Playing the Sex Card Since 1996

We normally disdain those who "play the race card" to get where they want. President Obama had to walk a very fine line but managed to avoid eliciting a sympathy vote because the color of his skin was out of the mainstream of previous candidates for the presidency.

But what about "playing the sex card?"

I propose that Sarah Palin has made liberal use of this card, very liberal use, especially when compared to other female political figures in recent history. To test this statement, I'll ask you to link up a public figure with the following statements:

She's a MILF!
I'd do her.
I think she is a tremendously sexy woman.

Let's see... are all these three referring to Hillary Clinton? How about Dianne Feinstein? Angela Merkel? Maybe Olympia Snowe. No? Margaret Thatcher? Geraldine Ferraro? Sorry, all wrong.

Women in politics have had to overcome barriers that their male counterparts never encountered. There are two ways to succeed in this male-dominated arena: Be more intelligent, more engaged and more thoughtful, or, be more coy and more sexy and focus on men's smaller heads. (Sorry, guys... not all of you.)

Sarah (Mrs. Todd) Palin has been playing the sex card for a long time. She was not all that attractive but with a little plastic surgery here and a few hair extensions there and plenty of Redbulls in between, she can prance onstage in an immodestly short skirt and sparkly high heels and rev up several "small heads" in whatever audience she addresses. Do not underestimate her charm when it comes to well-meaning but basically cowed males wishing for a female dominant to shackle, spank and teach them!

These days, if a guy in politics says anything against Mrs. Palin, that guy is labeled "misogynistic," a guy who hates women. Yet, she consistently presses forth the fact she is a woman. She consistently presses forth the fact that she has children. She consistently presses forth the notion that her children are being sexually abused. Which of those other woman politicians named above ever mentioned their children as any excuse for griping or bashing? None that I can see.

She consistently proffers Todd to go do the dirty work. Look, if a writer took up residence next door to me, I would go talk to him myself, I wouldn't send my alter-ego husband to do it. What does that say for her ability to handle anything?

Sarah Palin hides behind her husband and her children regularly. I know of NO other female politician who crumbles at the slightest affront. I also know of NO other female politician who has a cult following. (See conservatives4palin.com if you doubt me.)

There is something very, very wrong with this woman and the press she seems to get, even though she has NEVER opened herself to real questions from a real reporter since the Katie Couric mishap back before the 2008 election.

I am a woman. Thanks to the civil rights fight to give me a vote I can express my druthers in local, state and national elections. Thanks to a general acceptance of women in the field of technology, I manage to earn a living. Thanks to Sarah Palin, I and my sisters are in danger of being set back a century. I will raise my voice wherever I can and fight with whatever I have to make sure that backsliding never happens.

What other politician wanna-be ever.. EVER... had this: 'This Is Not Sarah Palin Inflatable Love Doll' Released By Topco Sales???

The Constitution and Mrs. Palin - Part 3

The First Amendment - Establishment Clause

Amendment I of the Constitution begins, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof..." This says to me that no single religious dogma trumps any other in our country.  Yet Mrs. Palin has been going around the country espousing and promoting the notion that the United States is a Christian country, founded on the Judeo-Christian belief set.

In an appearance on Fox channel with Bill O'Reilly (VIDEO), while discussing a court's recent finding that it is unconstitutional for the Federal government to declare a "National Day of Prayer," Mrs. Palin affirms, "I have said all along that America is based on Judeo-Christian beliefs and, uh you know, nobody has to believe me though, uh, you can just go to our Founding Fathers’ early documents and see how they crafted a Declaration of Independence and a Constitution that um allows that Judeo-Christian belief to be the foundation of our laws and our Constitution, of course, uh, essentially acknowledging that our unalienable rights don’t come from man. They come from God."

The term "Judeo-Christian" first came into use during the Second World War. It was not part of the settlers' or the founders' vocabulary when the Declaration of Independence was written. Basically, Judeo-Christian necessarily refers to the tiny intersection of beliefs held in common by adherents of Christianity and those of Judaism.  In an article titled The Judeo-Christian Oxymoron, author David E. Ross notes wisely, "Actually, an appeal to Judeo-Christian values usually reflects an attempt to generate Jewish support for a political agenda that many Jews who are well educated in their religion would reject."

