARC Entertainment in AMC Theatres the week of July 15 (locally, it will be in the City of Orange, in Orange County).

Interestingly -- likely coincidentally -- President Obama will also be in Iowa on Tuesday, promoting manufacturing jobs in Bettendorf. No word whether the two have a date to split corn dogs, but we doubt it.

Approached by Palin's camp to produce short films for SarahPAC, Bannon decided instead....

...to independently produce and finance a feature-length documentary, retaining editorial and creative control. He did get the audio rights to Palin's book "Going Rogue," and used excerpts from her narration.
As Palin has yet to commit to a presidential run, the timing and location of this premiere in the earliest caucus state are bound to kick the speculation engine into high gear (not that it needs much gas to go when Palin is the subject).

"The Undefeated" is the latest in a string of documentaries about political figures. Below is a sampling of films -- complimentary and otherwise -- about prominent pols of our era.

"By the People: The Election of Barack Obama": HBO premiered this film, produced by actor Edward Norton, on Nov. 3, 2009, the one-year anniversary of the eve of the last presidential election. But the history of the film stretches back nearly a year before the current president announced his candidacy on Feb. 10, 2007, when filmmakers Amy Rice and Alicia Sams -- showing a good deal of political foresight -- began following the junior senator from Illinois.

Over the next 19 months, they traveled across the country with the Obama campaign, chronicling the experiences of the candidate, his family, staff and volunteers.

"Hillary: The Movie": Produced by the conservative nonprofit organization Citizens United, this 2008 documentary, sharply critical of then-Sen. Hillary Clinton, was scheduled for cable pay-per-view offering just before the Democratic primaries opened in January 2008.
But a federal court in Washington agreed with the arguments of the Federal Election Commission that provisions of the McCain-Feingold Act -- a 2002 law regulating the financing of political campaigns -- prevented the film from being shown at that time.

This eventually led to a Supreme Court case -- Citizens United vs. Federal Election Commission -- which resulted in a 5-4 decision in favor of Citizens United.

In turn, this led to a testy moment at the 2010 State of the Union address, when Obama criticized the ruling with the justices sitting just below the podium. Justice Samuel Alito visibly registered disagreement.

As it turns out, Sen. Clinton lost her bid for the 2008 Democratic nomination anyway and is Obama's secretary of State.

"The War Room": Speaking of the Clintons, this 1993 film from directors Chris Hegedus and acclaimed documentarian D.A. Pennebaker tracked the successful 1992 presidential bid by Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton.

The focus of the film is not Clinton himself, but lead strategist James Carville and communications director George Stephanopolous.

In the years since the campaign, the colorful Carville married Republican strategist Mary Matalin, and has consulted with candidates and worked as a TV political analyst. He now teaches at Tulane University.

The perpetually boyish Stephanopolous transmogrified from political flack to political journalist, and is now ABC News' chief political correspondent and an anchor of "Good Morning America."

"Journeys With George": Perhaps the most personally revealing look at President George W. Bush is this often humorous 2003 film by documentarian Alexandra Pelosi (daughter of Rep. Nancy Pelosi) and Aaron Lubarsky, shot over more than a year leading up to the 2000 presidential election.

Working as a producer for NBC, Pelosi and her hand-held camcorder gave an inside view of the Bush campaign, with remarkable and often relaxed access to the candidate. She also examined the relationship between presidential contenders and the ever-present press corps.

"The Man From Plains": Jonathan Demme, an Academy Award-winner for directing "The Silence of the Lambs," wrote and directed this 2007 film, following former President Carter on a tour around the U.S. to promote his book, "Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid."

In a statement on the official website, Demme says he has "always held President Carter in high esteem."

Demme offers an intimate portrait of the former Georgia governor while also showing his public face discussing his book with multiple media outlets.

"Nixon in the Den": Available to watch on YouTube, this British documentary was first broadcast on BBC Four in June 2010. Historian David Reynolds examines both the public record and private life of President Nixon.

Reynolds argues in defense of Nixon's international accomplishments with China and the Soviet Union, while also examining the domestic crimes and coverups that ultimately torpedoed his presidency.

There's also a documentary called "Declassified: Nixon in China," an Emmy-winning collaboration between ABC News Productions and the National Security Archives. It draws on previously secret documents from the U.S. and China pertaining to Nixon's efforts to open a dialogue.

"Ronald Reagan: Rendezvous With Destiny": There are a lot of Reagan films -- including "Reagan," which debuted on HBO in February 2011, in conjunction with the late president's 100th birthday -- but this one is noteworthy in that the executive producers and hosts are Newt and Callista Gingrich, one of whom is seeking President Reagan's old job.

Among the interviewees are Reagan's son Michael and leaders Vaclav Havel of the Czech Republic and Lech Walesa of Poland.

It's also a production of Citizens United, the folks behind the Hillary Clinton film above. One assumes this film is kinder to its subject matter than its predecessor.

Bristol Palin On Good Morning America: Virginity Was 'Stolen'

Sorry, Bristol. You're the one who got drunk. Don't palm your blame off on someone else. You're the one who got back together with him even though you knew he was a "gnat."

Huffpost Books: Bristol Palin On Good Morning America: Virginity Was 'Stolen'
When her mother, Sarah Palin, was thrust into the spotlight as John McCain's vice presidential candidate, Bristol Palin had to come out with a secret, that she was about to be a teen mom. Now she's revealed her whole story in her book, "Not Afraid of Life," and there are plenty of surprises.

Bristol Palin doesn't accuse the father of her baby, Levi Johnston, of date rape, but does say she felt her virginity was stolen. She was drunk and to her, that's how it felt.

In the book, she refers to Levi Johnston as the "gnat" who is constantly "spreading false accusations about our family." When asked how her son might react to this description of his father when he grows up, Palin is not concerned. She says already he has less contact with Trip than he's entitled to.

Another revelation: between the time her engagement to Johnston was announced and the publication of the US Weekly interview revealing the engagement, Levi came home one day to tell her he might have gotten another girl pregnant. By agreement with the magazine, she was not allowed to say anything for two weeks.

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.

Opinion piece: Sarah Palin's bus stop

Guardian.co.uk: Sarah Palin's bus stop
It's been a difficult couple of weeks for Sarah Palin. The "is she, isn't she?" running for president storyline, which has secured her lavish attention from the mainstream media she ostensibly loathes, lost its lustre the night she failed to show up for the New Hampshire primary debate. And her thunder was stolen by actual candidates who actually declared that they are actually running. This combined with the disappointing stash of emails, which were less interesting for what the revealed (that governing a small state – at least, Palin-style – is about as riveting as organising a garden fete), than what they were short on (substance, policy ideas and yes, OK, scandal). It was enough to send the media running for shelter – or into the arms of more promising replacements like Michele Bachmann.

And so, on Wednesday, we get the news that Palin is quitting her bus tour half way through, as she did her governorship, and returning to Alaska to enjoy the summer. As with many Palin developments, this latest one defies logic and remains shrouded in confusion. Later the same day, Palin took to Twitter to have a good old laugh at the gullible media for believing the bus tour has been abandoned, insisting she's just back in Alaska to do some jury duty. And while the "is she, is she not quitting?" is not quite as engaging as the "is she, is she not running?" question, it's all we are left with for the moment.

