
The New York Times' resident conservative columnist David Brooks slammed Sarah Palin this morning on ABC's This Week, calling her a "joke." And in the process, he held up Virginia Governor-elect Bob McDonnell as the future of the Republican Party.
She's a joke. I mean, I just can't take her seriously. We've got serious problems in the country. Barack Obama's trying to handle war. We've just a had guy elected Virginia governor who's probably the model for the future of the Republican Party, Bob McDonnell, pretty serious guy, pragmatic, calm, kind of boring. The idea that this potential talk show host is considered seriously for the Republican nomination -- believe me, it'll never happen. Republican primary voters are just not going to elect a talk show host.
We'll have video shortly.
Late Update: Here's that video.
igotmyreasons
November 15, 2009 4:22 PM
Wouldn't that be wannabe talk show host?
I prefer Olbermann's "The blogger Sarah Palin"
TV executives aren't stupid either.
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JNagarya
November 15, 2009 11:48 PM in reply to igotmyreasons
It isn't whether TV producers are stupid; it's what the viewer will swallow.
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MNPundit
November 15, 2009 4:37 PM
Didn't he just describe Thune that way too? The future of the GOP is a lying closet theocratic misogynist?
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calchala
November 15, 2009 5:04 PM in reply to MNPundit
McDonnell ran a great campaign. Whatever you want to think of him, he downplayed his views and ran a very centrist campaign and praised Obama whenever he could. He didn't run against him at all.
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tosh
November 15, 2009 5:19 PM in reply to calchala
McDonnell largely hid his views because he's not a pragmatist. He's a crackpot religous right winger who's financial views are closer to a tea party member than a realistic (i.e. that we need to raise taxes to pay for all the stuff that both the GOP and Dems either want or are unwilling to take tough votes to cut).
McDonnell is to current right wing GOP'ers as Rick Warren is to traditional televangeliists: same views, but just goes down easier because he's "nice".
Then move onto McDonnell's potential International Views and you'll find he likely has none of note. In that way, he'll be little more than George W. Bush: an empty vessel that the Neocons can fill up and lead.
Palin and McDonnell are a pair of people with limited views, which are surprisingly similar if you get past how they present them. Palin does it as a cult of personality. McDonnell does it rather blandly, though "nice".
Here's what is frightening:
McDonnell is able to hide the nuttiness similar to how W was, and has the chance of slipping it right by the media (or frankly being enabled by the media). The "future" is actually the current and the past GOP. Just packaged in a way that Brooks thinks will slip by.
In the end, there is no self awareness on Brooks part that the past, present and "future" of the GOP all revolve around a core of wildly failed policies. It's frankly hard to think of any core important GOP policy that's proven not only to be a "success" but as anything other than a catostrophic failure.
That's is unless you run a major company in Big Health, Big Food, Big Energy, Big Media/Communications, and the Military Industrial Complex. I'm sure I'm forgetting some in there.
In the end, that is the core GOP policy: loot the country for those interests. We're 30 years into the process, and it only seems to be speading up as we have even more Dems willing to joy in to help them than ever before.
But I don't think Brooks can ever be honest about that being the GOP's core policy.
John
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JNagarya
November 15, 2009 11:52 PM in reply to tosh
Brooks is duped by his own efforts to prove to himself that he's a clever polemicist, when in fact the correct word is propagandist.
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midnight rambler
November 16, 2009 3:59 AM in reply to tosh
McDonnell certainly is pretty far right, but the reason he portrayed himself (successfully, I might add) as a moderate is that he is a pragmatist - in the sense that he actually wants to win elections. In that way, he differs from most of the current crop of Republicans. That's what makes him so dangerous. For all their noise, the teabagger/Palin crowd will never win over >30% (though it's frightening enough that they get that many). As you say, it's pretty premature to pick McDonnell himself since he's pretty much a blank slate, but I could easily see someone in that mold winning a presidential election.
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chucktrotter
November 15, 2009 4:43 PM
As noted elsewhere...How about a Dick Cheney\Palin run for president? That would add some glitz and pizazz to compensate for the "village idiot" syndrome that permeates the GOP, today.
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dougom
November 15, 2009 7:26 PM in reply to chucktrotter
How would having Palin on the ticket compensate for the "village idiot" syndrome? And how would having Cheney on the ticket compensate for the "whack-job" syndrome?
Seems like a ticket designed to get destroyed.
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brianm0122
November 15, 2009 4:49 PM
I saw that piece, and the first thing that came into my head was:
Republican primary voters are the ONLY people who would elect her!!
And that is the problem for the Republican party.
