Is Sarah Palin Gunning for 2012?

This is a rather humorous news article about Sarah Palin, I believe from Taiwan. On the one hand, the news presented orally (see the translation below) is straight-forward and non-partisan. However, the animation on screen mocks Palin and her family mercilessly from start to finish. I particularly liked the "notes" scribbled on Palin's hands: "abstinence," "small government" and "obama sucks" on her left hand, and "drill, baby, drill," "Dutch have dikes" and "Norwegians = Dutch sorta" on her right hand.

Sarah Palin was a virtual unknown, even in the US, when John McCain picked her as his vice-presidential running mate in August 2008.

But after parting ways with McCain, Palin has since become the standard bearer of the Republican Party and the conservative right in the United States.

Her opinions are sought after by a highly respected broadcast news organization.

Her family life is the subject of much fascination. There have been rumors her daughter and future son-in-law could feature in a reality TV show.

With her rising political profile, Sarah Palin has waded into New York City politics and in the process, invented new words. She compares herself to William Shakespeare.

She has used her popularity to raise US$1.3 million so far this year for her political action committee, SarahPAC.

This fund-raising largess has raised speculation that Sarah Palin could be preparing to run against President Barack Obama in 2012.

If she wins, that would indicate the American people have "refudiated" Barack Obama and chosen conservative values.

Kameelah Rasheed: I Am Not Asking For Your Approval

Kameela Rasheed has an interesting essay at Mecca.com in which she tells the world that she doesn't need their approval in order to wear hijab. In the middle of the essay is an anecdote about a "conversation" (really a monologue) she had with a South African man who tried to "reason" with her that by covering herself she was denying him his "need" to see her, her hair, her body. In this world, where scantily clad women are the norm for advertising, where cable news has become cable nilf, where even female politicians rely upon sex appeal, is it any surprise men "need" women to be "accessible?"

While most comments at this institution were reserved for private discussions, the college experience as well as my time in Johannesburg, South Africa provided an opportunity to understand what literally annoyed people about my Hijab. While in Yeoville, a hybrid inner-city/suburb of Johannesburg, I was approached by a man who was intent on liberating me from not only my gender oppression, but from my racial confusion. Apparently, 'I am not free' in Hijab and Islam is not an African religion. I had committed not only the ultimate sin of embracing a faith that 'forced' me to be modest; I had chosen a faith that had no roots in Africa. Let's not bother with the contrary historical facts, as that is the least of our concerns.

What I found of the utmost importance in this monologue (yes, because I was unable to get a word in edgeways) was that he conceptualised my channels of freedom via the ritualistic removal of my Hijab and his penetration or sexual conquest. I never knew that my freedom toolbox included an instruction guide - I will keep this in mind.

As he continued to speak in a series of poorly phrased insults, I realized that this was no longer about gender oppression or black authenticity; it was about the politics of accessibility to certain bodies. He repeated almost in a hypnotic fashion, 'I cannot see you… I cannot see your essence'. In wearing Hijab, it was his argument that I was making myself inaccessible to men, and particularly to him. Choosing to place myself off the radar was not a choice I could exercise.

In fact, I was required to make myself available and accessible to his gaze as well as the gaze of other men. Thus, the crime I had committed was not one of accepting my subjugation as a Muslim woman and 'confused African woman', but of refusing to situate myself in his myopic discourse of liberation that ultimately puts me at his mercy. If I was mistaken in this assumption, it was further validated by a number of men in Johannesburg and in America who have told me similar tales of my inaccessibility, as a reason why I should not wear Hijab.

They started with a narrative of genuine concern for my oppression and devolved into a shallow desire for a free pass to accessibility. It was not always about what was said, but the delivery of these diatribes. In many of these situations, these men used aggressive and paternalistic tones. They attempted to silence me by raising their voices. They worked to discredit my line of defense by telling me I did not know enough. Most of all they were surprised that I was able to put together a sentence and to give as well as I was given. It was a reminder that the covering of my head is not a covering of my mind or my mouth.

