Where Things Stand

For some reason, I just got an email alert from Adam at Net Right Nation. I know there are people out there who like to get emails from groups that they hate just to have something to mock and point at. My friend Tyler is fond of reading the letters to the editor of the Newark Advocate, which makes me want to bash my brains out with a claw hammer. At any rate, I don’t know how I ended up on the NRN mailing list, but here we are, so let’s see what they have to say!

Here is a must watch video of Missouri Senator Kit Bond discussing the November election results. Not only is his answer stunning, it is very telling of where the conservative movement is today.

Senator Bond was responding to a question about Obama's support for Global Warming when he said, "that's why I campaigned for Sarah Palin and her running mate."

I couldn’t have said it better myself.

Commenter Greg Bringing the Weak Sauce

You may remember commenter Greg and his cut-and-paste shilling for Sarah Palin from this post. His comments were barely relevant to the post, and he didn't formulate any argument at all, except that she remains popular to some minority of the American people, which no one had disagreed with.

Nevertheless, I tried to engage the weak sauce, partly because we don't get a lot of Sarah Palin fans on the site, but also because (and perhaps this is evidence of a lack of ideological diversity in my everyday life) I don't regularly talk to anyone who sees her as a capable leader. You'd think he'd take the time to reply, as that would further his aims of mindless promotion. Hell, maybe he'd even convert a reader or two with his brilliant rhetoric, lining the pockets of SarahPac in the process.

Alas, it turns out he's just like her, fleeting and vacuous.

Pay No Attention to That Woman Behind the Curtain ...

Reihan Salam convinces himself that Sarah Palin has, sadly, lamentably, unaccountably, turned out to be a grasping, power-mad political hack in a post for the Daily Beast. This seems like the same story from the run up to the Iraq War played again, in the farce section of the program. Once again, everyone eventually comes around to the position that it was a mistake, but no one wants to admit that it was a lementable, hilariously predictable mistake from the very beginning. Read Salam's post for the sad and funny sight of a man trying to square a circle and failing:

What I’m wondering is: Has Sarah Palin undergone some kind of secret lobotomy?

Senate Seats Still Up For Grabs

More bad news for convicted felon and TPBP favorite Ted Stevens. According to Talking Points Memo, it’s looking more and more likely that Stevens will sadly lose his reelection bid to Mark Begich, saving the Senate the trouble of having to kick him out and the nation the nightmare of having Sarah Palin appoint herself to the Senate. Could she do that? It would be mavericky, so who knows.

In other one-vote-can’t-make-a-difference news, the Minnesota Senate race between Al Franken and Norm Coleman is still going into extra innings, despite Coleman’s attempts to get Franken to concede because, well, I’m not sure what Coleman was thinking with that.

Hello In There

Someone let Governor Palin know- quietly, if at all possible- the election is over. She hasn't seemed to notice. If this NYT article is any indication, she isn't so much jockeying for position in 2012 as starting a very poorly timed bid for president in 2008.

Almost beyond belief, she doesn't seem to have noticed that the tone she continues to adopt was instrumental in the Republican failure in the recently ended campaign. Worse, without RNC money she doesn't seem to be able to afford the barely effective staff saving her from the worst of herself over the last couple of months.

There is a certain touch to losing gracefully, denoting character and maturity. McCain has hardly been seen since the concession speech that so pointedly, and sadly, marked the high point of his campaign. Palin doesn't seem to have spent so much as 15 minutes worrying about her image, preparation for office, or any ways she could improve herself as a candidate or her image with the American people. One has to wonder if the Republican party has had the sense to see this as an evolutionary dead end, or if they are planning to spend another campaign cycle on this foolishness.

Either way, someone with the temperament of a saint should be found to act as her chief of staff. At the very least, to liven up those pedestrian sound bites.

Bush League

As the McCain campaign's operators are finally free to turn on one another fully, the complete scope of Sarah Palin's...I struggle for the right word...unfitness to serve in high national office is emerging more fully.

This video from Fox, linked through TPM, runs the gamut. It suggests the Palin couldn't name the three countries involved in NAFTA. Believed Africa to be a nation, rather than a continent. And of course, couldn't explain the Bush doctrine to Charlie Gibson. Incredibly, Fox goes on to suggest that the McCain campaign can't really be faulted for this, because this level of ignorance in a state governor is inconceivable.