The bottom line for now is that all the Americans waiting patiently to be "educated and energised" by Palin's promised history lessons on our nation's founding principles will just have to wait. As it happens, this might not be such a bad thing. Sarah Palin's enthusiasm for history does not match her knowledge any more than her enthusiasm to educate her fellow Americans matches her enthusiasm to educate herself. This reality was painfully played out in the now infamous Paul Revere saga, where Palin claimed Revere's famous ride was intended to warn the British. She later clarified that what she meant was that Revere "warned the British that they weren't going to be taking away our arms". Most experts have averred that while this is not completely inaccurate, it is a highly unusual interpretation.

In Palin's defence, history is a tricky business and certainly open to many interpretations. It tends to be written by the winners, women are often written out of it, but even with those caveats in place, there are some inalienable facts that can't be rendered untrue by modifying a Wikipedia entry. For example, the founding fathers and the founding documents did not intend, as Palin claimed, "that we would create law based on the God of the bible and the ten commandments". We also cannot say for certain, as Palin did, that the founding fathers endorsed the "under God" part of the pledge of allegiance, because they were long dead by the time it was written and even longer dead by the time it was amended to include the controversial phrase. We are not at war with Iran, North Korea is not our ally and Africa is not now, nor ever likely to be, a country.

All of the above claims and misstatements were made by the as yet undeclared possible presidential candidate, who still maintains favourable poll ratings and is still thought to be qualified for the top job by 60% of Republican voters.

Sarah Palin may have failed in her mission to educate Americans, even before her history bus tour was prematurely suspended. There is one big lesson to be learned, however, from all we have seen and heard since the former governor of Alaska invaded our unsuspecting consciousnesses in 2008. Entitled as she is to her private fantasy of becoming president, the time has come for a reality check. Being the leader of the so-called free world is a very serious and demanding job that carries with it the burden of responsibility for the well being of hundreds of millions of people. It is a position for which only a handful of people can hope to be qualified and for which a smaller number still are capable of successfully executing.

Despite her many talents, Palin is not one of these. Let's hope that while she's enjoying the Alaskan summer, she learns to accept that reality. And let's hope that we, who continue to indulge her, can learn to let her go.

Sarah Palin reveals a secret behind her canceled 'One Nation' bus tour

Los Angeles Times: Sarah Palin reveals a secret behind her canceled 'One Nation' bus tour

In case you haven't checked Sarah Palin's Facebook page yet this morning, she offers an update about her canceled 'One Nation' bus tour.

It wasn't canceled.

So, how to explain recent delighted doomsday media coverage: "Did the Palin bus tour run out of gas?" or "Sarah Palin's bus tour: Have the wheels come off?"

The Republican former governor couldn't ask for a more cooperative media (Scroll down for our previous item on how she plays the media so skillfully.)

Knowing that those five letters S-A-R-A-H or P-A-L-I-N drive huge online traffic, the disappearance of the media celebrity for even a short time offers an irresistible opportunity to speculate. Which, in turn, offers her the chance to generate more publicity by pointing out how wrong they are.

Which is what she did again with delight Wednesday evening on Facebook.

She told her more than 3,157,000 fans there how surprised she was to read of her canceled bus tour because no one had told her. "Oh, wait," she wrote, "that’s because it hasn’t been cancelled. (Good ol' media... you never cease to amaze!)"

She added, "The summer is long, and I’m looking forward to hitting the open road again."

So, why the hiatus?

Well, she explains, it turns out that even former governors get called for jury duty back in Alaska. So, she'll do her civic duty. It seems there's a pending jury trial involving a newspaper reporter who allegedly embezzled money from an elderly Republican woman who spoke out in support of Palin.

No, we made that up. Who knows what she might be called for.

So, now that it's officially summertime in the lower 48, when will the 'One Nation' bus tour resume? "The next leg of the tour continues when the time comes," Palin wrote. "In the meantime, no one should jump to conclusions."

Also, in the meantime Palin's campaign pal from last fall, Michele Bachmann, will be announcing her candidacy for the Republican nomination for president, fresh from her impressive debate debut in New Hampshire two weeks ago.

Gossip: Writing poetry the Sarah Palin way

I really hate it when writers sneer at their subjects under the veil of reporting something:
Guardian.co.uk: Writing poetry the Sarah Palin way
Not keen on wading through the 24,000 pages of Sarah Palin's recently released emails? Help is at hand in the form of Michael Solomon, who has turned them into poetry.


Well, not all of them, obviously, but after some assiduous "literary sleuthing" through the email trove, the executive editor of Byliner and former features director of The Daily Beast has "discovered ... language that was clearly intended to be poetry [and] the result is 50 previously unpublished poems by Alaska's comedic bard". He's just published I Hope Like Heck: The Selected Poems of Sarah Palin, and if this extract in The Daily Beast is anything to go by, they are gloriously absurd.


I love "Where There's Smoke":


One of Lyda's aides stopped me in the hall
To say the building was getting a kick
Out of my 'burnt toast' episode this morning
That caused the fire alarms to go off
For 20 minutes
And caused an evacuation.
She thought it was funny
I was cooking breakfast in the capitol
And burnt it.
I assured her
I was not in the building this morning,
I was not cooking breakfast here at any time,
And I did not burn any toast.
She looked at me warily,
I doubt she believed me.


And I'm moved by the plaintive last line of "I May Be Pretty Wimpy":


I may be pretty wimpy
About this family stuff,
But I feel like I'm at the breaking point
With the hurtful gossip about my family
That Sherry
And others
Get away with.
Bear with me.
I hate this part of the job
And many days
I feel like it's not worth it
When they have to put up with the hate
That spews from people like Sherry.
And there are others.


I am also chuckling at "I Hope Like Heck":


Also,
When asked about the Gravina Bridge—
I hope like heck
Lawmakers are smart enough
To chop that out
Of the state budget
So I don't have to.


As Solomon writes in his foreword, "Verse, like America, yearns to be free. Few 21st-century poets understand this better than Sarah Palin. Not since Walt Whitman first heard America singing has a writer captured the hopes and dreams of her people so effortlessly – and with so many gerunds." Indeed.


I wonder what an attempt to make poetry of my own emails would yield. Let's give it a try, with (complete with ee cummings-esque missing capitals) "Home from Down Under":


when
did you get here? are you
unjetlagged? i take it
not,
given the time
of your email


Does it work? Am I a bard in the manner of the "Belle of Wasilla"? Hmmm. I'd love to see your own email reformattings – and if they are poetic enough, I may even share more of my lyrical Sent box with you ...

Gossip: Sarah Palin Bus Tour Appears To Take Truncated Route

HuffingtonPost: Sarah Palin Bus Tour Appears To Take Truncated Route

Where is Sarah Palin?