HT: my hijab = my *diamond* crown

The Late Show - Sarah Palin's Top 10 Excuses

David Letterman's Top 10 List for Sarah Palin's "excuses" for her turkey debacle. (Can't this woman get anything right?)

The Daily Show on Sarah Palin

Sarah Palin, the gift that kept on giving (in a very perverse sort of way ;) ).

The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10c

The Daily Show's Best Sarah Palin Moments

Barack Obama Interview
John McCain Interview

Sarah Palin Video
Funny Election Video

Good riddance.

The Stupid

Lexington is an anonymous columnist writing opinion pieces about the American economy and politics for The Economist. (There are similar, anonymous columnists for Britain and Europe.) This week's column, Ship of Fools, is interesting for what it says about the Republican party: they're brain dead. Not that this is a surprise to those of us on the left, but, considering that Lexington is a Republican (it's obvious from his/her writings), I wasn't expecting him/her to dare speak the truth. (Likewise, read the comments to see much wailing and gnashing of teeth at Lexington by the "faithful.") Some excerpts:

The Republicans lost the battle of ideas even more comprehensively than they lost the battle for educated votes, marching into the election armed with nothing more than slogans. Energy? Just drill, baby, drill. Global warming? Crack a joke about Ozone Al. Immigration? Send the bums home. Torture and Guantánamo? Wear a T-shirt saying you would rather be water-boarding. Ha ha. During the primary debates, three out of ten Republican candidates admitted that they did not believe in evolution.

The Republican Party’s divorce from the intelligentsia has been a while in the making. The born-again Mr Bush preferred listening to his “heart” rather than his “head.” He also filled the government with incompetent toadies like Michael “heck-of-a-job” Brown, who bungled the response to Hurricane Katrina. Mr McCain, once the chattering classes’ favorite Republican, refused to grapple with the intricacies of the financial meltdown, preferring instead to look for cartoonish villains. And in a desperate attempt to serve boob bait to Bubba, he appointed Sarah Palin to his ticket, a woman who took five years to get a degree in journalism, and who was apparently unaware of some of the most rudimentary facts about international politics.

Republicanism’s anti-intellectual turn is devastating for its future. The party’s electoral success from 1980 onwards was driven by its ability to link brains with brawn. The conservative intelligentsia not only helped to craft a message that resonated with working-class Democrats, a message that emphasized entrepreneurialism, law and order, and American pride. It also provided the party with a sweeping policy agenda. The party’s loss of brains leaves it rudderless, without a compelling agenda.

This is happening at a time when the American population is becoming more educated. More than a quarter of Americans now have university degrees. Twenty per cent of households earn more than $100,000 a year, up from 16% in 1996. Mark Penn, a Democratic pollster, notes that 69% call themselves “professionals.” McKinsey, a management consultancy, argues that the number of jobs requiring “tacit” intellectual skills has increased three times as fast as employment in general. The Republican Party’s current “redneck strategy” will leave it appealing to a shrinking and backward-looking portion of the electorate.

Why is this happening? One reason is that conservative brawn has lost patience with brains of all kinds, conservative or liberal. Many conservatives — particularly lower-income ones — are consumed with elemental fury about everything from immigration to liberal do-gooders. They take their opinions from talk-radio hosts such as Rush Limbaugh and the deeply unsubtle Sean Hannity. And they regard Mrs Palin’s apparent ignorance not as a problem but as a badge of honor.

Another reason is the degeneracy of the conservative intelligentsia itself, a modern-day version of the 1970s liberals it arose to do battle with: trapped in an ideological cocoon, defined by its outer fringes, ruled by dynasties and incapable of adjusting to a changed world. The movement has little to say about today’s pressing problems, such as global warming and the debacle in Iraq, and expends too much of its energy on xenophobia, homophobia and opposing stem-cell research.