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TheraP
November 15, 2009 4:49 PM
One of the rare times I agree with David Brooks! On Palin. But he's a bit late coming to that conclusion!
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JNagarya
November 15, 2009 11:55 PM in reply to TheraP
Does he have a choice? If the entire world were lined up to vote in the "Sarah Palin is an Idiot" line, Brooks would be the last to join.
Not because his judgment is worth a shit; but because he's overwhelmingly insecure about not belonging to the group which appears to hold the majority view.
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Rich in NJ
November 15, 2009 4:50 PM
The punchline of the joke is that the MSM treats her as if she is a serious person.
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Viva!America!
November 15, 2009 5:18 PM in reply to Rich in NJ
Truly, they do. They bend over backwards to make it seem as if she will have this major comeback and will give Obama a serious run for his money in 2012.
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Big River Bandido
November 15, 2009 8:45 PM in reply to Viva!America!
Gotta sell newspapers somehow. Fewer and fewer people are buying them now — just like Republican ideas, in fact. I'm willing to bet the two are related. At the rate things are going, maybe we'll be lucky and most newspapers will have gone belly up by 2012. Fewer Republican nonsense for us to have to knock down all the time. At that point, the only implosion left to watch will be teevee itself. And after that happens, who will be around to amplify Republican "ideas"?
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JNagarya
November 15, 2009 11:59 PM in reply to Rich in NJ
That's becaseu they fear being seen as selecting which candidates are legitimate, and which frauds. They've forgot that all they need do is report the facts, and We the people will make that decision.
Then again, the media settled the 2000 election by not raising the Constitution as prohibiting the unelected SC's involvement; and they like the idea of getting the candidates they want. Bushit promised tax cuts, and that mattered more to David Brooks, et al., than the health and survival of the country.
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dustbunny44
November 15, 2009 5:17 PM
"Republican primary voters are just not going to elect a talk show host."
They are sticking with what works - they are voting for actors.
Maybe the occasional ignorant redneck son of a well-connected ex-president.
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JNagarya
November 16, 2009 12:02 AM in reply to dustbunny44
Republican primary voters would elect a dead rock so long as it were represented as being a Republican.
The idea that they wouldn't elect a talk show host is horseshit: they confuse celebrity for intelligence and relevant competence, which is why they unquestioningly swallow what entertainers Limbaugh and his ilk spew.
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drwu
November 15, 2009 5:19 PM
Sure, Palin's a joke. Ditto: Cheney, Wall Street/Pro-Empire Dems, The Party of No. Seriously folks, we're in decline, the economy a house of cards run by crazed Financial Behemoths, we're fighting a losing battle against 2 billion Muslims and our politicians are all on the take. And our latest hope, President Obama is seriously on the skids... Best bet: drop the empire thing, drop the Wall Street bubble artists and take care of business at HOME--making (manufacturing ) things we can all use. Enough outsourcing, enough Clinton/Bush/Obama globalization, enough!!!!
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CharlesSmith
November 15, 2009 5:22 PM
Clinton-Palin coffee date: Beer Summit 2 in the making.... latest details on this case: http://www.35energy.com/news/clinton-palin-coffee-date-beer-summit-2-in-the-making.html
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Kuyleh
November 15, 2009 5:33 PM
Aren't jokes supposed to be funny? This woman is alot of things, but she stopped being funny VERY fast.
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lousgirl84
November 15, 2009 5:41 PM
I was more insulted by Gwen Ifill's comments in response to Brooks.
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gjdodger
November 15, 2009 7:09 PM in reply to lousgirl84
She said, "Don't underestimate the degree to which women will be drawn to her story," and then referred to Palin reaching out to Sec. Clinton and to the glass ceiling. The implication was she has accomplished a great deal in her field despite discrimination against women, and now people are belittling her.
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Joe Bob
November 15, 2009 11:27 PM in reply to gjdodger
What an insipid comment on Ifill's part. There are plenty of Republicans in my family. Of the ones who aren't unrepentant racists and/or teabagger sympathizers, Palin caused them to flee the McCain ticket in droves.
In contrast to Ifill's comment, women with accomplishments of their own do tend to see Palin as a joke. Likewise, they saw Palin's place on the McCain ticket as an insult to their intelligence. There are women in my family who voted for Obama who hadn't voted for a Democrat for president in their entire lives, and Sarah Palin was the deciding factor.
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daveminnj
November 15, 2009 5:51 PM
what did she say?
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semiotix
November 15, 2009 5:53 PM
I don't give BoBo any credit for speaking the blindingly obvious truth, but it does please me to think of how much he'll come to regret it.