The former Alaska governor embarked on a bus tour of the eastern United States last month, kicking off the trip Memorial Day weekend in the nation's capital. While Palin initially remained mum on where her travels would take her, her tentative itinerary reportedly included stops in Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, New Hampshire and Iowa.

Real Clear Politics reports:

Though Palin and her staff never announced a timeline for the remaining legs of her trip, aides had drafted preliminary itineraries that would have taken her through the Midwest and Southeast at some point this month. But those travel blueprints are now in limbo, RCP has learned, as Palin and her family have reverted to the friendly confines of summertime Alaska, where the skies are currently alight for over 19 hours a day and the Bristol Bay salmon fishing season is nearing its peak.
Earlier this month, Palin regarded her time on the road as "one of the best weeks" of her life in a web video released by her political action committee highlighting stops from the first week of her trip.

"Our family has been blessed with an opportunity to showcase all that is good and strong and free about our exceptional nation," said Palin in a statement released in conjunction with the clip. "Even though the media too often sadly chose sound-bites over substance, they did get lots of substance during our 'One Nation' tour from the nearly two dozen opportunities I got to speak candidly with them and talk about policy, politics, history, and everything in between. More importantly, I got to talk with countless everyday Americans who want to get our country back on the right track."

Bristol Palin's memoir 'Not Afraid of Life' dishes on McCain family, Levi Johnston and more

Zap2It: Bristol Palin's memoir 'Not Afraid of Life' dishes on McCain family, Levi Johnston and more

Bristol Palin, oldest child of potential 2012 presidential candidate Sarah Palin, has a memoir out titled "Not Afraid of Life: My Journey So Far," where the 20-year-old dishes her true feelings about Levi Johnston, the McCain family and more.

ABC News has a preview of the book, where Palin writes of John McCain's daughter Meghan McCain, "Every time we saw Meghan, she seemed to be constantly checking us out, comparing my family to hers and complaining. Oh the complaining."

She says Cindy McCain offered to be godmother to her son Tripp. "I had just met her and I wondered why she wanted any type of guardianship over my child ... I'd never seen people with so much Louis Vuitton luggage, so many cell phones, and so many constant helpers to do hair and makeup."

Of her "Dancing With the Stars" experience, Bristol writes, "I noticed some of the contestants rolled their eyes when they realized we'd survived to dance another day."

And of baby daddy Levi Johnston, Bristol calls him a "gnat" and says he "cheated on [her] about as frequently as he sharpened his hockey skates."

Boy, that's some good writing right there. You can read an excerpt of "Not Afraid of Life" at the ABC News website. The book hits shelves Tuesday (June 21).

Conservative Bloggers Cheer Palin Film

New York Times: Conservative Bloggers Cheer Palin Film

MINNEAPOLIS — A documentary portraying mainstream Republican leaders as villains and Sarah Palin as an inspirational heroine for the Tea Party received an enthusiastic reception from grass-roots conservatives at the film’s first public screening here on Friday night.

“The Undefeated,” an unapologetically partisan documentary meant to advocate for Ms. Palin’s potential candidacy for president, makes the case that she was the original Tea Party inspiration. It will make its premiere in Iowa in a couple of weeks but was shown to several hundred activists attending Right Online, a convention of conservative bloggers.

The two-hour film does not spare usual conservative targets like the news media and the Democratic party. But it is establishment Republican leaders — portrayed as toothless bystanders while Ms. Palin was attacked during her vice-presidential run in 2008 — who receive special scorn.

Ms. Palin represents “an existential threat” to them, Andrew Breitbart, the flame-throwing conservative blogger, says in the documentary, and he goes on to compare the party’s establishment to “eunuchs.”


The film would seem to have the potential to fire up support for candidates with Tea Party bonafides for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination. They include Representative Michelle Bachmann of Minnesota; Governor Rick Perry of Texas, who is considering a run; and, of course, Ms. Palin herself if she decides to jump in.

Those same contenders, representing an insurgent challenge to more mainstream candidates like Mitt Romney, the former governor of Massachusetts, seemed the favorites of the 1,400 or so activists attending Right Online, a workshop on using the Internet to promote political causes and the conservative answer to the liberal Netroots conference, which is also taking place here this weekend.

Ms. Bachmann spoke at Right Online on Saturday morning. Mr. Perry, who received an award Friday evening, appeared on video (and drew groans for encouraging the right-wing digerati to “follow me on Tweeter”).

Ms. Palin appears in “The Undefeated” only in voice-over, although the film uses video footage from her days in office. The filmmaker, Stephen K. Bannon, said he was first approached by Ms. Palin’s aides but ended up making the film independently and with his own financing. He said he has never met Ms. Palin. The film uses passages of her audio recording for her book “Going Rogue.”

Ms. Palin’s successes as governor, which led to high approval ratings in the state for a time — and a fateful phone call at the Alaska state fair from Senator John McCain — is likely to come as news to some viewers, who heard little of her governing successes during the 2008 campaign. But the film’s account is also selective. There is no mention of the “bridge to nowhere” or Troopergate.

Introducing the movie, which will open in some theaters July 15, Mr. Breitbart, who published the compromising Twitter pictures that led to the resignation of Representative Anthony Weiner of New York this week, predicted a similar impact for “The Undefeated.”

“As we’ve noticed in the past few weeks,” he said, “the truth is like a nuclear bomb to the mainstream media.”

Sarah Palin® Trademarks Her Name

The Atlantic: Sarah Palin® Trademarks Her Name
A few months ago, an attorney for Sarah and Bristol Palin put in an application with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office to trademark their names. (One of many things that suggests that profit, and not the presidency, is what's motivating Palin.) For Sarah Palin, the intent was a little less clear cut than it was for her daughter, as this article in Politics Daily made clear:

For Sarah Palin's application, there are two classes of commercial service for which her name would be a registered trademark. One is for "information about political elections" and "providing a website featuring information about political issues." The second is for "educational and entertainment services ... providing motivational speaking services in the field of politics, culture, business and values."

The "Bristol Palin" application is for "educational and entertainment services, namely, providing motivational speaking services in the field of life choices."

According to the same reporter, the deadline to challenge Palin's application passed on Friday and -- amazingly -- nobody seems to have challenged it. So it looks like the Patent and Trademark Office will award both patents in the near future. Better hold off on those bootleg Palin T-shirts you were thinking about printing up.

Sarah Palin: Anthony Weiner Has Been 'Rendered Impotent'

HuffingtonPost: Sarah Palin: Anthony Weiner Has Been 'Rendered Impotent'
During an appearance on Fox Business Network on Thursday night, Sarah Palin weighed in on news of embattled Congressman Anthony Weiner's (D-N.Y.) decision to resign after becoming embroiled in an online sexual scandal.

"From henceforth after his personal indiscretions were disclosed, he was going to be rendered impotent basically in Congress and he wasn’t going to be effective," said the former Alaska governor when asked if she thought Weiner could have fulfilled his political responsibilities despite the controversy. "Obviously it was the right thing to do. Day late dollar short though, I think he should have resigned when all of this came to light.”