This longer clip from the same interview also discusses how, during the last two weeks, she would fly into what aides describe as "tantrums" upon seeing her morning press clippings, with items being thrown about the room and reducing at least one staffer to tears. It got so bad that McCain wouldn't allow her to do interviews on her own, actually curtailing her air time when he couldn't be there.

John McCain, RNC,right wing pundrity, et al: you nearly put this woman in the White House, behind a 72 year old man. Really, think about that for a moment.

Palin apparently returned to Alaska today, and was greeted by "dozens" of supporters chanting "2012." Watch that underwhelming video here. According to the NYT, she has been deluged with interview requests, but has so far been hiding from the media, not even appearing at work today.

Adding insult to injury, an RNC lawyer has been dispatched to Alaska to retrieve some of the 150k worth of clothing that apparently somehow found its way back to the frozen North with the governor. Read about this embarrassment here.

Palin's personal troubles aside, the Republican party seems to be on the edge of a vast wilderness if this, this, this, or this, story are at all correct.

The leadership struggles and infighting over who lost what for whom are all very nice, but the problem seems to run much deeper. Palin was far more popular on the campaign trail than McCain was. We all saw her campaign. Where, exactly, would Colin Powell fit in her worldview? Or Edmund Burke, ideological founder of conservatism, for that matter. I'm hardly the first to suggest it, but Palin isn't capable of even pretending to appeal to intellectual conservatives. Unless they happen to be moose hunters.

She is, truly, a fitting addition to the Bush league.

** Update **
On CNN, Palin claims these stories are products of rumor being spread by upset former staffers.

Having slept on this post, I'm not half inclined to wonder if she might actually be right on this one. Fox may have had a point- could she really have believed Africa to be a nation? Could anyone be that out of it?

McCain Campaign Cracks Up, Sober Reflections upon Mortality Ensue

The collapse seems to have begun in earnest, with members of the various McCain/Palin factions jockeying for post-election position in the GOP civil wars that will be occupying us through the new year and beyond. Andrew Sullivan points to this analysis by George Stephanopoulos that has an interesting quote.

But some McCain camp insiders tell ABC News they simply couldn't put Palin out in front of the media any more than they did because she wasn't ready.

The Palin camp is fighting back, arguing that if the McCain campaign had just let Sarah Palin be Sarah Palin, she would have done just fine on her own.

While I’m by no means a huge fan of John McCain, I’d have to say I have an underlying sympathy for his version of events. There’s been zero evidence so far that Palin could have become ready no matter how much handling she’d had. The absurd position from Palin’s partisans that they were mistaken in not letting her be Palinesque enough is idiot. Can Palin have been any more Palin than she has in the last eight weeks, short of shooting a moose and communicating in grunts and expressive gestures? How deep can the Palin run? Has there been any point in the last two months where you’ve looked at the news and thought, “John McCain needs to let that young go getter Sarah Palin out here to speak her mind. Enough with her being a delicate, blushing flower, cowed by the grim old men of Washington!”? I have to doubt it.

Incidentally, when did George Stephanopoulos get so old? The picture of him on the page above makes him look like William Sanderson in Blade Runner. I guess it’s been a while since I remember him from the Clinton administration, but jeez.

The Empress' New Clothes

The news hit last night that the RNC has spent $150 thousand dollars (or $149,446.96, too be specific) on Sarah Palin’s hair, makeup and wardrobe during the campaign so far. That’s a pretty amazing amount of money. Palin’s been on the campaign trail for fifty-two days now. That’s $2,873.98 a day.

For the most part, I find these little gotcha games annoying and a distraction. It doesn’t matter to me one whit that McCain wears $500 shoes or that John Edwards has a $400 haircut. If I had the kind of money that those guys have, I probably wouldn’t spend it on stuff like that, but I certainly wouldn’t want the media poking around my stereo. This, however, is a whole new level of absurdity. Is it even possible to wear $3000 worth of brand new clothes a day? Does she burn it all at the end of the day? Is she incapable of wearing the same dress twice?