Further in Mrs. Palin's session with O'Reilly, she goes on to say, "I think we should just kinda keep this clean, keep it simple. Go back to what our founders and our founding documents meant -- they're quite clear -- that um we would uh create law based on the God of the bible and the ten commandments. It's pretty simple."

If our founders truly desired that laws reflect the ten commandments, why did they not legislate against carving statues of anything in the heavens, on the earth or under the seas? Why is there no punishment when people take God's name in vain? Where is the law that says you can't go to movies or mow lawns on Sunday? And oh dear, of course, why did the founders fail to demand that husbands or wives who cheat on each other be stoned to death?

To which God, and to whose bible does Mrs. Palin refer?  The vengeful Old Testament God who forbids us to eat shellfish and despises homosexual behavior, or the New Testament God that claims Jesus as his Son, the same Christ who is every Mark Souder's refuge when he gets caught committing adultery?  But wouldn't either of these be a God firmly identified with a particular religion?

President John Adams, our 4th President, signed the Treaty of Tripoli that was passed unanimously in 1797: "The United States government is not in any sense founded on the Christian Religion."

John F. Kennedy, a Catholic (like Mrs. Palin was before switching to Pentecostalism) and our 35th President said, "I believe in an America where the separation of church and state is absolute."

Thomas Paine, founding father, wrote, "My country is the world, and my religion is to do good."

If our country truly was founded on Judeo-Christian beliefs, I find it odd that Article 6, Section 3 of our Constitution says, "No religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States."

James Madison, another founding father, said, "Religion and Government will both exist in greater purity, the less they are mixed together."

And Thomas Jefferson, rascally founding father that he was, said, "Question with boldness even the existence of a God."  No wonder Texas wants to remove him from their history textbooks.

--o--o--o--o--

I wonder what Mrs. Palin and friends would say if our Congress ordained a "National Week of the Hajj," or a "National Day of Tantric Sex," or a "National Month of Meditation and Silence."

--o--o--o--o--

The Constitution and Mrs. Palin - Part 2

The First Amendment - Freedom of Speech

Mrs. Palin has a curious take on the free speech part of the First Amendment of the Constitution.  Here she is, recorded by WMAL, an AM station in Washington, DC: "If [the media] convince enough voters that that is negative campaigning, for me to call Barack Obama out on his associations, then I don't know what the future of our country would be in terms of First Amendment rights and our ability to ask questions without fear of attacks by the mainstream media."

When she railed against her running-mate's opponent during the 2008 race, her attacks were vitriolic and incessant.  She maintained that Barack Obama could not be "one of us" because he got his start in the living room of a domestic terrorist, and continued to "pal around with" Bill Ayers, a member of the Weather Underground when candidate Obama was not yet a teenager. As a result of her rhetoric, Palin rally attendees called for Barack Obama to be killed. In a twisted interpretation of the First Amendment, Mrs. Palin insisted that she not only had a right to say what she did, riling up redneck crowds at every campaign stop, but that the media had no right to call her on it.

 Let's take a look at that part of the First Amendment. "Congress shall make no law ... abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press..." Nowhere in this amendment does it say that a person who speaks freely shall be protected from the press reporting on what was said.  Yet Mrs. Palin appears to regard commentary by the press as an infringement on her right to free speech.

At the same time, she seems not to recognize the hypocrisy of her personal view because through her attorney, Mrs. Palin threatened to sue Alaskan blogger Shannyn Moore for reporting the existence of rumors about a pending investigation of her potentially corrupt dealings.

So, let's get this straight.  If Mrs. Palin says wild and incendiary things on the campaign trail, her right to free speech should protect her from the media talking about what she said.  But if someone else mentions an extant rumor that names Mrs. Palin, that person deserves to be sued for daring to repeat what others have been saying.

I'd say that Mrs. Palin's understanding of this part of the First Amendment is wanting.

The Constitution and Mrs. Palin - Part 1

On the Role of Vice President

On one hand we have Mrs. Palin mocking President Obama, saying (VIDEO), "we need a commander-in-chief, not a constitutional law professor..." But when energizing Teaparty crowds she points to the Constitution as the yellow brick road to perfect freedom and prosperity: "...that the Constitution provides the path to a more perfect union — it’s the Constitution."