Palin said that the constituents of Weiner's New York district "deserve better."

During the segment, Palin also addressed the recent release of thousands of emails she sent and received during her tenure as governor of Alaska. The documents were disclosed in response to requests made by media organizations and individuals under the state public records law during the 2008 presidential election.

“It certainly shows the priorities in what was once a respected cornerstone of our democracy, our mainstream media and we see that priorities are quite skewed," said Palin of the approach news organizations took to covering her emails. "I hope folks who read the emails learned a lot about energy independence, fish and game conservation, protecting second amendment rights, why I opposed Obama’s stimulus package."

A new woman is on the block: bye bye Sarah Palin

London Evening Standard: A new woman is on the block: bye bye Sarah Palin
It was a Republican beauty parade, and the winner, of course, was the one with the best hair: Mitt Romney. There were seven would-be presidential candidates at Monday's television debate in New Hampshire, plus two most notable absentees.

Jon Huntsman Jr, President Obama's recent ambassador to China, has not yet got going, while Sarah Palin, the can't-be- bothered former Governor of Alaska, was the elephant who happened not to be in the room.

The received opinion about Palin is that she retains, brilliantly, the ability to attract attention and controversy. But to what end? Her latest stunt was to attempt to spoil Romney's declaration of his intent to run. This she did by dashing around the eastern seaboard in motorcycle togs talking gibberish and grabbing headlines with her spectacular ignorance of American history.

Yes, Romney's press conference was a dull affair. But was Sarah Palin's train wreck an edifying spectacle, or was it - she couldn't remember the point of Paul Revere's ride - simply too stupid for words?

The problem Palin now faces is that there's more than one of her: she has a political avatar called Michele Bachmann, working the hustings and raising money and doing all the things that presidential candidates are supposed to do. Wherever Palin goes she makes clear her contempt not only for Democrats, for liberals, for Obama and all the sections of society she is supposed to have contempt for; but also for the Republican Party, for its establishment but also for its foot-soldiers, its local organisations, its volunteers.

Palin seems to inhabit a fantasy where none of the conventional wisdom applies to her - she doesn't have to wear out the shoe-leather, she doesn't have to have a national organisation, she doesn't have to tickle tummies in Iowa and New Hampshire. All she has to do, if she wants to, is stretch out her hand and the fruit will fall into it. It would be a nasty surprise for her if she stretched out her hand and the fruit fell to Michele Bachmann.

Palin's contempt for the Republican rank and file was noted publicly by Newt Gingrich, another of Monday's candidates, hobbled though he was by the fact that his political team had just resigned en masse rather than put up with his nightmare wife, Callista, any longer.

You may remember that Callista and Newt together ran up a six-figure bill on a revolving (that is, unpaid) account at Tiffany's. It turns out that Newt's campaign cannot get going in the morning until Callista's hair is done - a major operation, it seems, to achieve a peroxide helmet effect.

It will be a shame to lose Gingrich from the contest, as I suppose we soon will. He was the most interesting, least predictable, and one of the least crazy, of the speakers on Monday, when he made two notable humane interventions. One was on scrapping Medicare (the state health insurance programme for the over-65s), in which he said the Republicans, if they had got too far ahead of public opinion, should slow down.

The other was about immigration and the problem of the large illegal work-force. Gingrich deplored an all-or-nothing approach to the problem, which would take a punitive attitude to a large section of the population. He wanted some nuance, some humanity. Perhaps for this reason, but more likely because they can see the wheels coming off his campaign, the public has turned against Gingrich, and his support has dropped in the polls.

One of the striking things for those who associate Republicans with a hawkish stance on foreign policy, was to see Monday night's line-up go quite cold on Afghanistan, and indeed attack President Obama for his numerous military involvements in the Muslim world. Romney, in a remarkable slip of the tongue, called for the Americans to leave Afghanistan. He said: "It's time for us to bring our troops home as soon as we possibly can, consistent with the word that comes to our generals that we can hand the country over to the Taliban military in a way that they're able to defend themselves."

Immediately realising the enormity of his mistake he went on: "Excuse me, the Afghan military to defend themselves from the Taliban. That's an important distinction." He could say that again - but he probably won't until he's seen how well this Carter-like "Come Home America" line goes down with the general public. It may do very well indeed, leaving Obama as the hawk.

Ron Paul, the aged libertarian, made much of the unwisdom of Americans prosecuting foreign wars they could not afford, from Afghanistan to Libya. This is how the empires of the past became overstretched and fell. The strain of political thought represented by Paul tends to strict isolationism. The Paul family - Ron and his son Rand - like to follow a thought through: no money to spare for Muslim adventures, but also - most unusually - no aid for Israel either.

On economic policy the Republicans are a record that got stuck long ago in a groove that said: taxes are too high. Nobody can do anything, it would seem, unless it can be represented as a tax cut, and it matters not at all that the Bush era tax cuts are what led to the present deficit. No taxes can be raised. And if you say: "Very well, let's not raise taxes but let's cut ethanol subsidies" (which are unpopular with several politicians) you are told that cutting this sort of subsidy is tantamount to a tax hike, so you can't do that either.

What you can do, and what Michele Bachmann proposed on Monday, is abolish the Environmental Protection Agency and anything that can be depicted as restraining the freedom of business. And universal health care? That's number one on the list for the chop.

Sarah Palin Grabs Second and Third in Latest Polls

TheStateColumn.com: Sarah Palin Grabs Second and Third in Latest Polls

Sarah Palin, who is not an official candidate for the Republican presidential nomination, took second and third in a series of polls that were released this week. In a CNN/Opinion Research Corporation poll, Palin grabbed second place and, on Thursday, Palin took third place in a Public Policy Polling poll. Despite the fact that she didn’t attend the first major GOP debate on Monday night, Palin cemented her status as a contender this week.

In the latest CNN poll, 20 percent of Republican voters selected Palin from a list of GOP candidates when asked “which candidate you would be most likely to support for the Republican nomination for President in the year 2012?” Palin’s support in a CNN poll conducted at the end of May was only at 13 percent.

In a Public Policy Polling poll, Palin grabbed 15 percent of the Republican vote. In this poll, Palin took third after Herman Cain bumped her out of second with 17 percent. In both polls, Mitt Romney took first with more than 20 percent of the vote.


Palin has remained quiet about her plans for the 2012 presidential race. When asked during her “One Nation” bus tour if she could “beat Obama in 2012,” Palin told a reporter that “any Republican candidate is very very electable.” When asked specifically if she will run for the GOP presidential nomination, Palin remarked that “we’re still kind of contemplating that.”

Palin’s recent gains may be due to the impact of her “One Nation” bus tour. Palin’s bus tour took her up and down the East Coast from the Rolling Thunder ride to the Granite State. Palin’s tour stopped at Mt. Vernon, the Liberty Bell, Fort McHenry, Gettysburg, Bunker Hill and the Paul Revere House among other national landmarks and events. “It’s imperative that we connect with our founders, our patriots, our challenges and victories to clearly see our way forward,” said Palin about her whirlwind trip.

