The hot new hashtags on the Twitter are #telepalmer and #palinhand. This appears to be due to St. Sarah the Commonsense Conservative and Savior of RealAmerica being busted for having notes written on her palm during the totally not scripted part of her Q&A at the Teabaggers' Ball.
To be clear, these were not exactly the sort of concepts you'd think would be that hard for someone being paid $100,000 to give a policy speech to memorize; e.g., "We have got to jump start these energy projects that we have heard so much about."
She actually explicitly wrote "Lift American Spirits." Wow.
RisingHegemon calls it the Triggmata.
One thing's for sure: there will be no stopping the libtards and their snark.
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Moar ...
More pix and vids documenting this at the Stefan Sirucek post (same link as above).
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• Too bad #telepalmter didn't catch on quite as well. That's even funnier.
• TMZ headline: "Sarah Palin's Hand Gets Job Done."
• The Sunday spin shift at Wingnut Command Central is pathetically not up to the job, but at least we can now be sure that Stephen Spruiell rhymes with tool.
• TBogg also too has an Oh, my. His connection to Ol' Starbursts is FTW.
• And Blingees? Of course there will be Blingees!
6 comments:
Andrew Sullivan on Palmgate:
"I stand by my belief that none of this matters to the people who support her, and that she remains a very potent, content-free and destructive force in American politics."
Sure, none of this matters to the people who support her. But no matter how much foam they fleck on the lever in the voting booth, they only get to pull it once. And they will never be more than 20% of the electorate.
In the end, the only destructive effect Palin will have is on the Republican Party. You betcha.
Only 20%? 46% voted for her in the worst year for Republicans in living memory. Well, 1976 might have been worse, thanks to Watergate. (But really, was Watergate worse for Republicans than the Bush/Cheney disaster? That would be a good discussion.)
With the prospect of depressed Democratic turnout in 2012 and an energized wingnut/lunatic base, I have no trouble believing Palin could secure that last 4.1% of the vote she'd need to win the presidency.
Note: Debate like this tends to sharpen contrasts. I would like to remind that I'm only saying it's possible that Palin gets elected; I don't (yet) believe it's probable. I think she'd be easier for Obama to defeat than almost any other Republican prospect. But still.
On a purely strategic point: Even if Palin's poses no threat of being elected, if she's as unpopular as you suggest, it would be to our benefit to help establish her as the face of the Republican Party and conservative movement, much the way it was helpful in 2008 for the Republicans to be assocaited with Bush and Cheney.
No. 46% did not vote "for" her. A big chunk of those people voted against the Democrat, especially the Democrat with the funny name. And the dark skin. As they always do, as they always will.
Look back at the time series polls of her popularity from Aug-Nov 2008 -- the more she was in the public eye, and people actually thought about her being one heartbeat away from being president, the more she dropped.
Right now, she's someone who's fun to cheer for, if you're a wingnut who can't stand Obama, or you're pissed off because the economy sucks. But she won't even win the Republican nomination in 2012, and if she goes third-party, all the better.
No. 46% did not vote "for" her. A big chunk of those people voted against the Democrat, especially the Democrat with the funny name. And the dark skin. As they always do, as they always will.
Okay. Assuming that I agree the distinction reveals a meaningful difference, I would just say that maybe, in 2012, 50.1% will not vote "for" her, but will vote against the sceery Muslin. Either way, she wins. Votes for her or against her opponent amount to the same thing in the end.
Right now, she's someone who's fun to cheer for, if you're a wingnut who can't stand Obama, or you're pissed off because the economy sucks. But she won't even win the Republican nomination in 2012, and if she goes third-party, all the better.
I don't know. I think you underestimate the genuine attraction to her that millions of the teabaggers feel.
Still: the more we discuss this the more I appear to be arguing that Palin represents some kind of serious threat to Obama and that she has a good chance of getting elected president. I still think her chances are <50%. I'm almost tempted to think that her nomination by the Republican Party would be the best thing we could hope for, as it might all but guarantee Obama's reelection, and would probably energize the Democratic base, increasing turnout and helping candidates down the ballot.
But I prefer not to play with fire and I don't think I would want to take the chance, even with good odds, when the downside so severe.
When all is said and done, I cannot see the majority of the people being less inclined to vote against her, no matter how much they might be disinclined to reelect Obama, assuming things don't get appreciably better over the next two and a half years.
I think you don't give the American people -- 80% of them, anyway -- enough credit to be able to recognize, as you do, what a disaster she would be.
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