The economy is in bad shape right now, and the government is resorting to some pretty extreme measures to try and prevent the crisis from turning into a catastrophe. McCain is rightly viewed as being all over the place in regards to the economy. It doesn’t help McCain’s position that the economy is normally a Democratic stronghold. But after the houses flap from earlier this year, this is exactly the kind of absurd, out-of-touch publicity that the Republicans needed to avoid. And with them withdrawing in Michigan, Colorado and North Carolina, wasn’t there anything more useful they could have spent this money one – I dunno, GOTV operations or television ads? Is giving Rich Lowry a boner really worth a hundred and fifty thousand dollars?

But on the bright side, with all of McCain’s houses, they’ll probably have enough closets to hang all those clothes.

Missing the Point

So smilin' Sarah Palin finally confronted her nemesis, in the most fleeting possible way, on SNL last night. Most of the coverage addressing her appearance has dwelt on the idea that Palin is somehow demonstrating what a good sport she can be, but I come away from the video above thinking rather that she personally contributed to a joke she still isn't quite all the way IN on.

Witty repartee with Alec Baldwin? Governor, you're running for vice president- besting an actor can only be a hollow victory. A situation made worse, then, by the fact that you patently failed to best him: He accuses you of being a "horrible person," you respond that you've always preferred his brother's acting?

And the dancing to the moose-rap thing? Yes, you looked like the cool mom up there, but you looked like that already. What the US wants to see from you is some indication of gravitas behind the winsome public facade.

I guess I would have liked to see Palin confront Fey, or at least field a couple of humorous questions from the fake news conference. On the whole, SNL proved to be yet another Palin tour de faiblesse.

A Report

I know there’s been a lot of loose talk around here about how I stole a car and murdered a drifter – the most deadly game. Well, good news: I’ve conducted an intense investigation into my possible misdeeds, and it turns out, I’ve cleared myself of all wrongdoing. So, hopefully we can all leave all this petty divisiveness behind us and move forward with the important business of running this blog.

Out of the Woodwork

Well, the racists certainly don’t seem content to go gentle into that good night. I guess that shouldn’t surprise us. I imagine that Matt Yglesias is entirely correct when he assumes that an Obama victory will drive the racist elements of the Republican coalition into the open air for on last, grand Götterdämmerung. Well, that’s just fine with me. As these things go, sunlight is the best cure. This is why the civil rights movement was so very successful. The contrast was simply too stark: you can’t look at a parade full of quiet, peaceful, respectable people having firehoses turned on them by thugs like Bull Connor without having it shape your attitudes. In that sense, nonsense like the kind of theatrics we’re seeing at Palin’s rallies are more likely to continue, not less.

This strategy might wring a few more votes out of the bitter, decaying pulp of the Republican coalition, a brief distraction from the economy’s woes – perhaps even the outside chance of a victory.

So here’s my question for those inclined to answer it: what will replace the Republican Party? Will they just have to spend some time out of power for people to forget the upcoming ugliness, as well as the corruption, malfeasance and stupidity of the Bush Era? Or will they be utterly destroyed, the brand rendered so hollow and meaningless that it has to be replaced with something entirely new? Just because we’ve had over a hundred years of dominance by the Republican and Democratic Parties doesn’t mean it always has to be like that. It’d be pretty exciting to watch, too.

Debates Were Held

An interesting article from CNN lays out the differences in Biden and Palin’s speaking styles from the debate. What struck me the most was this:

The analysis by the Austin, Texas-based Global Language Monitor said Palin, governor of Alaska and the GOP vice presidential nominee, used the passive voice in 8 percent of her sentences, far more than the 5 percent used by the Democratic senator from Delaware.

The analysis noted that the "passive voice can be used to deflect responsibility; Biden used active voice when referring to [Vice President Dick] Cheney and [President] Bush; Palin countered with passive deflections."

Passive voice, as they mention, is used to obscure the subject of a sentence: “Mistakes were made.” I’m not saying who made the mistakes, but there they are and we should move on without belaboring the point. I’m no great statistician, but it seems odd to me that 8% is really “far more” than the 5% that Biden used. What’s more interesting, the article implies, is the way that Palin used the passive voice to avoid mentioning George W. Bush and Dick Cheney. I know that Republicans are going out of their way to avoid being associated with the one time leader of their cult of personality, but isn’t it interesting that even Palin would resort to eliding their existence grammatically rather than have to deal with the consequences of eight years of Republican leadership? Actions and consequences, it seems, were referred to.