He never mastered Safire's trick of not giving a damn. Given how thin a skin he's shown when liberals snark at him--people who by definition disagree with him--I can only imagine the hurt that the inevitable wingnut shitstorm is going to put on him.
As you're about to find out, David, when Pol Pot calls for the massacre of the bespectacled intellectual elite, not actually being terribly smart is not a defense if you look and act the part.
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JNagarya
November 16, 2009 12:06 AM in reply to semiotix
Well said.
Got that David? You aren't as smart as you believe you are. Except when you bullshit instead of telling the dangerous truth.
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Steve Vokers
November 15, 2009 6:02 PM
The Republicans won't elect a talk show host? Seriously? Wasn't Reagan a bad B-movie actor?
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JNagarya
November 16, 2009 12:09 AM in reply to Steve Vokers
The loons would exult if Limbaguh or his ilk ran for office. And the rest of the Republicans will support anything that can be elected regardless what it is.
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Walter Mitty
November 15, 2009 6:09 PM
McDonnell won because Deeds was a crummy candidate. If the GOP thinks this means the thesis he wrote is old news, they got another thing coming.
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Big River Bandido
November 15, 2009 9:01 PM in reply to Walter Mitty
It's always sunny for Republicans in Brooksville. For all their bluster, today's Republicans don't have a prayer at winning a national election with such bleak party ID numbers. What remains of the Republican rump is simply too weak, too divided, and too discredited to win a national election, especially with an untried one-term governor who won his office against such a weak opponent.
Because Virginia governors are lame ducks, they make for hobbled presidential candidates, unable to attract the confidence of donors and staffers necessary for a national campaign. The only potential future for a Virginia governor lies in the U.S. Senate — and that avenue is pretty securely closed off for the forseeable future. Even if the media calls his tenure a success, McDonnell will have reached a political dead end in 4 years' time.
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jdb316
November 15, 2009 10:42 PM in reply to Big River Bandido
McDonnell could run against Jim Webb in 2012. Webb won by 0.3% in 2006 and will be one of the more vulnerable incumbents in 2012. If McDonnell does a good job as governor and the Dems don't get things done, he'd have a shot.
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Big River Bandido
November 16, 2009 1:02 AM in reply to jdb316
Possibly. But I don't think so. Webb is an extremely canny politician — a former Republican himself — and will be very difficult to beat in 2012 regardless of the Democratic Party's standing. I can cite two anecdotes that illustrate his political skills.
The first: Webb's 2006 victory was close, yes, but there was an implicit threat that Allen might not concede, so Webb simply ignored "political courtesy" and made his victory speech: The votes are in, and we won. In seven words, he outmaneuvered Allen and cut off any chance of him credibly contesting or delaying the result.
The second instance is when Webb got busted for trying to take his gun past Capitol Hill metal detectors. I don't believe this was a gaffe at all, considering how it boosts his street cred in Virginia. If it was a gaffe, Webb is simply the luckiest politician alive and no politician will have a prayer against him in 2012.
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Leftflank
November 15, 2009 6:14 PM
Does David Brooks want credit or some sort of praise for repeating this already well established fact? What will his next deep investigative report be? Orly Taitz is completely friggin' nuts. Fox news is really not a news station but is a complete sellout for the right-wing & tea-baggers. george bush was a puppet.
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EOC
November 15, 2009 6:23 PM
"The idea that this potential talk show host is considered seriously for the Republican nomination -- believe me, it'll never happen. Republican primary voters are just not going to elect a talk show host."
...says the columnist and ubiquitous television interviewee.
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RHERSH12
November 15, 2009 7:04 PM
I so want Cheney and Palin to run in 2012. It would totally make my decade. The hilarity would be almost too much to stand.
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tamiasmin
November 15, 2009 7:49 PM in reply to RHERSH12
Making your decade be damned. No one who gives a rat's ass about the country would want that.
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barth
November 15, 2009 9:17 PM in reply to tamiasmin
I care about the country and would like a return to the two party system, but to get there this Reagan GOP needs to be destroyed and Cheney=Palin; Palin-Cheney would do just that.
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RHERSH12
November 15, 2009 9:41 PM in reply to tamiasmin
I said I wanted them to run. Nobody with a brain wants them to win. Read carefully, please.
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Peter Principle
November 15, 2009 7:56 PM
Republican primary voters are just not going to elect a talk show host.
Second-rate, washed-up Hollywood actor, yes. Spoiled, moronic frat boy with an overdose of testosterone, yes. But talk show host, no.
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Kuyleh
November 15, 2009 8:21 PM in reply to Peter Principle
When you say it like that, she sounds like the best option...Bad thoughts. Very bad thoughts.