The pols that Mrs. Palin endorses often refer to the Constitution in their cry for smaller government. From Rand Paul's site we read, "The Federal Government must return to its constitutionally enumerated powers and restore our inalienable rights." The Teaparty platform recently adopted by Maine's GOP repeatedly mentions the Constitution. Hypocritically, the document demands that "legislation must adhere to the restrictions ... in the Constititution to protect the individual from intrusive government," while at the same time insisting on anti-choice and anti-gay marriage "family values."

Mrs. Palin and her supporters talk a lot about the Constitution, but has Mrs. Palin ever really read it, studied it, understood it? Back before she was chosen as John McCain's running mate she was quizzed about being a potential VP pick.

She continued, "I'm used to being very productive and working real hard in an administration. We want to make sure that that VP slot would be a fruitful type of position, especially for Alaskans and for the things that we're trying to accomplish up here for the rest of the U.S., before I can even start addressing that question."

Here is a 44-year-old Governor of one of our 50 states, who seems clueless about the executive branch of the Federal government and wants someone else to look it up for her! She clearly sounds concerned that the role may not be important enough, anyway. Well, Mrs. Palin, according to the Constitution, the Vice President is a backup in the event the President is removed, dies, resigns, or is unable to discharge the duties of the office. The Vice President also has an honorary role as President of the Senate, and is allowed a vote only in the case of a tie. That's pretty much it.

After accepting McCain's invitation to join him on the 2008 campaign trail, Mrs. Palin began to imagine the role of Vice President as something larger and more grand than what the Constitution calls for. In an interview with KUSA, a Denver NBC affiliate, she told a youthful caller that, "A vice president … also, they're in charge of the United States Senate, so if they want to they can really get in there with the senators and make a lot of good policy changes that will make life better for Brandon and his family and his classroom. And it's a great job and I look forward to having that job."

During the single 2008 Vice Presidential debate with Joe Biden, Mrs. Palin continued her quest to expand the role for which she was campaigning. In response to a question from Gwen Ifill about knowing what a VP does every day, Mrs. Palin responded, "Of course, we know what a vice president does. And that's not only to preside over the Senate and will take that position very seriously also. I'm thankful the Constitution would allow a bit more authority given to the vice president if that vice president so chose to exert it in working with the Senate and making sure that we are supportive of the president's policies and making sure too that our president understands what our strengths are." It boggles the mind, truly it does.

After the debate, Carl Cameron of Fox News questioned Mrs. Palin on her comments regarding what the Vice President does, to which she responded, "The vice president, of course, is not a member, or a part of the legislative branch, except to oversee the Senate. That alone provides a tremendous amount of flexibility and authority if that vice president so chose to use it."

There is no tremendous flexibility and authority given to the Vice President by the Constitution. Was Mrs. Palin channeling former VP Dick Cheney who clearly broke the mold of Vice Presidents throughout history? I can only assume that Mrs. Palin envisioned herself as an inside agitator, proddin' them Senators to vote for rill Amerikuns and expandin' drillin' and preventin' women from choosin', also, too. But did she get her interpretation from the Constitution? I think not.

Oh Sarah!

Found this gem via a link that Neal Paisley posted in a comment on one of HuffPo's daily side show stories about ... yup, Mrs. Palin. Don't neglect to read the lyrics that Neal (one of the band members) added right on the YouTube page for this music video, also, too!

Kittehs in da House!

We welcomed two little precious kittens to our family just yesterday—here's a clip of the cuties:



It took a while to find what we were after—siblings, one girl and one boy, around 8 to 10 weeks old. Finally found a wonderful woman who does animal rescue work that had just what we were after. Makes me smile all over.

Sage Blossoms May 2010

May has to be my most favorite month, other than possibly October when the first chill turns the leaves into a stunning panorama of oranges, reds and yellows.  In the foreground here is a sage plant from last year, blossoming for all its worth in one of the porch rail herb boxes.  In the background are this year's raised beds.  The broccoli looks ready to take off.  We've been picking red leaf and butter lettuce leaves for several days now and the radishes are almost ready to harvest.  Come on spring onions!

Green has to be my most favorite color, except if I'm wearing it... :)  Lavender is a close second, but that early spring yellow is so smile-inducing!

Blogging and Me

I recently told a friend about my blog and after he had a look, he was like, "It would be nice if you wrote about something other than Sarah Palin all the time."

