Not an Onion headline

AP: Palin working on book about virtues and strengths

Why Palin won't win the nomination

Ambers is somewhat encouraging.

Palin endorses Paul

In a Republican primary, I suppose it can't hurt...

Quote of the day

"In the days leading up to an interview with ABC News’ Charlie Gibson, aides were worried with Ms. Palin’s grasp of facts. She couldn’t explain why North and South Korea were separate nations and she did not know what the Federal Reserve did. She also said she believed Saddam Hussein attacked the United States on Sept. 11, 2001."

Andrew pounces.

The view from Pakistan

Regarding the Af-Pak situation, here's commenter Vaneeza at Library Grape, lightly edited:

The situation is much more complicated than it seems and definitely too complicated for Sarah Palin to understand. The war in Afghanistan is not one that can be "won". I think the Obama administration still understands the situation better than the Republicans. We are seeing changes in their way of dealing with us. When Hillary Clinton came to Pakistan, although her visit was short still she utilized it pretty well. She did a number of debates with our top journalists on tv who asked many difficult and critical questions. The way she answered them and took all the questios and criticism tactfully and gave replies to them was wonderful. I myself watched many of her interviews on TV. She went to a number of mosques and shrines. She showed her respect by covering her head going there. These are the things that mean a lot to the common man here. For me, it was a refreshing change that she pronounced “Pakistan” correctly unlike other Americans.

The aid that is coming from America, for the first time is going to non-governmental organizations instead of the pockets of our corrupt politicians. They will get some part of it but the fact that any part of it will be going directly to NGOs too is amazing. Although the common man can still not be won by just these measures as the history of mistrust goes back to decades but these measures still do at least some pat in easing the tension. Increasing troops in Afghanistan might help a little but you need to understand that Pakistan is at the center-stage of this whole drama. Some Taliban in Afghanistan are locals but most of them are foreigners and we all know that a huge number of them come from Pakistan who are trained at here. Whenever the America launches a full scale military offensive against them, they just come here to Pakistan which they consider a safe haven and as soon as things get better there they go back.

Even if they are stopped from escaping to Pakistan by tighter border control and lets say all of the Taliban are killed in Afghanistan, more will be recruited from these same madrassahs and extremist training camps from Pakistan. America keeps launching drone attacks from time to time in our tribal areas which have been effective but have caused a large number of civilian casualties as well. What needs to be done is better intelligence services and attacking the militant safe havens and training grounds in Pakistan secretly in association with Pakistani government. This goal can be achieved with the help of American intelligence agencies. It is true that Pakistani government needs to do more in fighting these terrorists. Unfortunately our politicians are just as bad as the military dictators. I do believe that the government in some ways is trying to make things bad here to get more aid from America which obviously wont go to the people but to the pockets of the politicians themselves.

Some people do believe that some or even most of the bomb blasts in Pakistan are actually arranged by the government so they can show to the world and especially America that “look what Taliban have done and what they are capable of and what they can do to you also, so give us more and more money in aid and funds that we can use to fight Taliban”. Most of the money in fact goes to their own pocket and little goes to do what it was given for. The government of Afghanistan lead by Hamid Karzai is also very corrupt. He is sometimes called the “the corruption king”. Until more schools and hospitals and factories and jobs are created in Afghanistan and the quality of life of afghans is improved , no real change can come. Sometimes they become Taliban because that’s the only option they have. Also there are a number of madrassahs still operating in Pakistan who turn regular people who just want to get knowledge about Islam into terrorists. Even in a lot of mosques, the Friday sermon is more America bashing speeches than anything related to Islam. There are religious shows and channels on TV that preach extremist ideology and urge people to take up arms.

Nothing is being done about them by the Pakistani government . All that is very important, because nobody can deny Pakistan’s role in the war that is going in Afghanistan. There is a lot of social unrest here in Pakistan. The poverty, unemployment and inflation are out of control. People are selling their children and committing suicide because they cannot provide for their families. It is much easier to persuade a person like that to take up arms to go on a “road to heaven” than someone who actually has some part of his/her life in control. Our mullahs come in all shapes and sizes, hair styles, beard styles and clothing to cater to the religious needs of all social strata. It is more like a business. The other day a more modern looking mullah on TV with a shorter beard and a pant suit with few sentences of English sprinkled here and there in his speech was urging young people to India as it was the prophecy of prophet Muhammad. This is so frustrating that these type of psychos are allowed to spread their message of hate and war on TV with no restrictions.