Paul, Bachmann, Tim Pawlenty, Jon Hunstman and Rick Santorum all grabbed less than 10 percent of the Republican vote in the CNN poll.

And what they don't tell you?
Interviews with 1,015 adult Americans conducted by telephone by Opinion Research Corporation on June 3-7, 2011.

Pretty much any poll that's out there has only ever talked to 1,015 people before they make their prognostications, talking like the entire Republican voting base has responded. So annoying.

Email, email, email

Lots of bloggers today writing about Sarah Palin and her email. One says she writes at an 8th grade level.

However, as the blogger points out, that's on a par with most CEOs, and I have experience with that. When I worked as a secretary for a defense company in Minnesota, it was the Secretaries who took what the CEOs and other bosses wanted to say, and wrote it down intelligibly. It takes a special skill to be a writer!

Anyway, I'm bored with this email stuff, and will not share any more about it.

Palin, Romney top recipients of Ohio contributions

What I don't understand is, if she isn't running for President, or any other public office, but is rather a media figure, why in the world are people contributing to her PAC? What is she doing with the money?

Palin, Romney top recipients of Ohio contributions
WASHINGTON - The first votes for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination are still months away, with candidates bowing in and out of the race by the week, but Ohioans already have given nearly a quarter of a million dollars to would-be candidates.

Buckeye State residents have contributed almost $58,000 to former vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin's SarahPAC and more than $50,000 to former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney's Free and Strong America PAC.

Romney is officially in the race, but Palin has not announced.

"I think Sarah Palin is a true, patriotic American," said Patricia Alderson, 62, a community organizer for charitable giving from the Cincinnati suburb of West Chester, who gave Palin's political action committee $2,000 in November 2009.

"She wants to do the right thing, she's a person who speaks from her heart and she reminds me of a woman fighting for her children. Every time she talks, I'm like, 'you go, girl.'"

Thomas Bigwood, 83, a Canal Winchester retiree who has given Romney's political-action committee $1,400 since April 2010, said, "I looked over the whole crop and I said, 'He's the best of the lot.'"

Ohio, long a bellwether, isn't necessarily a must-win for Republican primary candidates. But the enthusiasm a candidate musters in the Buckeye State - including financial contributions - can be indicative of how they'll do in the general elections.

"Ohio's always going to be a focus of presidential elections," said Dave Levinthal, a spokesman for the Center for Responsive Politics, which collects and analyzes data about political fundraising. "If one candidate is doing particularly well there, that could to some degree foreshadow their success later."

Ohio money is important, too. And before presidential candidates launch formal campaigns, they raise money through leadership PACs - political-action committees that politicians use for indirect sponsoring of a candidacy, including travel, political consulting fees or polling. Levinthal calls those PACs a barometer of early support.

Later, Ohio can be expected to be a significant donor to campaign coffers.

In 2008, Ohio was the 16th-highest state for presidential campaign donations, giving nearly $16 million to the campaigns.

Of that, more than $8.1million went to Republican candidates and more than $7.6 million went to Democrats from the primary through the general election, according to an analysis of financial contributions by the nonprofit center.

That year, Cincinnati led all Ohio metropolitan areas in donations, giving a total of $5.1 million to presidential candidates through the general election. Cleveland donated $4.1 million and Columbus $2.7 million, the center found.

This year, the early Ohio money is going largely to Palin and Romney.

Nationally , Palin's PAC has garnered $5.7 million and spent $4.4 million as of the end of last year. Romney's has garnered $9.1 million and spent $8.7 million, the center calculated.

Both Palin and Romney file quarterly, but, under Federal Election Commission rules, are not required to file until July in 2011, a nonelection year. President Barack Obama, who declared his candidacy for re-election earlier this year, also will file fundraising reports in July, Levinthal said.

Former Ohio Secretary of State J. Kenneth Blackwell said the early support reflects which candidates are investing the most time in Ohio. Palin has held fundraisers for Right to Life in the Cleveland area and Columbus, he said.

"She gave of her time and she gave of her treasure," he said. "And people are still talking about it."

He said Romney has ties to more "establishment money" and fared well in fundraising in 2008.

Cincinnati, which was a heavy early donor to Romney's primary campaign in 2008, is showing more support for former Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty so far this cycle. Of the 53 individual donations to Pawlenty's PAC, more than 40 came from ZIP codes within Cincinnati. Of the 70 individual donations to Romney's PAC, 20 were from Cincinnati. Some donors gave multiple donations.

Former Sen. Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania, who, like Pawlenty, has announced his candidacy, also has done well: Ohio donors gave his PAC $24,901 so far this cycle, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.

John Green, head of the Ray C. Bliss Institute of Applied Politics at the University of Akron, said one factor that might affect GOP candidate fundraising in Ohio this year is a later primary season. The first primaries next year are tentatively set for February, as opposed to January in 2008. Ohio is considering moving its presidential primary back to May. The later schedule, he said, is causing the race to shake out a little more slowly than usual.

"Usually by this time in a presidential cycle there are a lot of declared candidates and people engaging in what some scholars call 'the invisible primary,' where they raise a lot of money to impress each other and the Republican leadership," he said. "It's just started very slowly this time."

Palin Supporters Working on New Analysis of Email Dump

What I want to know is... is anyone or has anyone demanded an email dump from Obama's time in the House, and now, the Presidency? Don't we have the right to see what he has said in missives he had thought were private?

Also: Portions of some Palin messages were redacted and more than 2,000 pages were reportedly withheld for privacy reasons.
In other words, someone has already had to go through all these emails - at taxpayer expense - to redact some stuff and determine whether other stuff was private. How much time did that take, who did it, and how much were they paid per hour? Just curious!

CBSSnews.com: Palin Supporters Working on New Analysis of Email Dump
Sarah Palin supporters have united in a collective grizzly roar, angered by the media's decision to analyze more than 25,000 pages of emails from Palin's term as the governor of Alaska. For the past several days hundreds, if not thousands, of commenters expressed their disappointment online, conservative writers and radio hosts lashed out -- even Ashton Kutcher seemed dismayed.

And now, claiming Palin has been mistreated by the media once again, Conservatives4Palin, a non-profit website with more than 1 million visitors each month, is planning to analyze the emails themselves.

"Some of us were like, 'Oh no, it's just going to be a massive witch hunt. We were afraid of what the media would cook up or try to take out of context," said Conservatives4Palin contributor Nicole Coulter, who lives in Hershey, Pa. "We feel like the media was hoping to find something to pin on her negatively but it's kind of blown up in their faces, with all due respect."

Coulter, who was a Democrat until deciding to become Republican in 2004, has spent the past year writing for the pro-Palin website, which was co-founded in 2009 by Rebecca Mansour, a current SarahPAC staffer. Mansour has some frankness issues of her own when it comes to the Palins.

Coulter says it's impossible to read the emails and not come away with the impression that Palin is loyal and protective of her staff.

"We're categorizing all those emails that suggest the record of a competent and ethical person," she said. "Her record is being finally revealed. I hope everybody reads the emails."