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barth
November 15, 2009 9:14 PM
Poor David. His therapist must be working overtime. David: As your vote for President Obama last November (I am sure of it) made clear, your beloved Republican Party expired two decades ago, but what remnants of it continued were buried in November in the NY 23rd. Gov Palin is a joke, but so was G HW Bush, and their beloved Ronald Reagan, as you know. You keep telling us about a party that has moved beyond The Great Reagan, but I don't see it anywhere.
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Clear
November 15, 2009 9:36 PM
From the Oxford English Dictionary, "rogue":
1. a. One belonging to a class of idle vagrants or vagabonds.
2. a. A dishonest, unprincipled person; a rascal.
3. One who is of a mischievous disposition.
5. a. An elephant driven away, or living apart, from the herd, and of a savage or destructive disposition.
6. b. Something that is inexplicably faulty or defective.
6. c. That which lacks appropriate control; something which is irresponsible or undisciplined.
rogue state n. a state perceived to be flouting international law and threatening the security of other nations.
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VexSmith
November 15, 2009 10:15 PM
It's one thing to dismiss Palin as a future President and another to dismiss her as a potential GOP nominee. Brooks is correct to do the former but unwise to do the latter.
While I wouldn't make her the favorite, I really think she has a heck of a shot at the nomination. Talk-show host or not, the "field" is unimpressive. And that includes McDonnell.
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AmericanMuser
November 15, 2009 11:38 PM
“Disillusioned” is the word that best describes how many Americans feel after eight years of George Bush and the election of Barack Obama a year ago. Republicans had a majority in congress and the presidency, yet achieved little for Middle America. They betrayed voters by inflating the deficit and growing government, sending men and women into nation-building wars whose purposes are still unknown, and created a culture of moral and ethical corruption in Washington D.C. It was under lax and pathetic regulatory oversight that a Republican president and Republican congress allowed corporations to betray shareholders with questionable and highly leveraged credit default swaps, only to be followed by a $700 billion taxpayer bailout created by the Bush administration—so much for limited government. Republicans are a party without a message and without a messenger.
Last week’s election results in Virginia and New Jersey, where Republican candidates for governor triumphed over their Democrat opponents, say more about the public’s rejection of Obama’s big government solutions and less about Republicans articulating a message to help Middle America. If Republicans think the public is embracing the party again, they are simply whistling past the graveyard, drunk on their own greed, and completely out of touch with the needs of Middle America.
Not that Democrats are offering any worthwhile solutions to address the most pressing needs of Middle America—job creation—but at least Democrats are intellectually honest about their desire for big government, universal healthcare, taxpayer-funded abortions, labor union power, and a litigious society for plaintiff lawyers to fleece the public. There is something, dare I say “refreshing and frank” about knowing where Democrats are on issues that impact Middle America, whereas Republicans pretend to be something they are not.
It is time for the Republican party to stop blindly whoring for the business community and begin addressing the issues that impact Middle America—job creation, affordable healthcare for all, and quality public education for our children. Republicans are a one-trick-pony, where “tax cuts” are their solution for all of Middle America’s problems. It’s because the party cannot articulate rational policy solutions to the real problems we face.
Take healthcare for instance; the Republican solution has been health savings accounts (HSAs). Are you kidding me? We can’t get people to save money in IRAs, never mind HSAs. That’s the best Republicans have got? Why don’t Republicans push to allow consumers to shop for healthcare across state lines, require everyone to have healthcare, and deny insurers from rejecting consumers with pre-existing conditions?
If Democrats have any hope of maintaining power, they too need to put viable solutions on the table for Middle America, where people care a hell of a lot more about jobs and the economy than government-run healthcare, union card check, the protection of gays from hate crimes, and cap and trade. Both parties have failed miserably to address the needs of Middle America, which I suppose is why I feel so disillusioned with both parties.
A. Muser
http://americanmuser.wordpress.com/
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JNagarya
November 16, 2009 12:22 AM in reply to AmericanMuser
"a litigious society for plaintiff lawyers to fleece the public."
How does an injured patient, as plaintiff, "fleece the public" by suing the rivate doctor/medical facility that fucked up?
Instead of basing your "arguments" on greed, while trying to pretend you oppose greed, learn what the actual facts are instead of going for the apparently-cheapest price.
As example, how many medical malpractice actions are there per year? How many are won by the plaintiff?
And: how many insurance companies have malpractice plaintiff attornies set insurance rates?
I'll answer that last question for you:
None.
Insurance premiums are not under the control of "malpractice attornies"; they are under, and set by, the insurance companies. So learn to stop blaming the victim, dupe.
