“Dur, Alaska is Close to Russia” (and other discredited liberal taunts)

Liberals have been mocking the McCain campaign’s references to Governor Sarah Palin’s role in relations with Russia by pointing out their proximity. Well, it turns out that Governor Palin has been involved in trade and cooperative environmental/resource-gathering with Russia (source).

In addition to negotiating trade and cooperation with Russia, Governor Palin has been involved with negotiations with Japan, Korea, China, Canada and Germany (and those are just the top five! [source]).

I found these results by googling “alaska trade”. I didn’t have to log in to anything and required only an internet browser and Adobe Acorbat Reader (which is free), so I can certainly see why the media has been as yet unable to discover these obscure facts.

ABC Offered First Palin Interview

According to the Associated Press, Sarah Palin has offered her first televised interview to ABC. According to the story, the interview will take place later this week after Governor Palin returns to Alaska off the campaign trail. 

Stay tuned for details!

Martha Stewart, You’re Next: Oprah Faces Revolt

Let the peasants talk back and see how they repay the Queen of Daytime TV?

Oprah is facing an insurrection at her own website of hundreds of members of the community who are unhappy with her blacklisting of Sarah Palin from her show. 

While I haven’t read enough to say there’s a general consensus, the majority of what I have read supports the idea that Oprah’s base, white middle-class women in the flyover states, are pretty upset with Oprah’s judgement. 

The call for people to boycott Oprah’s show and her sponsors has gone up. Only time will tell whether anyone heeds the call. 

Note: to see the thread linked above, you must have an account and be logged in at Oprah.com.

Sarah Palin vs. Hillary Clinton: the True Battle?

The New York Times has an interesting hypothesis: that the true battle this fall could very well be Sarah Palin vs. Hillary Clinton. 

This raises an interesting question for Hillary Clinton. Does she want to work very hard to elect Barack Obama? On the chance (however slight) that he doesn’t make a complete disaster out of his presidency, Hillary will be another 4 years away from running for President. But on the other hand, if Obama utterly fails and ends up damaging the nation even more, Hillary will be one of the people who put him there. There’s only so much that saying “I told you so” can help.

But to make matters more complicated for her ambitions, if Hillary doesn’t break her back to elect Obama and he loses, the far-leftists who make up Obama’s base won’t lift a finger to elect her in 2012. It’s a very interesting conondrum in an election where white working women (or “Wal-Mart moms” as Democrats condescendingly refer to them) could swing certain battleground states. 

But the true danger, I think, is Barack Obama running against Sarah Palin. The reasons for this are twofold: because it raises Governor Palin to an even higher level; and because more people find Sarah Palin favorable than find Obama or McCain or Biden favorable. The more people learn about Sarah Palin, the more they seem to like her (unless they’re liberals). If he tries to go after her, even if she goes after him, it will backfire–we’ve seen this already in the past week. I could go on for days about how people only find Governor Palin’s attacks on Obama’s smug self-worship to reaffirm their distaste for his antics, but that’s for another post. The long and short of it is that the usual tricks aren’t going to work against Governor Palin. 

But can Obama trust the Clintons to try to move against her, given the way he threw Hillary under the bus?

I don’t know Rachel Lucas, but I do know she’s awesome

Anyone who comes up with such gems as:

…must be without a doubt quite awesome. Go check out RachelLucas.com!

Atlanta Journal-Constitution: Palin Files Ethics Complaint About Self

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported earlier today that Governor Sarah Palin has filed a complaint with the Personnel Board, which handles ethics complaints against government officials in Alaska. This comes after a $100,000 investigation was authorized by the Governor and the Legislature to investigate allegations that Governor Palin used improper influence to have her ex-brother-in-law fired from his position as a state trooper.

I think this is an encouraging sign. Where the Democratic investigation in the Alaska legislature is likely to drag on and on and continue to affect the Presidential election, an impartial investigation by a board that is empowered to do these kinds of investigations will be seen as less partisan and, therefore, the results will be more accurate.

Will this stop irresponsible speculation on Governor Palin’s actions? No. But it shows (just as all her other actions have) that the Governor is forthright and honest about her record.

Good Commentary in the Post Intelligencer

The Seattle Post Intelligencer had a good article on the Bristol Palin media craze, which you can read in full here. While I don’t necessarily agree with her characterization of the switch in liberal and conservative roles, the columnist Monica Guzman cuts through the nonsense to the real issue: that Bristol Palin doesn’t matter to this election.

You can find the link to the article above but I found the following excerpts to be valuable:

If there’s a lesson here, it’s that liberals and conservatives are defined not so much by their dogma as by their need to use their differences against each other.

The debate about Bristol Palin isn’t really about Bristol Palin. It isn’t even about teenage pregnancy. The most angry exchanges in this conversation are about political consistency.

Most relevant, I think, is her plea that Republicans and Democrats put aside their partisanship for the greater good–and to finally put to death the inane arguments about flip-flopping. “I don’t often quote dead writers. But Ralph Waldo Emerson once wrote something that’s changed the way I look at politics: “A foolish consistency is the hobgobblin of little minds.”"

Amen to that, Monica. Thanks for the perspective.