Coulter added, "I 100 percent support her, she's my No. 1 candidate."

Although the email dump wasn't damaging to Palin, many of her advocates remain frustrated that the emails were posted in the first place. Angry comments have dominated news websites since Friday, and over the weekend the Twitter account of Crivella West, the company that put Palin's emails online for MSNBC, Mother Jones magazine and investigative news website ProPublica, was hacked.

Some of the tweets sent out over the weekend included: "Emails: Gov. Palin a Hard-Working Public Servant," "Email Witch-hunt Backfires" and "Weiner's America Or Palin's America - That Is The 2012 Choice."

Art Crivella, president and co-founder of Crivella West, told ABCNews.com the Twitter account was accessed from the company's Facebook page. Other than that incident, he says, they haven't encountered any backlash -- in fact, they have seen a huge amount of interest from around the world.

Crivella said the emails –- which were posted in just 12 hours -- have generated more than 10 million page views from as far away as Spain, Norway and "all over the English-speaking world."

Anticipating the public's fascination with all things Palin, The New York Times and the Los Angeles Times both created their own searchable Palin email databases. And the Washington Post created a special webpage to house stories about the Palin emails -- a quick search of the Post's website puts the latest article count at more than 30.

The Media Are 'Making Asses of Themselves'
The time and cost involved in such an extensive review of the former governor's emails became perplexing to thousands of commenters online, especially because the emails -- more than 13,000 messages -- were so voluminous they had to be housed in six boxes that each weighed 55 pounds.

National Review contributor and radio host Mark Levin commented on the "massive media frenzy" last Friday, saying the media are "making asses of themselves."

"We don't even know if she's running for office –- and look at this … We're told she can't win. We're told to dismiss her, and yet they are all over these emails," he said on "The Mark Levin Show."

"In the spirit of transparency" Levin called on President Obama, Vice President Biden, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi to release their emails. But, as he later noted, the Freedom of Information Act doesn't apply to Congress (or the central offices of the White House).

Linda Perez, administrative director of the governor's office in Alaska, told ABCNews.com she has so far received 17 FOIA requests for Palin's emails from media organizations.

ABC News did not submit a separate FOIA request, instead partnering with the Anchorage Daily News and the Daily Beast to digitize and analyze the documents.

MSNBC recruited about 25 volunteers in Juneau, Alaska, who helped read the emails, according to Crivella. He described it as "a constructive and meaningful examination" that benefited from the citizens of Alaska having the chance to weigh in.

Other media organizations also solicited citizen journalists, and in doing so, provoked some of their readers.

New York Times blog The Caucus put out a request to "Help Us Review the Sarah Palin E-mail Records" – a posting that generated more than 150 comments.

"Wow NYT, this seems beneath you," wrote a commenter who went by the name 'bk.' "I'm really terribly surprised by this appeal to your reader base to act as journalists, on a topic that I hardly feel is news worthy and frankly positions the Times as a willing partner to something that smacks of a mix of Yellow Journalism and character assassination."

The Post's blog, The Fix, also drew scrutiny when reporter Ryan Kellett posted a call-out, asking 100 people to work in small teams to "analyze, contextualize, and research those e-mails right alongside Post reporters" to unearth important information.

More than 2,500 comments streamed in, the majority of them negative.

One comment in particular was "liked" by more than 240 readers: "Rake your own muck," wrote kitchendragon50. "Disgusting that you call on readers to join in your festivities."

Another commenter suggested Palin was facing discrimination: "It is pure sexism the way Palin is being attacked," wrote tina5. "I remember how Hillary was attacked, too. The idea of calling on readers to dig through her emails is outrageous. Why don't you do your own job?"

Even actor Ashton Kutcher criticized the email dump. On Saturday he tweeted, "As much as I'm not a fan of Sarah Palin I find sifting through her emails repulsive and over reaching media."

His wife, actress Demi Moore, chimed in: "So agree!"

The Washington Post has since revised their earlier request, updating their blog with the following: "We have had a strong response to our crowdsourcing call-out on the Palin e-mails. We've reconsidered our approach and now would like to invite comments and annotations from any interested readers."

A spokesperson for the Post told ABCNews.com in an email message, "We reconsidered and revised our approach after we took a second look at how the idea was presented. Inviting everyone to send us their comments was more in line with the innovative crowd-sourcing effort we were aiming for."

Several readers have wondered why the Palin emails were released in the first place.

Media organizations requested the nearly two year's worth of emails in 2008 via a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request filed after Palin became Sen. John McCain's running mate. FOIA allows for public access to government records, including emails from public officials -- unless they can be lawfully withheld.

Portions of some Palin messages were redacted and more than 2,000 pages were reportedly withheld for privacy reasons.

ABCNews.com reported the emails covered a wide range of Palin's state business, surprise at her sudden ascension to the national stage, and worries about media backlash.

So far, however, there haven't been any bombshell revelations.

"The thing I've noticed most about the emails is that Sarah Palin is a really good person. She's very gracious and thoughtful to her staff," said Stacy Drake, an editor and contributor at Conservatives4Palin, in an email to ABCNews.com. "She's has stayed steady on policy issues like energy development, government ethics, she's always been against cronyism, the way she views union members differently than union members. She's never been a typical politician."

So atypical, in fact, that even though Palin isn't in office (or currently running for office) she somehow remains the topic of conversation.

Michele Bachmann is the candidate Sarah Palin was supposed to be

WashingtonPost: Michele Bachmann is the candidate Sarah Palin was supposed to be

Michele Bachmann’s interview with the Wall Street Journal is a precision-guided missile aimed at the heart of the Palin semi-campaign. Whatever you like about Palin, Bachmann will go double-or-nothing with you. Want family values? “She’s a mother of five, and she and her husband helped raise 23 teenage foster children in their home, as many as four at a time. They succeeded in getting all 23 through high school and later founded a charter school.” Want a Mama Grizzly rather than a career politician? “The kids were coloring posters in 11th grade algebra class. I decided to do my duty, go to the Republican convention. I had on jeans, a sweatshirt with a hole in it, white moccasins, and I showed up in this auditorium and everyone said, ‘Why are we nominating this guy [Gary] Laidig every four years?’” Want proof that a conservatism so raw you could use it to strip wood can win? “She ran for Congress in 2006, the worst year for Republicans in two decades. ... She won 50% to 42%.” Want someone who drives liberals crazy? “Nancy Pelosi and all her horses spent $9.6 million to defeat me in that race’ ... In 2010, the Democrats and their union allies raised more than $10 million to try to defeat her. ‘My adversaries have certainly been highly motivated,’ she says.”

And whatever it is that a tea partyer might not like about Palin, Bachmann’s got that covered, too. Want a candidate who can rattle off her reading list without embarrassing the ticket? “When I ask who she reads on the subject, she responds that she admires the late Milton Friedman as well as Thomas Sowell and Walter Williams. ‘I’m also an Art Laffer fiend — we’re very close,’ she adds. ‘And [Ludwig] von Mises. I love von Mises,’ getting excited and rattling off some of his classics like ‘Human Action’ and ‘Bureaucracy.’ ‘When I go on vacation and I lay on the beach, I bring von Mises.’” Want a true believer who seems interested in winning the election rather than just carrying the torch? “We’ve got a huge messaging problem [on Medicare]. It needs to be called the 55-and-Under Plan. I can’t tell you the number of 78-year-old women who think we’re going to pull the rug out from under them.”