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Dreamscribe
November 16, 2009 2:38 AM in reply to AmericanMuser
Muser,
If you're trying to spin the story that this was a thorough rebuke of the Obama administration's policy agenda, I need only point to Creigh Deeds.
Deeds lost while running away from Obama's agenda. He was opposed to most of Obama's major legislative pieces and got roundly defeated for taking those positions on the issues. Add in that out of the four races that day, Democrats won half of them and that paints a very different picture than "the public’s rejection of Obama’s big government solutions" -- especially when in nearly every off-year special election to date, federal issues take a backseat to local issues.
Plus, if "Middle America" thinks that crime ought not to be an issue because of who's involved then can we please make it legal to egg redneck jackasses? I do believe this would come as much relief to many of us outside of "real" America who dislike bigots of all kinds.
No? That's not cool?
Buzzkill.
Oh well, at least "Middle America" didn't use the same rhetoric to block the Civil Rights legislation for many, many years. Because I wouldn't want to accuse "Middle Americans" of being racist in addition to being homophobic. Luckily, "Middle Americans" had absolutely no part in the hundreds of gays murdered last year for their sexual orientation, nor did the "Middle Americans" of years past have any part in the murder of thousands of people of color just because of the color of their skin.
I guess we can all rest easy knowing that "Middle America" knows what's best for society, because they're awfully tolerant and empathic folks.
Hey, speaking of which...remember when empathy wasn't a bad thing? I remember all of those "Middle Americans" who stood up when the Republican party attacked empathy and roundly rejected the idea that being able to understand someone else's point of view somehow make you weak. I clapped and applauded just like everyone else.
Tired of the inferences?
Me too. So let's rap. My suggestion moving forward Muser would be to drop the "Middle American" schtick and just be forthright about how you view America: more white, more ignorant and lots more intolerant.
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dswx
November 16, 2009 8:45 AM in reply to Dreamscribe
McDonnell represents *all* the failed policies of the Republicans: trickle down economics, anti-women, and anti-science, just for starters. Foreign and domestic. There is not a prayer (pun intended) in the world that he gets national recognition aside from Fox/RNC News. Beltway pundits always jump on the Virginia Republican governor's bandwagons, proclaiming them as national figures and they always fail. See incompetent Jim Gilmore and racist George Allen as classic examples.
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Dorn76
November 16, 2009 10:41 AM in reply to AmericanMuser
A.Musing.
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joejoejoe
November 16, 2009 4:06 AM
David Brooks isn't any more serious than Sarah Palin. He's just an unfunny joke where Sarah Palin is, to her credit, hilarious.
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Bill E Pilgrim
November 16, 2009 4:59 AM
Yeah, the next thing you know someone will be suggesting some "B" movie actor making the switch to politics and running for President, or maybe even an "A" list action movie hero becoming governor of some large state. I mean, Republican voters would never allow that to happen!
David Brooks inhabits that alternate universe in which conservatives are "fiscally responsible" and the only sober, serious people in the game.
Like John McCain, who Brooks lavished praise on for years for McCain's sober, serious decisions, like picking Sarah Palin to be a heartbeat away from the Presidency. Er, wait, no earlier decisions. The sober ones, you know.
Brooks may be right about Palin but I wouldn't bet on it. No one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the Republican voter.
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Silence
November 16, 2009 9:13 AM
Palin wouldn't make it past the primaries. However, she is doing a bang up job of exposing the left as hypocritical, sexist, family hating, elitist, bullies.
By opposing the repubs as well, she brings great publicity to the grassroots movements.
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Dreamscribe
November 16, 2009 4:16 PM in reply to Silence
It's interesting that liberals - the people who want something as pluralistic as health care for all people - are somehow elitists; and yet conservatives who, to this very day, use Ayn Rand's doctrine of greed and class warfare directed against the poorest workers as a touchstone for their political and governmental ideology are somehow "of the people". Gimme a goddamn break, Silence. If you want to talk about hypocrisy, look no further those conservatives (of which Palin is one) that subscribe to Randian economic and sociological philosophy.
As for the idea that Palin is somehow a grassroots political player, I have never heard a more laughable assertion in recent political history (birthers aside). There's been no evidence to date that she was substantively more effective at raising money from small donors during the '08 campaign. At best, she's an astroturf politician: she gives the appearance of grassroots support without the actual grassroots.
You know, the way that George W. Bush was compassionate.
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L0ngT0m
November 16, 2009 3:39 PM
This pretty much guarantees Palin the nomination. Brooks has never been right about anything. Reagan was a joke, too. Some punch line!
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Tosh
March 12, 2010 6:28 AM
they are both not serious
kamagra m65
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