Exceeding Expectations and Other Low Hanging Fruit

The debate last night proceeded pretty much exactly as I thought. Palin’s performance was uninspired and uninspiring unless you are already in the bag for the governor of Alaska. I think the conventional reaction so far has been pretty dead on. Palin clearly has little to no understanding of matters foreign or domestic. The format last night was a great favor to her. When Palin got into trouble with Couric and Gibson was on the follow up questions, where she was expected to rephrase and explain ideas and thoughts that she had learned by rote. The format last night gave her the opportunity to simply recite the talking points that have been carefully drilled into her, even if those rote responses didn’t answer the question that had been asked her. She didn’t fall down or drool on herself and I have no doubt that this will be the last time we see her in any setting that is not a stump speech in front of a carefully vetted crowd. There’s no margin for the McCain campaign in putting her out there – she can only make herself look like a fool.

I thought Joe Biden’s performance, especially in the early going, was uninspired. As the debate wore on, I felt he picked up steam and really got into the moment. He certainly “won” the debate on the merits, but this was never about “winning.” Everyone knows Biden is worlds smarter and more informed than Palin. All Palin had to do was do better than the exceedingly low expectations set for her. Mission accomplished.

Barring some sort of unforeseen disaster, I think Palin has stopped being a factor in the race. Not that she should, of course. But once the McCain campaign pulls the curtain in front of her, what is the media going to do? I can’t see them going into open revolt on one of the major party candidates a month before the election. I also think the rumors of Bristol Palin’s wedding happening before the election are absurd. There’s simply no way the McCain camp will want to put the spotlight back on her now that they’ve cleared this hurdle.

Arguments and Expectations

Tonight’s the big debate. I’m looking forward to checking it out, although it’ll be on at about four o’clock in the morning here, so I’ll likely have to wait until tomorrow to see tonight’s debate. There are a lot of issues in play – Gwen Ifill, the specter of the big, old white guy picking on the attractive young(er) woman. I think, however, anyone expecting a kind of nationally televised schadenfruede-fueled meltdown is going to be disappointed. I agree with James Fallows who thinks that the expectations for Palin are so low that any performance she turns in that doesn’t include drooling and pratfalls is going to be treated as a victory over expectations. I don’t think this means Palin is going to deliver anything close to a successful performance – or even a coherent one – but I do think she’s going to do better than every expects.

Palin will get up there, read through her talking points, and that will be the end of it. Republicans will claim that Ifill was being overly harsh on the governor and that, regardless, Palin’s poor performance so far was all liberal media bias to begin with.

Russian Mirage

I really wanted to stay away, but this is too good.

So, CNN sent a film crew to the only part of Alaska from which Russian territory is visible with the naked eye. It's 500 miles west of Anchorage, in the middle of the Bering Sea, a windswept rock with 150 people, no television, and it is also a place Sarah Palin has NEVER BEEN. In fact, no governor of Alaska has ever visited this remote island.

What did she think she was seeing? It seems clear that she has been warily eying some part of US territory all these years, unless this whole line of argument is just complete BS. I realize the place obviously isn't exactly a haven of votes, but it does have 40% unemployment. You'd think someone would have seen fit to go look into that.

See the excellent video here.

bibliography

It's probably too late to worry about piling on with Sarah Palin, but this story might just be the final word for me. At least, until the debate.

It's a WaPo piece about how Palin has gained her understanding of the world. She points out that as she only got her first passport two years ago, she has had to gain most of her experience through reading. However, on what must have been the least interesting episode of Charlie Rose ever, she reveals that her favorite authors are:

1. CS Lewis (the poor man's Tolkien)
2. Dr. George Sheehan (Runner's World)
3. Garfield. From a desk calendar.

Yes, that's right, Palin's worldview has been shaped by a desk calendar. Never mind that Garfield isn't, properly speaking, an author, or that calendars sort of stretch my understanding of a medium capable of sustaining literary narrative. I can't claim much acquaintance with Sheehan, but once upon a time I read both Garfield and Lewis. Neither was exactly "The Prince." Maybe this explains why having seen Russia counts as international experience- everything is relative.

*update 1 October 2008, 8:20am*

Katie Couric also discovers that journalism major Palin can't name a single news source that she reads, well, ever. Continue to be amazed here.

with friends like these

So as the VP debate draws nearer and Sarah Palin's Saturday Night Live video becomes the most popular thing that has ever happened on my Facebook page by a considerable margin, Palin seems poised on the edge of becoming perceived as a national farce.