So America should urge Pakistani government to do something about these mullahs and madrasshas and TV channels also who are misleading people, recruiting more Taliban and making things worse for America in Afghanistan.

Quote of the day

"If this is [Sarah Palin's] game of Scrabble, you can only imagine what her foreign policy would be like."

—Tyler Cowen, Marginal Revolution

Photos of the day

Former servicemen cried as they said goodbye to their fellow soldiers, at the end of their army-service term, at a railway station in Shijiazhuang, Hebei province, China, Wednesday.



Rabbi Avraham Berkowitz climbed stairs at Chabad House in Mumbai Wednesday. The site, home to the Mumbai chapter of the Chabad-Lubavitch Jewish movement, was one of several sites attacked by gunmen on Nov. 26, 2008. The coordinated attacks claimed 166 lives. A Pakistani court has indicted seven people in the terrorist acts.



Fans, one holding a painting of former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, cheered as they listened to her speak before she signed copies of her book “Going Rogue” in The Villages, Fla., Tuesday.

(via WSJ)

Going Rogue in review

The top Amazon.com customer review for Going Rogue: An American Life...

Ain't afraid of no Vietcong king, November 17, 2009

By Gen. JC Christian, patriot

There are many kinds of truth. There are truths based on facts, truths based on faith, and truths based on something that sounds as if it should be true (truthiness). Then there's the kind of truth we find in Sarah's book: stories and concepts that become truths simply because she states them. She's a lot like our Lord and Savior, Glenn Beck, in that respect.

Sometimes, she states truths that would be considered ludicrous if uttered by someone else. Her claim that the McCain campaign forced her to spend $150,000 in RNC funds to dress her family in designer clothes is one example of that. Although it might be easier to believe that she acted like a trailer park Zsa Zsa who'd found a credit card left behind at a possum feed, she blames McCain staffers. That's good enough for us, because we have faith; we want to believe her truths.

But the book isn't perfect. As much as I enjoyed the few short paragraphs in which Mrs Palin laid out her policy objectives, she could have condensed it all into one sentence: "I'm going to grab an Oxo Good Grips Stainless Serving Spatula and go all mavericky on your non-white, non-Christian and non-heterosexual butts."

The book also fails to expose Mrs. Palin's intellectual brilliance and keen grasp of foreign policy issues. Why wasn't the text of her recent speech in Hong Kong included? Although it remains secret, it's rumored that she viciously rebuked the Vietcong king for his assault on the Empire State Building. That's a speech we've been waiting for nearly 75 years to hear. It's big news and should have been included.

As you read other reviews of this book, please remember that Mrs. Palin has many enemies who are eager to pan her work. The Palin family's most potent nemesis, Levi's johnston, is no doubt fully erect and ready to spew globs of misfortune upon them for a third time. And reason-adoring intellectuals are certain to point out that an interview on Good Morning Topeka doesn't qualify as a policy summit in the Far East.

But a few bad reviews won't stop her. She's seen much worse from her kitchen window. It can't be pleasant to gaze upon Antichristograd every morning as you brew your coffee.

My review isn't complete, but I think I'll quit anyway, because writing reviews, like governing, is just too darned hard to finish.

Jon Stewart explains to conservative pundits why he doesn't like Palin

Conan O'brien's Palin interview

A Digger protests:

I would hate to be Sarah Palin right now. The media is dragging her through the mud just from this one interview.

While this is somewhat funny I personally feel it is kind of disrespectful...even if you hate Palin...

In my opinion no one deserves this no matter what your personal political views are.

Another responds:

Marxist. Death panels. Palling around with terrorists. Yep, not fair to Sarah. Distortions. You betcha.

FTW.