There are definitely other things in my life that are more important than Mrs. (failed VP candidate and former half-term Alaskan Governor) Palin. First comes my family, but details about them are strictly personal and I will never expose that part of my life to an Internet audience. Then there's my job, but that's not something I can blog about either, and still keep said job. Let's just say that what happens at work stays at work. Then there are my diversions: one is my long-standing participation in online role-playing games. I could blog about that, but it is a world apart from politics and would seem incongruous here at H&HT to talk about how one of my World of Warcraft characters happened across the Time-Lost Proto Drake and got the high-speed mount item that mob dropped. Equally incongruous would be a warning I'd like to issue about the ripoff that is Evony, or my background in coding for and administering MUDs. That would require a new blog title and a great deal of effort and I hardly have time for this blog as it is!

Another is gardening, and I've been known to insert a few pictures of cucumbers, zucchini, tomatoes, and other produce from the lovely raised beds in my back yard.

But my other main diversion (or call it passion) is politics. Well, not exactly politics, but hypocritical people who are politicians or who are in public view, people who seem to capture attention and imagination and have an apparent impact on our national dialogue. That's what H&HT is devoted to, and that's why Mrs. Palin figures so heavily into the content here. She's not the only one who needs calling out. But she's the one that touches home with me because she is constantly "out there," thanks to someone who wants to keep her in the public eye. She's the one who is the biggest hypocrite of all, based on what I know about her. She's all over TV, the Internet, magazines, radio, and every sort of media out there. Her indiscretions are never-ending. Her lies are incessant. Her chutzpah is without parallel. Her phoniness is without par. And yet she keeps playing the victim while flaunting her ignorance and disparaging anyone who doesn't buy her schtick.

An aspect of Mrs. Palin's story that particularly grates on me is the lie that she "chose life" in order to give birth to Trig Palin. Her history as a Mayor of a town of about 6,000 pales in comparison. Nobody even mentions the consolation prize she won after her failed run for Lieutenant Governor, a position on the Oil and Gas Commission. And after she quit as Governor well before finishing even one term, she hangs her hat almost entirely on the fact that she is a mother (so?) and specially, a mother of a child with Down syndrome. In the absence of Trig, she'd still be in Alaska and out of the public eye. In the absence of Trig, she'd never have become McCain's chosen one. In the absence of Trig, even if McCain had picked her anyway, her star would have faded by December 2008.

Instead, you can find stories and videos and transcripts of her trademark "word salad" speech nearly every day in countless media outlets. But the Trig story is a lie, and so far she's gotten away with it. I know it, she knows it, and a good number of other people know it too. Mrs. Palin is giving women everywhere a bad name. That's what bugs me and as a woman, that is why I will point out her hypocrisies on H&HT as long as she keeps providing the ammunition. She is, as far as I'm concerned, the biggest hypocrite on the public scene today and therefore, a worthy target of most of my blog posts.

Inspiring Violence Is More Like It

Time has announced the most influential people of 2010 in their top 100 list.  Glenn Beck, age 46, comes in at #40 of 200 with a little over 15,000 votes.  Apparently Sarah Palin, former half-term governor of Alaska and currently half-witted celebrity was asked to write a blurb on the Beckster in which she stated (bolding mine),

Best of all, Glenn delights in driving the self-proclaimed powers-that-be crazy. Though he sometimes dismisses himself as an aw-shucks guy or just a 'rodeo clown,' he's really an inspiring patriot who was once at the bottom but now makes a much needed difference from the very, very top.

Serpent Beck and Ice Queen Palin - two peas in a bloody pod

Well, this inspiring patriot not only has a TV show but also a radio show and if you ask me, what he's been inspiring over our public airwaves is anything but patriotism -- unless of course you think being a patriot means inciting fellow Americans to carry out violence against those with whom you politically disagree.

Here's Glenn not so long ago (video), screaming about killing a member of Congress with a shovel:

I've been sittin' here for the last few minutes trying' to come up with a list of people that I wanna kill with a shovel!  People that I want to whack over the head with a shovel!

Let's light 'em up and shoot 'em in the head!

People we'd like to beat to death with a shovel: Charlie Rangel!!

And then here's Glenn again (video), vividly imagining himself killing Michael Moore by strangulation:

I'm thinking about killing Michael Moore, and I'm wondering if I could kill him myself, or if I would need to hire somebody to do it. No, I think I could. I think he could be looking me in the eye, you know, and I could just be choking the life out -- is this wrong?