Conservative intellectuals are also engaged in their own version of what Julian Benda dubbed la trahison des clercs, the treason of the learned. They have fallen into constructing cartoon images of “real Americans,” with their “volkish” wisdom and charming habit of dropping their “g”s.

...

Business conservatives worry that the party has lost the business vote. Moderates complain that the Republicans are becoming the party of “white-trash pride.”

...

Richard Weaver, one of the founders of modern conservatism, once wrote a book entitled “Ideas have Consequences”; unfortunately, too many Republicans are still refusing to acknowledge that idiocy has consequences, too.

Terry Tate vs. Sarah Palin

Make sure you don't have any drinks in your mouth as you watch these. ;)

Sarah Palin, Secret Democrat

This woman really is clueless.


"Oh, look! It has little donkeys on it and, see? It says 'Vote!' Nothing but the best for me at Neiman Marcus!"
Photo credit: Newsweek

Perhaps She's Watched "Fargo" Once Too Often?

Sarah and her disappearing "accent." Sarah, does this mean that your persona is just as fake?

You betcha!

But, Wait! There's More!

With the huge amount of satirical pictures and videos about Failin' Palin out on the Intertubes, I may have to make this into a daily feature.

Let the good times roll! >:)


HT: WTF Is It Now?!?

James Galbraith: Goodbye, Conservatives. Hello, Predators.

A very interesting article in Slate's The Big Money about the so-called "conservative" wing of the Republican party. Galbraith's thesis, in fact, is that the Republican party is beholden to a predatory class of politicians (who, IMO, aren't necessarily neocons) that practice crony capitalism. Galbraith's conclusion is that the presidential election really hinges on a single issue: Do Americans want a continuation of the predator state, or is it time to clean the government out?

Below is the meat of the article:

Real conservatives know that neither Bush nor McCain is one of them. Bush is a bread-and-circuses reactionary with a clientele of lobbies. McCain gets his economic ideas from Phil Gramm, the ultimate architect of the Enron culture, of libertine speculation and financial disaster. As for Sarah Palin, back in Alaska she took every dime of pork she could lay her hands on. This crowd deregulates and privatizes not because they think it might work out for the public but because they know it won't. What they care about is putting their friends in charge.

Under Bush, oil and gas, drug companies and defense contractors, insurers and usurers, banks and big media control the government of the United States. John McCain was a key member of the Keating Five and a lynchpin of the savings-and-loan debacle; then, as chair of the Senate commerce committee, he presided over Lobby Central; notoriously, his campaign is run by lobbyists to this day and until last week his policy could be summed up in slogans: he was a "free market" man, a "deregulator." Sarah Palin is an interesting case. What was she known for in Wasilla and Juneau? For trying to fire any public servant, from the town librarian to the state commissioner of public safety, who didn't toe her line. Bush and McCain are the predator state writ large, and she is the predator state writ small.

The predator state has no public purpose. Apart from a few empty slogans-smaller government, balance the budget, feel your pain-the connection between actual problems and actual policies has disappeared. It has become clear that, if the Republicans had their way, this election would not be about issues. It would be about anything else: personalities, associations, the politics of fear, and the life history of a long-ago prisoner of war.

But fate blew McCain's cover. On the morning that Lehman Bros. and Merrill Lynch fell, John McCain spoke the immortal words of Herbert Hoover: "The fundamentals of our economy are strong." He said it twice. It's a phrase with deep resonance in American politics. People understand it. No politician says "the fundamentals are strong" unless they know that they are not.

The Dow Jones average fell 504 points that day. As stocks crashed, suddenly people remembered that modern markets cannot exist without a cop on the beat. Every important market out there, from fresh food and safe drugs to autos and air travel to housing and health care, depends on government to maintain trust, and without it, none of them would survive. Without regulation, predators take over, and when they do, trust eventually collapses. Every important market is in peril now, precisely because of the predators in power these past eight years. And none more immediately than finance.