Sarah Palin, international face of the opposition

Dish reader:

In response to your other reader emails requesting that you leave Sarah alone, let me say - don't leave her alone! I am currently living overseas in Sydney and let me tell you, she is the international face of the Republican party. Unlike parliamentary systems of government where there is a clear opposition leader, in the US there is no clear leader. So for whatever reason (I'll leave that analysis up to the experts) Sarah Palin has become the international de facto face of the opposition. No one in Sydney knows who John Boehner is. No one knows who Mitch McConnell is. Yes, they know John McCain, but he is old news. Whenever you read or hear a story down here about political opposition to any of Obama's policy initiatives it is always Sarah Palin that is quoted.

Eeek!

Quote of the day

"..I've got [Palin's] book, I have it right over here [..] I made a prediction when I talked with her yesterday. I said "You've got enough in here that people who get hold of this, like the AP, or any of the state-controlled media, they're going to focus on the soap opera aspects of your book and they're going to ignore what is truly one of the most substantive policy books I've read. This woman, governor Palin, clearly is jazzed by policy, particularly environmental policy and energy policy, as well as taxes and so forth."

—Rush Limbaugh, The Rush Limbaugh Show, 13 November 2009

Why McCain lost

Conservatives still blame McCain for being too independent and not conservative enough. Here's something they ought to come to terms with:

Richard Johnston and Emily Thorson analyze polling data from the 2008 election and find a close link between declines in support for John McCain and declines in approval for -- who else? -- Sarah Palin:

John McCain’s August 29 announcement of Palin as his running mate surprised the Republican establishment, the media, and especially voters. She made a strong first impression: she enjoyed high approval ratings after her acceptance speech, and the percentage of voters saying that they intended to vote Republican skyrocketed. But within days of the speech, her ratings began a precipitous slide from which she—and the McCain campaign—never recovered. Throughout the rest of the campaign, vote intentions were closely tied to Palin’s approval ratings: each major Palin approval drop was followed, within a day or two, by a drop in McCain vote intention. No other factor moved McCain support with such precision. 

However, conservatives have a well-earned reputation for ignoring reality, especially in recent years. So don't hold your breath.

Deep thought

Since Trig isn't Todd & Sarah Palin's son, who will win custody at their divorce?

Punchline

"Now she has a book deal presumed to be worth millons, and I cannot wait to read it. I believe on the tenth page she decides since the book is going to end anyway to leave the last 200 pages blank."

—Stephen Colbert on Sarah Palin's resignation in Alaska.

(ht Political Browser)

Nietzsche, updated for Palin

God has resigned.

Peggy Noonan annihilates Palin

Via LG, I hear:

She penned a double-barreled torpedo against Sarah Palin today in the WSJ that has to be read to be believed.

And wow, it really does. I had to punch some air as I read it.

Oh noes, for the money!

Palin obsessives are pouncing on Levi's suggestion that she resigned for better money:



This isn't proof of anything, but it is a suggestive counter to Palin's boilerplate rhetoric about resigning to serve some Higher purpose. I would assume wealth was only part of her motivation to resign, and maybe not a deciding factor. As Andrew says, it makes sense—but not because Palin is some unusually selfish person—I would argue—but because people like money, politicians like money, celebrities like money...everybody likes money! Wealth is useful, and people resign to switch jobs for it all the time. Indeed the job economy pretty much operates on the concept.

Much more interesting, I think, is Levi's point at the end:

"No [I wouldn't vote for her] ...obviously if she's stressed out as Governor, moving up to the Vice President or President is huge...I just don't think anymore that she's cut out for the job."

He surely knows Palin better than most people, but Levi's 'stressed out' is still an assumption. It could have been any number of other things, including wealth. So let's just give Palin's stated reasons a huge benefit of the doubt and suppose her resignation was driven by the media and burdensome FOIA requests and ethic investigations...

The core of Levi's argument stands: whatever it was that made her unsuited to finishing her term has governor obviously makes her unsuited to being president or VP. If you can't hack it as a Class A, you're hardly ready for the Majors.

Deep thought

Perhaps the resignation is Palin's idea of suspending her campaign.

11 theories for Palin's resignation

The Republican governor soap opera continues.