If this is patriotism, or inspirational in any decent, honorable, 'common sense' sense of that word, then call me unpatriotic.

Sarah of the supposed fine family values, do you really condone this sort of over-the-top rhetoric?  This sort of shock jock insanity?  Is this what you want your children to listen to?  Has life been so cruel to you that you find it necessary to stroke the ego of this madman to climb the popularity ladder?  He thinks you belong back in the kitchen, you know.  (See video at YouTube.)

Sarahypalinocrisy

As in the title to this post, my new coined word is meant to express the supreme hypocrisy as embodied by Sarah Palin.

Take for example her recent quote that bad behaviour should be punished.  Then flip back through your cards to find that never once was Ms Sarah punished:  hacking Randy Ruedrich's computer; lying about being pregnant for the 5th time with "Trig;" Willow getting off scot-free even though she was the mastermind of breaking into and trashing a nearby vacant house for sale; spending $50,000 on a red velvet makeover of the Wasilla mayor's office, and when challenged, saying "I'll do what I want until the courts tell me I can't."

Unfortunately the hypocrisy that is Sarah Palin doesn't begin or stop here... it's rather an ongoing show with her. 

I'm about to add the word, "sarahypalinocrisy" to the urban dictionary.  If you have a concise description and some examples, please let me know. 

Canada, Oh Canada, Did You Deserve the Intimacy? [UPDATED]

[Updated to add pop-up boxes with actual word salad in them.]

The Globe and Mail (a Toronto publication) obtained a recording of Sarah Palin's recent speech in Canada, given before 900 people who paid $200 per seat/plate for a little known charity.  A transcription of the speech is available on the Globe and Mail's site.

Here is an interesting fact about the speech that Palin gave:

She used the word "I" (or a variant like "I'm," "me", or "we" in the personal or royal sense) at least 265 times in her overly long 45 minute dinner ramble.  When you do the math, that comes out to 5.87 references to herself every minute, or once every 10.22 seconds.  Can there be any doubt that for Sarah, she is the very center of the universe?

Since the speech was awfully long I'll just paraphrase each paragraph below.  But if you are willing to wallow in her trademark word salad complete with moose dropping dressing one paragraph at a time, just click the buttons to see what she actually said.

1. I don't know the difference between Buenos Aires (Argentina) and buenos dias (kinda like bonjour) but I love diversity and I'm used to being heckled, so bring it on!

2. I really don't want to be "political" but I can't help myself talking about energy.  After all, the more we drill, baby, drill, the more money we can donate to worthy causes because we'll all be richer!  Yay!

3. I'm just getting off the Tea Party trough. And hey, shifting from the political, where you never knew which interviewer would play "gotcha," is a good thing because "gotcha" is a terrible game.

4. Poor Piper, doesn't want me cheating by asking God to speak through me in the VP debate.  Not that I would ever think God actually would do such a thing!  But no harm in asking… "Cause you know, why not?"

5. Go Hamilton, go NHL, rah rah. And I'll use my awesome powers of persuasion on the NHL president if I gets the chance. Rah.

6. Out of left field, there's this Marcanti family. What a story.  [What story?]

7. There was this coach who said we shouldn't just sit around in parked cars waiting for God to do something for us. 

8. And eh, I even sound Canadian so you should really like me.

9. We lived right across the border from you, and hockey too.  Good times.

10. Even had a bootlegger in our family tree from Canada.  We Palins are never boring!

11. I'll forgive you for winning the Olympic gold in hockey.

12. By the way, everyone wants to know if I'm going to run for President in 2012, don't you?

13. And don't forget about not just sitting in your parked cars.

14. Todd's cool.  He is gone 6 months of the year but still goes to all kinds of tea parties, even the women kind, and rides snowmachines with a broken arm. And Alaska is really big, too!

15. I did a lot of cool things when I was younger. My kid Track broke his shoulder at 18 and joined the Army instead of becoming a major league hockey player. Freedom isn't free, ya know?

16. I don't know how much Todd has to do with it but I found out I was pregnant with a retard. Go figure that God would pick me instead of my sister. But I found the silver lining eventually.

17. Haha, nobody knew I was 7 months pregnant, and I had the kid after only 3 weeks. Can you believe there's some people who question this?