The Bush-Paulson bailout exposed the predator state in detail. Deregulation and desupervision were the origin of this crisis: the 1999 Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act repealing Glass-Steagall, and the Gramm-authored loophole legitimating credit default swaps in 2000. Bush's financial regulators brought chainsaws to press conferences, a clear signal to sub-prime hustlers that "anything goes." "Liar's loans," "neutron loans" and "toxic waste" became financial terms of art. When the crash came, Paulson and Bernanke were plainly not up to the job. The original three-page Treasury bill was less a power grab than a punt; it said to Congress: "there's nobody home over here."

The crisis forces McCain back to issues and exposed the emptiness of his campaign. He resorted to theatrics, "suspending" his campaign to fly to Washington to "work" on a bailout bill, only to demonstrate that his leadership charms were lost on Republican members of the House. At the White House summit he had nothing to say. Later he attacked the morals and ethics of Wall Street, but backed a bill that was aimed to protect the stock prices of the Wall Street firms, while imposing no new discipline and doing nothing to stop the foreclosures. And when it came time to actually cast his vote, he couldn't be bothered even to speak from the Senate floor.

It seems unlikely that John McCain, the regulation-wrecker, will become, overnight, the man who would turn vice to virtue on Wall Street. But even suppose he were serious. Who would trust him? No one with money on the line.

This is McCain's deeper problem. If he is elected, under his leadership, trust cannot be restored. No one with his philosophy or record can do that. Restoring trust requires a government of trustworthy people. Team McCain doesn't have any, and some, especially Gramm, inspire the opposite. It wouldn't matter what their policies were or pretended to be. Nothing they attempted would work.

The Democrats did not do well in the crisis; they were conflicted, divided, unsure of their ground, and they got rolled on many details. Yet they nevertheless broke through politically; Nancy Pelosi's stinging speech last Monday was a rare statement of plain truth. And so the choice in this election is well-defined. One party believes that the government serves no public purpose. The other believes that it must. One party has turned the government over to lobbies, to cronies and to big donors. The other is beginning to realize that a real government must be rebuilt. One party would keep the same crowd in office; the other would have to begin by clearing them out. No one can say there is no difference between the parties this year, and the basic issue in this election is really just as simple as that.

Want a Job? Vote for a Democrat!

A couple of interesting posts on unemployment today, the first being from Spencer at Angry Bear:

So much for Sarah Palin's claim that Republican tax cuts create jobs. In the post WW II era every Democratic President has left office with a lower unemployment rate than they inherited from their predecessor while only one Republican president left office with a lower unemployment rate than they inherited. That was Ronald Reagan, but his first term still holds the record for the highest average unemployment rate of any post - WW II four year Presidential term.

George Bush inherited a 3.9% unemployment rate and the results of all his tax cuts has been a rise in the unemployment rate to 6.1%, so far. By contrast Bill Clinton inherited a 7.4% unemployment rate and with his prudent fiscal policy left Bush a 3.9% unemployment rate.

Leave it to Team Bush to be the only American President to throw a war that failed to stimulate the economy.

Another scary graph comes from Economist's View:

A grim morning: Double plus ungood news on multiple fronts this morning. The credit crunch is getting worse: LIBOR jumped again, the TED spread is at a new record. Bad news on employment: payrolls down 159,000, average work week down, official unemployment rate flat at 6.1 percent but broad measure (U6) up from 10.7 to 11.

We are going over the edge.

The track record: This chart shows U6, the broadest measure of unemployment and underemployment from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. (No data available before 1994.)

Hey Sarah Palin

Cute.