Bachmann is a better politician than Palin, a better policy wonk than Palin, and because she’s a better politician and a better policy wonk than Palin, she’s actually able to be a bit more extreme than Palin, as Palin rarely gets specific enough to do such precise ideological positioning. Put simply, Bachmann is the candidate Palin was supposed to be.

Incidentally, I don’t put Palin and Bachmann into competition because they’re the two women in the Republican field. I put them in competition because they’re the two candidates who can plausibly consolidate the tea party wing of the GOP behind them. The only other obvious contender for that crown is Herman Cain, and I’m not ready to take him seriously yet. My hunch right now is that Palin either won’t run or will seriously underperform expectations, and either way, Bachmann will quickly emerge as the acknowledged leader of Tea Party America. Which isn’t to say she’ll win the nomination. I’m still looking to Romney or Pawlenty for that, with an eye on whether Paul Ryan runs, which I’ve long thought is more likely than people realize.

Emails tell shocking inside story of Sarah Palin's time as Alaska governor

I wonder if this is going to set a precedent, and now everyone's emails will be fair game. If so, let's start with Obama since the beginning of his political career. That should make for interesting reading!

ZNetGovernment: Emails tell shocking inside story of Sarah Palin's time as Alaska governor
What if all your friends could comb through all your email messages, ever, to see what you really thought about them? What if your family members could see every email message you ever sent? What if your employers (past, present, and future) could see a complete archive of your professional dealings via email?

Could you withstand the scrutiny?

I’m not sure I could. I am highly profane in my email traffic (I’m an engineer by training; profanity is a necessary tool). I’m cranky. I tend to tell my correspondents about how little sleep I’ve gotten and how long it’s been since I’ve had lunch.

Of course, my email archive also has a lot of personally identifying information as well. It has birth dates, dates of events, addresses and contact information of people who might not want their information made public, and even, probably, password reset codes for various services.

I would not want to share my email with the world. You probably wouldn’t want to, either.

Our politicians, though, often do. Or, more precisely, they often are required to, after putting up as much of a fuss as possible.

This is certainly the case with Sarah Palin. The State of Alaska finally acceded to disclosure requests and released a massive dump of 24,000 email messages to various media entities, covering her nearly three years as Alaska’s chief executive.

.Home / News & Blogs / ZDNet Government
Emails tell shocking inside story of Sarah Palin's time as Alaska governor
By David Gewirtz | June 13, 2011, 5:00am PDT

Summary
Could you withstand the scrutiny?

Topics
Sarah Palin, E-mail Message, E-mail, Online Communications, David Gewirtz
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David Gewirtz
BioContact.BiographyDavid GewirtzAs a child, David Gewirtz discovered he was a geek sometime during the middle of the Johnson administration. He is the author of How To Save Jobs: Reinventing Business, Reinvigorating Work, and Reawakening the American Dream and Where Have All The Emails Gone? How Something as Seemingly Benign as White House Email Can Have Freaky National Security Consequences.
He is the executive director of the U.S. Strategic Perspective Institute, founder of the ZATZ technical magazines, a CNN contributor, and the cyberterrorism advisor for the International Association for Counterterrorism and Security Professionals.
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Original image of Governor Palin courtesy CBS News.

What if all your friends could comb through all your email messages, ever, to see what you really thought about them? What if your family members could see every email message you ever sent? What if your employers (past, present, and future) could see a complete archive of your professional dealings via email?

Could you withstand the scrutiny?

I’m not sure I could. I am highly profane in my email traffic (I’m an engineer by training; profanity is a necessary tool). I’m cranky. I tend to tell my correspondents about how little sleep I’ve gotten and how long it’s been since I’ve had lunch.

Of course, my email archive also has a lot of personally identifying information as well. It has birth dates, dates of events, addresses and contact information of people who might not want their information made public, and even, probably, password reset codes for various services.

I would not want to share my email with the world. You probably wouldn’t want to, either.

Our politicians, though, often do. Or, more precisely, they often are required to, after putting up as much of a fuss as possible.

This is certainly the case with Sarah Palin. The State of Alaska finally acceded to disclosure requests and released a massive dump of 24,000 email messages to various media entities, covering her nearly three years as Alaska’s chief executive.

If you want to know what Sarah Palin thinks and how she works, you can find out. It comes as little surprise that there are very few surprises in her archives. Palin, while aggressive in her self-promotion, has shown very little artifice in her public presentation.

We’ve learned that Todd was, indeed, called the “First Dude,” we’ve learned that she really did call herself “momma,” we’ve learned Todd had a lot of involvement in her administration, we’ve learned she’s pretty protective of her kids, and we’ve learned she spent state money in dubious ways for the benefit of her family.

We also know that she used a variety of personal Yahoo accounts (we knew this a few years ago, when a hacker broke into one such account), and we know she’s pretty prolific in her email traffic.

In other words, we’ve learned nothing new.

I’ve often talked about the difference in tone and style between email and traditional forms of written communication. Email tends to be more casual, so when we read an email archive from someone’s administration, we tend to get a much better feel for that person’s personality than we might from reading a printed correspondence archive from a political leader in times past.

And so it has been with the Palin data dump. Whether you like her or not is up to you, but the one big surprise coming out of an examination of 24,000 email messages is that there really is no surprise, no shocking inside story.

What you see with Palin is generally what you get.

News: Elisabeth Hasselbeck, Sarah Palin On The Outs: Report

HUffpost Media: Elisabeth Hasselbeck, Sarah Palin On The Outs: Report

Elisabeth Hasselbeck's harsh criticism of Sarah Palin earlier in June may have struck some as surprising. After all, hadn't Hasselbeck campaigned for Palin during the 2008 campaign? According to PopEater, though, the two have been on the outs for months because Palin is ignoring Hasselbeck.

A friend of Hasselbeck's told the site that Hasselbeck tried to get in touch with Palin over and over again, only to be snubbed.

"Elisabeth feels used by Sarah," the friend said. "When she needed her, she was all over Elisabeth and now she treats her like a stranger. It's sad."

Besides her pointed comments last week—in which she said Palin was "manipulating" the media—Hasselbeck also criticized Palin's notorious "crosshairs" political map, calling it "despicable" after Gabrielle Giffords was shot in January. [Although it has been proven that that "crosshairs" political map has been used by both parties for decades, and the loon who shot Giffords was too out of touch to have even seen that - he had a private grievance against her.]

Opinion: Sarah Palin Can Do Many Things to Help Republicans -- Running for President Isn't One of Them

FOxNews-Opinion, Bernard Goldberg: Sarah Palin Can Do Many Things to Help Republicans -- Running for President Isn't One of Them
There’s one thing die-hard liberal Democrats and hard-core conservative Republicans have in common: They both want Sarah Palin to run for president. That’s where the similarities end.