18. Good ol' Trig, he's a blast.

19. Not only did we get Trig, my perfect daughter got knocked up! Raining babies … wow.

20. Shit happens.  Wonder what Tripp is going to call me?

21. And then, go figure, in the very same year, John McCain calls me up. Talk about being in a tough situation before! This is when I realized I could use some cheering up, and after all, Plato said be nice to everyone.

22. Ok some days are better than others and if you just hang on, you'll live through all the crap.

23. I mean, it's painful to go through all the crap but look at me now!

24. My idol, Reagan, loved you Canada people. Good on you for sending troops who died in our war.

25. Think about all the people who said they'd leave America.  Where do they want to go?  Canada!

26. There's more Canadians in Los Angeles than you can shake a stick at! But we lost, me and McCain, so they didn't have to leave.

27. And by the way, after driving on the Al-Can highway which only took 26 days to ram through, I was a mayor and a city council member and a city manager and a commissioner and a governor, too, don'tcha know!

28. Don't forget that we have hungry, hungry markets for energy. I was transparent, and I defeated untold oil and gas corruptions and  got the gasline moving after 50 years of talk.

29. That's why I gave the contract to TransCanada, for their ingenuity and work ethic.

30. Your tar sands make me drool.

31. Don't forget, if we drill we will prosper and be more secure too. Maybe then we can volunteer to help others.

32. By the way, I'm still working on energy.

33. Tea Parties are just a hoot! But the life-size pictures of naked people caught me off guard.

34. Todd's not even a Republican, and more power to him, even if I can't get him to join the party.

35. Drill, baby, drill.  That will keep our people from hurting and stop terrorists from attacking.

36. Did I mention that I'm going to focus on energy?

37. Let's work together just like we did when I was governor. Remember I was governor?

38. Even if I don't have a title you can still call me governor.

39. Remember Plato and the Al-Can!

40. Oh, and did I tell you that Todd's an Eskimo? God bless this night and carry the torch because our ancestors gave it to us and that's not a coincidence.

 ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~0~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Danielle Crittendon, who writes for the Globe and Mail, published a way-too-kind synopsis of Palin's speech here and my friends at Palingates published Danielle's live tweets from the event. (Danielle's husband is Canadian-born David Frum, recently of the National Review, and no longer employed thanks in part to his, imo honest, assessment of where the Republicans went wrong in the health care debate.)

Archivist has a totally LOL take on this speech too, spotlighting just a fraction of the truly stupid that spilled out of Sarah's mouth.  No wonder Sarah didn't want anyone taping it.

"Happy Birthday," Trig

April 18 2008 - the day that God Almighty blessed Sarah Palin with a gift beyond compare, a child with an extra chromosome. Or so the story goes. In loving memory of this grand lie, let us have another look at Sister Sarah just a week or so before she had her miracle birth.

On the left, we have (ta da!) Sarah Palin, taken from a video of her on or about April 8 -- when Elan Frank visited Alaska to film her.  On the right, we have a woman who is actually 7 months pregnant.

Interesting that we have heard nothing about or from Elan Frank since then!

Anyway, the child most of the world knows as Trig, even though you didn't emerge from Sarah Palin's womb and even though your real birth date is not likely to be April 18, 2008, please know that a lot of people care about you and hope you are doing well -- getting the special help you need, even if your so-called mother is not the one providing it.

Happy Birthday, Trig.

Oh Really, Sarah?

One of the tweets from the twit who acts as if she is still a governor says:

Oh really? And just how do you think such tragedies can be averted in the future? This was the worst coal mining disaster in decades. According to the Washington Post,

The industry's influence in Washington was highlighted several years ago during a fight over safety legislation co-sponsored by then-senator Barack Obama. The 2007 bill would have allowed MSHA to issue subpoenas and to more easily shut down troublesome mines.

But according to Mrs. Todd Palin, government intervention in private industry is what is destroying our country. Go figure that Barack Obama, now our President and prime target for the failed VP candidate from last election, thought mine safety was important enough to sponsor a bill about while he was doing nothing as a Senator, if you believe the Grifter Queen.

So how, pray tell, how would you -- Mrs. Palin -- work to eliminate the awful heartache just suffered by our West Virginia coal-mining families? What do you have to offer? Smaller government? Less regulation? Freedom for the coal industry to crank up and make more money? What good is a wage if you die while earning it?