Hey Sarah Palin, do you tell them in Wasilla
That 4,000 years ago we roamed the planet with Godzilla?
Is it true?
I am so fucking scared of you
As number 2

Hey Sarah Palin, I think Alaska's very pretty
But just 100,000 people more than Oklahoma City
Yes it's true
Go look it up, I'm telling you
Oh man, were through

Chorus
Oh, if you become VP, oh, it's Canada for me (2x)
It's Canada for me

Hey Sarah Palin, did you really once inquire
Whether you could throw library books into a big bonfire?
God, my eyes
This really might be our demise
This pack of lies

Hey Sarah Palin, just because you're good at shootin'
Doesn't mean you have the ammo to negotiate with Putin
Are you on coke?
This fucking country's up in smoke
Oh what a joke

Chorus
Oh, if you become VP, oh what will it mean for me (2x)

Bridge
Just because I can see the moon
Doesn't make me an astronaut, you loon
Your foreign policy expertise is pooh
Do you really think a woman commits
To a candidate just because she has tits
Please tell me that this ticket is not true
I thought that there could be no worse
Than Cheney, but here you are, I curse
The madman who would cast a vote for you
And McCain too

Hey Sarah Palin, is it media distortion
Or would you tell a girl who's raped that she could not have an abortion?
It's a new low
Who knows just how far you would go
I'd rather vote for Ross Perot
Hey Sarah Palin I don't know
Where can we go

Chorus

HT: TBogg

Don't Think So!

Is Failin' Palin smarter than a fifth grader? I think we can safely assume what the answer would be. ;)

Original photo credit: WTF Is It Now?!? Modified by yours truly.

The More Things Change... Sarah Palin and Petroleum Export Bans

The McCain/Palin strategy on economic talking points appears to be one of turning molehills into mountains: focusing on rather small issues and blowing them up dramatically in the hope that most people will take the Republicans' word for it. However, as Economist's View pointed out the other day, issues like the amount of budgetary earmarks may sound like a lot of money, but they constitute less than one percent of the federal budget. Likewise, the idea that we can start offshore drilling for oil now and that it will help us in any way today is completely bogus. Americans are being sold a bill of goods by the Republicans, but many people don't care. P.T. Barnum knew the American attitude all too well. The more things change...

Now there's a new issue where Sarah Palin shows her "expertise," that of petroleum export bans:

Of course, it's a fungible commodity and they don't flag, you know, the molecules, where it's going and where it's not. But in the sense of the Congress today, they know that there are very, very hungry domestic markets that need that oil first. So, I believe that what Congress is going to do, also, is not to allow the export bans to such a degree that it's Americans who get stuck holding the bag without the energy source that is produced here, pumped here. It's got to flow into our domestic markets first.

Oh, dear! We Americans are exporting our own oil to other countries when we need it first. Surprisingly enough, that's true. Considering the ferocious appetite Americans have for petroleum, one would think that all domestically-produced petroleum would never be exported outside of the country, but it does. OK, so how much is exported?


If you look at the EIA's Energy Flow chart [pdf] above, you'll see that, in 2007, the US produced 10.80 quadrillion BTUs (QBTU) of its own crude oil, imported 28.70 QBTUs of petroleum and exported 2.93 QBTUs of petroleum. So, 2.93/39.50 = 7.4%. That's how much oil is being exported out of the country. Seven percent.

Let's get into the nitty-gritty even further. The seven percent above includes both crude oil and other petroleum products. However, if you look at the US imports and exports of crude oil and other petroleum products, you'll see that only 26,000 barrels per day were exported (as of this writing) compared with the 12,498,000 barrels per day that were both produced domestically and imported into the U.S. That's a grand total of 0.2% of the daily supply.

In principle, I don't have a problem with the U.S. setting up an export ban on domestically-produced petroleum, although there may be some very good reasons why that oil is being exported to begin with that are not being addressed by the Republicans. But what I do want to point out, yet again, is that this is a very small issue. Crude oil exports make up a tiny, tiny, tiny fraction of the total amount of crude oil that America uses on a daily basis. But Republicans would rather focus on the inconsequential than deal with the more serious economic matters at hand.