The NYT seems to be in general agreement that the stakes for McP seem to be getting higher, and when you have conservatives of no less stature than David Frum saying things like:

“I think she has pretty thoroughly — and probably irretrievably — proven that she is not up to the job of being president of the United States,” David Frum, a former speechwriter for President Bush who is now a conservative columnist, said in an interview. “If she doesn’t perform well, then people see it."

So...yeah. It's hard to imagine anyone offering a more biting critique than that. Guess that vetting thing kinda does matter after all.

*Update*

It also emerges that apparently there are unaired clips from the Katie Couric interview, including a moment when we discover that Palin can't name - not can't explain, but can't even name- any supreme court decisions other than Roe V. Wade. See this blurb here. So there may even be a chance that more pseudo-comedy is to follow at periodic intervals.

By the Numbers

I could embellish these numbers with several hundred words, but they really don't require that. Obama emerges with a statistically significant lead, Palin's favorability ratings plunge to -10, mostly stopping there because that's as low as the poll allows them to go...

Read em and weep (or cheer, as appropriate) at Kos.

The obvious ground for speculation rests with what McPalin do next. I've been rather surprised by the number of calls for Palin to withdraw- I can't see her doing that. McCain might as well suspend his campaign for real if she does, unless he can resurrect Ronald Reagan and convince him to take the job. On the other hand, allowing her more press time seems to be nearly as damaging. I'm actually glad I don't have to resolve that one.

Having decisively lost the debate, and with Palin turning into an anchor of the first order, it will be interesting to see what they come up with for next week.

The First Debate

I have a hard time caring much about debates as such. For the most part, the candidates have both solidified their talking points to such an extent that there’s not much else to be said by the time the debates roll around. Debates exist mostly for those who haven’t paid attention, and I’ve always found that curious. How can they know whether or not the candidates are being truthful, are presenting themselves in an accurate way? If you haven’t paid attention up until now, what’s the point in tuning in at this point?

All that being said, having watched it from last night, I have to say I think Obama came off the better of the two. This is not surprising, as I think Obama would make a good president and John McCain is a crazy old man. It doesn’t make much difference to me how the two perform – I know where the two stand on the issues I care about. I have my problems with Obama in a lot of respects (he’s more hawkish than I would prefer), but there really isn’t a comparison with McCain – he’s wrong on pretty much all the issues, he is a dangerous personality, loves war and has little interest in or aptitude for domestic policy questions, which would leave his administration open to the hands of the extreme right wing of his party.

McCain’s performance reinforced a great deal of that last night. He was exacerbated where Obama was civil and calm, he was arrogant, dismissive and rude while Obama should him a great deal of deference, probably more than was warranted. If the primary question was, “Will McCain act like a crazy person?” and “Is Obama experienced enough?” both of them walked away with a strong performances. But while McCain didn’t hit anyone or randomly suspend the debate, Obama had a good night. Solid, competent and boring. After eight years of George W. Bush, I think Solid, competent and boring sounds just about right.

The real fireworks, of course, come next week. The vice presidential debates should be one of the more noteworthy presidential election events of the last twenty-five years. I doubt that Palin will do as spectacularly bad as many progressives (and conservatives) are expecting. If you’re predisposed towards seeing her in a positive light, she’ll do surprisingly well. If you’re inclined the other way, she’s going to choke. But right now the expectations for her are so exceedingly low that I wouldn’t be surprised if she did better than I would expect. As long as she doesn’t come out and burst into tears she’ll be on the winning side of expectations.

Trainwreck

This is just sad. Palin’s responses to Charlie Gibson’s questions were often trite recitations of canned talking points, but largely they were coherent. With Palin’s interview with CBS’s Katie Couric, we seem to have crossed that particular Rubicon. It’s just depressing me to watch her now. I feel sorry for her. She seems like a nice enough woman. McCain, by playing for the evangelical base has really done her a disservice. I don’t think she ever would have been ready for the big time – as has been noted, she doesn’t seem to have any interest in things outside her very narrow, Alaska centered worldview. I guess that’ll be okay when the Rapture drives all the believers from the Lower 48 up into Alaska. But right now, it’s just depressing.