It's immensely disappointing and even disturbing that many residents of West Virginia's coal mining towns think you care about them, Sarah, when everything you seem to support would work to kill them even faster than now. Health care? Pooh. Get a job! Pre-existing conditions? (Think black lung.) Bah. Tough luck for you. Crippled in a mine explosion? Ha! Get your community to bring you casseroles, but don't stop mining that coal because after all, it's energy and you all know energy = security! Bring a law suit against the coal companies? No way! How will they survive if you put a dent in their multi-million dollar lobbying efforts!

I really dislike hypocrisy, and that, my friends, is Sarah's true name. She could give a sh!t about those who died at MontCoal. She has no clue why they died or what to do to keep such a horrid event from happening again. Her tweet about being sorry is nothing more than theatre.

Priceless

Sarah Palin Bobblehead Doll


$24.99

---

Photo-op with Michele Bachmann
and Sarah Palin


$10,000.00

---

Waking up one day to the news that Sarah Palin has been indicted for graft, fraud, corruption and tax evasion




PRICELESS!!

---

Metaphor Madness

[UPDATE - Read more on this topic by Archivist and Marianne Williamson]

I'm not sure what all Sarah Palin's recent Facebook post was intended to mean (and maybe she doesn't either, since it's well known she frequently employs ghostwriters for the screeds that appear above her name). It starts out talking about "March Madness" and if you only read the first paragraph or two, you might think she was just giving advice to basketball players, something she considers herself expert in.

Here's a wordle of the last two paragraphs in the post, with a little emphasis on some of the more violent warlike language:

Maybe if Sarah hadn't been widely criticized for urging her supporters to "RELOAD," I may not have grown as increasingly uncomfortable with the verbal imagery here. But I know what she's been saying recently as she stumps for John McCain and am quite familiar with her predictable rabid ferret bite-your-face-off response if you call her out on anything. Instead of backing off her language, Sarah has doubled down on her "Never retreat, instead RELOAD" exhortation. No, more like she tripled or quadrupled down! Here is a direct quote from her Facebook post:

To the teams that desire making it this far next year: Gear up! In the battle, set your sights on next season’s targets! From the shot across the bow – the first second’s tip-off – your leaders will be in the enemy’s cross hairs, so you must execute strong defensive tactics. You won’t win only playing defense, so get on offense! The crossfire is intense, so penetrate through enemy territory by bombing through the press, and use your strong weapons – your Big Guns – to drive to the hole. Shoot with accuracy; aim high and remember it takes blood, sweat and tears to win.

Focus on the goal and fight for it. If the gate is closed, go over the fence. If the fence is too high, pole vault in. If that doesn’t work, parachute in. If the other side tries to push back, your attitude should be “go for it.” Get in their faces and argue with them. (Sound familiar?!) Every possession is a battle; you’ll only win the war if you’ve picked your battles wisely. No matter how tough it gets, never retreat, instead RELOAD!

War, Fight, Intense, Remember, Battle, Tactics

Thoughts are things. Words have meaning. Language stirs emotions. Careless use of language is as potentially dangerous and harmful as driving without paying attention to the road.

Guns, Shoot, Sights, Set, Aim, Go, RELOAD, Win

Sarah and buddy John McCain are rebutting the notion that their words are in any way responsible for acts of violence and vandalism directed toward Democratic members of Congress and their families.

Bombing, Big Guns, Penetrate, Targets, High

Any one incendiary word taken in isolation may be excused for lack of context, and presumed spoken in innocence. A few combative terms spread out over pages of text may likewise escape notice. But dozens and dozens of militaristic words in each of two successive paragraphs cannot be mistaken for anything except warmongering and inciting to violence.

Fight, Enemy, Blood, Shot, Hole, Offense, Execute [courtesy IGN.com]

I honestly tried to read the post as if it were really only about basketball. But how does pole vaulting or parachuting relate? And since when is "get in their faces and argue" a valid tactic on a basketball court for winning anything except a prolonged time-out?

Can't reach the basket any other way? Parachute in!

Playing basketball is not at all like real war. Players on the opposing team, be it in sports or politics, are not enemies. But if you label your neighbor an enemy you make it just a little easier to put them in the crosshairs of your weapon and shoot with accuracy, aiming high, remembering there will be blood, sweat and tears also, too, you betcha.