The hard-right wants her to run because they think she’s brilliant – a word they use a lot – and would make a great president. Liberals want her to run because they think she’d get clobbered by President Obama. It doesn’t happen often, but here’s a case where the libs are right and the right is wrong.

A recent CBS News/New York Times poll (taken June 3-7) found that two-thirds of all voters -- and 54 percent of Republican voters -- don’t want Palin to run. Nearly 6 out of 10 of all voters have an unfavorable opinion of her.

The hard-right (like all true believers) lives in a bubble. They don’t care much what people on the outside say. Listen to conservative talk radio for 10 minutes and you’ll “learn” that the only reason Palin isn’t doing well in the polls is because the mainstream media have convinced the American people that she’s a dolt. And since conservatives can’t let the liberal media call the shots, that’s another reason they want her to run.

But they give too much credit to the “lame-streams.” It’s true that the media have bashed her maliciously and often unfairly since she first came on the national scene in 2008. But that’s not why her poll numbers are low.

Sarah Palin is why Sarah Palin’s numbers are low. The American people have seen her, they’ve heard her, and they’ve formed their opinions about her. Let’s just say they’re not impressed.

This means nothing to the hard-right. They love her and therefore, they figure, the voters will come around and love her too. This is how bubble people think. The hard-right always wants the most conservative candidate out there to win the GOP nomination in any primary battle. That’s why they're so passionate about Sarah Palin.

Then there’s the William F. Buckley wing of the party, of which I count myself a member. We want the most viable conservative to win the nomination. The key word being viable, as in the most conservative candidate who can actually win. And if that means voting for a Republican who isn’t the most conservative in the field, but one who has a better chance of beating the liberal Democrat, that’s just fine with us.

The ideologues on the right see this as selling out. Compromise, to them, is tantamount to treason. As articulate as some of them are, especially the ones who make a living on the airwaves, they don’t really understand politics. They come off as incredibly unsophisticated, not understanding a simple rule of politics and of life: You can’t always get everything you want.

For the rest of us, the second -- or even third -- most conservative Republican is better than any liberal Democrat. We don’t see that as selling out or as treason. We see it as smart politics. Or as Charlie Sheen so elegantly put it: Winning!

Sarah Palin can do many things to help the Republicans. But running for president is not one of them. And she surely knows this. If a majority of voters in her own party won’t support her, then there’s no way she can win. She won’t run.

If that makes some conservatives sad, this ought to cheer them up. It’s another number from that CBS News/New York Times poll. It shows that only 37 percent of the American people think President Obama is doing a good job when it comes to handling the economy.

And, for most voters, it’s still the economy, stupid

Sarah Palin Movie 'The Undefeated' Getting National Release In AMC Theaters

HuffPOstPolitics: Sarah Palin Movie 'The Undefeated' Getting National Release In AMC Theaters
The Sarah Palin documentary, “The Undefeated,” is getting a national release this summer at AMC movie theaters.

"The Undefeated is the ideal candidate for digital theatrical distribution," said Jonathan Dern, president of Cinedigm Entertainment Group, which is managing the release, in the press release. "Given Palin's ardent following throughout the country, digital cinema allows us to be extremely precise and efficient in our distribution strategy, bringing this much-anticipated film directly to interested theatre-goers."

After premiering in Iowa and then other key primary states this month, the film will be released in Dallas, Denver, Oklahoma City, Orlando, Atlanta, Orange County, Phoenix, Houston, Indianapolis, and Kansas City, among other cities on July 15.

Directed by Steve Bannon, a conservative filmmaker, it follows Palin’s time as Alaska governor, the vice presidential run, and her current political life.

Initial impressions from pre-release screenings have been on the low side.

“Its tone is an excruciating combination of bombast and whining, it’s so outlandishly partisan that it makes Richard Nixon look like Abraham Lincoln and its febrile rush of images -- not excluding earthquakes, car wrecks, volcanic eruption and attacking Rottweilers -- reminded me of the brainwash movie Alex is forced to sit through in 'A Clockwork Orange.' Except no one came along to refresh my pupils with eyedrops,” wrote Kyle Smith, the New York Post's film critic.

Palin supporters are likely to have a different take, however.

Story continues below
AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisement“If you like Sarah Palin, the movie will make you like her even more,” CBS News noted.

“Using never-before seen video, it shows Palin taking on the machine and winning, while racking up whopping 80 percent approval ratings in the state. And you will feel fresh outrage about how savagely she has been treated and mocked by Hollywood and the liberal elite.”

National Review (likening it to a “hero’s journey” in politics) and The Daily Caller (a “game-changer”) both praised the film.

According to MSNBC, however, the most striking part of the film is its attack on the GOP establishment.

“To hell to the establishment,” says conservative activist Andrew Breitbart near the end of the movie. Then come pictures of Mitch McConnell, John Boehner, and Eric Cantor. Breitbart’s beef with the GOP establishment: It didn’t defend Palin from the attacks she received after the ’08 campaign. “I see eunuchs,” he added in the "CODA" of the nearly two-hour movie.

News: Sarah Palin for president in 2012? Most people polled say no

Los Angeles Times Top of the Ticket comentary by Andrew Malcolm
An interesting choice of photo used to illustrate this article. It would be very interesting to take a look at every issue of the Los Angeles Times from, say, 2000 onward and see what kinds of photos they printed of each Presidential candidate. From respectful ones (for Democrats) to ones for Republicans which use a "gotcha" moment where they are yawning, or have their mouths wide open, etc. etc. ) (Having said that, Fox News and Rush Limbaugh seem to delight in gotcha moments for the Clintons and Obama, so it's not like they all don't indulge in this pettiness.)

Sarah Palin can draw crowds wherever she goes. She can get audiences with billionaires, bikers and conservatives. No question about it, the former governor is interesting. But when it comes to having the hockey mom as the next president of the United States, Americans say "no, thank you," according to a new poll.

Sixty-six percent of likely voters polled by CBS News would not like to see the former beauty queen run for president. Fifty-four percent of Republicans would also take a pass on a Palin bid and half of those who align themselves with the "tea party" give the idea of Palin for president a thumbs-down.

The conservative is often referred to as a "tea party darling" since she espouses many of the limited government beliefs that they do, however only 38% of tea party supporters polled say they want the maverick to try to get the GOP nomination.

With that said, there is a glimmer of hope for Palin and her supporters in the poll. Despite the fact that 36% of likely Republican voters view her as unfavorable -- the highest of any of the would-be and actual GOP candidates -- she is also tied with former Gov. Mitt Romney for the top for those who view her in a favorable light. Thirty-seven percent of likely conservative voters give she and Romney the thumbs-up.

Mysteriously, Texas congressman Ron Paul is nowhere to be seen on the CBS poll that was released Wednesday nor mentioned on the news site's blog post.

And of course what this article doesn't tell you?

They are making these blanket deductions based on talking to 1,024 adults. Nationwide.