[H/T Toby Toons for the image.]

This past week in the wake of the shooting of Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords by Jared Lee Loughner (that killed six people and wounded nine others–including the congresswoman), the mainstream/liberal media instantly pounced on “the violent rhetoric” by Sarah Palin and the Tea Party as the cause of Loughner’s mad shooting spree. Oh, and they did this within half an hour of the victims being shot, before any of the facts of the case had come in. To be specific, the likes of Andrew Sullivan (he of “Trig Truther” fame), Markos Moulitsas, Matthew Yeglesias, Paul Krugman, The New York Times Editorial Board and just about everyone at MSNBC immediately implied that “right-wing rhetoric”, and specifically Sarah Palin, were accessories to this tragedy. In fact, Markos Moulitsas even went so far as to tweet out “Mission Accomplished Sarah Palin” immediately after the shooting, and blamed her based an obscure map that she had put out almost year ago on her Facebook page “targeting” certain districts for the 2010 election. To quote Alex Knepper, according to liberals, “Guns don’t kill people, Sarah Palin’s metaphors do”. (See an image of her Facebook map below.)

Except that it didn’t take conservative bloggers long to learn that the Democrats had put up a similar “target” map in 2009 (before Palin did) stating which Republicans they wanted to “target” for opposing the now infamous stimulus bill.

Furthermore, as Patterico points out Markos Moulitsas, himself, put a bulls-eye on Gifford’s district (because she’s a moderate Democrat).

Then, Michelle Malkin responded by cataloging all of the shockingly hateful and violent rhetoric towards Sarah Palin and John McCain courtesy of the Left–not to mention, she unearthed a plethora of leftist assassination fantasies about President Bush. (H/T Karl–be sure to read his excellent column.)

And finally, Bill O’Reilly swung into action by promptly calling out the left-wing charlatans participating in this hateful farce. Moreover, O’Reilly pointed out how Democrats have no problem using gun metaphors–and how Joe Manchin even shot the stimulus bill in an ad–and, that MSNBC is actually ground zero for hateful rhetoric. (Hat tip to Allahpundit for the video.)

Watch the latest video at video.foxnews.com

["Oopsy daisies. Quick, quick--backtrack in the other direction! Let's now just denounce all heated rhetoric and free political speech."]

So now it’s official–court is in session and the verdict is in. According to public opinion polls, the MSM has “botched the coverage” of the Tuscon shooting by immediately and ignorantly blaming “right-wing rhetoric”. However, what’s even further evidence that the MSM has disgraced themselves with their coverage of the Arizona shooting, is that many liberal pundits are now calling out the MSM/liberal media for it’s repugnant coverage–not to mention, in his speech, President Obama wisely cautioned people against blaming “incivility” for the tragedy.

For instance, Jon Stewart, Jack Shafer of Slate, and T.A. Frank of The New Republic all blasted the liberal MSM meme of blaming “conservative rhetoric” for causing the Tuscon tragedy (T.A. Frank wrote that the MSM “botched the coverage”). Furthermore, Kirsten Powers came out with a column in The Daily Beast where she wrote that President Obama didn’t go far enough in his speech to “shut down the nonsense about how Sarah Palin or right-wing talkers caused the shooting.” Moreover, Democratic strategist Pat Caddell referred to Paul Krugman as….well, let’s just say a “sphincter” for writing that God-awful column where he blamed conservatives for the Tuscon murders (the column that O’Reilly easily debunked above). To be specific, Caddell said the following:

“People are dead, and the first thing they have to do is go to politics. No wonder the country hates the media.”

And finally, yesterday, Charles Blow (yeah, the guy that called minorities in theTea Party “a minstrel show”), wrote a column where he accused the Left of participating in “a witch hunt” after the Tuscon shooting spree.

So, now the question becomes, not, “Did the media botch the Arizona shooting?” (the obvious answer to that question is, “Yes”)–but rather, “Why did the media botch the coverage of the AZ shooting”? Well, after giving it much thought, I have come up with four reasons why the liberal MSM disgraced themselves so badly with regard to the AZ massacre.

1.) Many liberals are elitists and automatically assume that they are the smartest people in the room, so, therefore, they can get caught mindlessly flapping their gums on a subject about which they know very little.

I know nothing about ichthyology or rocket science, so therefore, I would never go on national television and try to sell myself as an expert on ichthyology or rocket science. However, this past week, there were a plethora of liberals on TV speaking about mental illness as if they were psychiatrists (stating that “angry rhetoric set off the killer”). Well, Charles Krauthammer (who is a Harvard trained psychiatrist) explained Jared Lee Loughner’s state of mind best when he wrote the following in a recent column:

“The charge: The Tucson massacre is a consequence of the “climate of hate” created by Sarah Palin, the Tea Party, Glenn Beck, Obamacare opponents and sundry other liberal betes noires.

The verdict: Rarely in American political discourse has there been a charge so reckless, so scurrilous and so unsupported by evidence.

As killers go, Jared Loughner is not reticent. Yet among all his writings, postings, videos and other ravings – and in all the testimony from all the people who knew him – there is not a single reference to any of these supposed accessories to murder.

Not only is there no evidence that Loughner was impelled to violence by any of those upon whom Paul Krugman, Keith Olbermann, the New York Times, the Tucson sheriff and other rabid partisans are fixated. There is no evidence that he was responding to anything, political or otherwise, outside of his own head.

A climate of hate? This man lived within his very own private climate. “His thoughts were unrelated to anything in our world,” said the teacher of Loughner’s philosophy class at Pima Community College. “He was very disconnected from reality,” said classmate Lydian Ali. “You know how it is when you talk to someone who’s mentally ill and they’re just not there?” said neighbor Jason Johnson. “It was like he was in his own world.”

His ravings, said one high school classmate, were interspersed with “unnerving, long stupors of silence” during which he would “stare fixedly at his buddies,” reported the Wall Street Journal. His own writings are confused, incoherent, punctuated with private numerology and inscrutable taxonomy. He warns of government brainwashing and thought control through “grammar.” He was obsessed with “conscious dreaming,” a fairly good synonym for hallucinations.

This is not political behavior. These are the signs of a clinical thought disorder – ideas disconnected from each other, incoherent, delusional, detached from reality.

These are all the hallmarks of a paranoid schizophrenic. And a dangerous one. A classmate found him so terrifyingly mentally disturbed that, she e-mailed friends and family, she expected to find his picture on TV after his perpetrating a mass murder. This was no idle speculation: In class “I sit by the door with my purse handy” so that she could get out fast when the shooting began.

Furthermore, the available evidence dates Loughner’s fixation on Rep. Gabrielle Giffords to at least 2007, when he attended a town hall of hers and felt slighted by her response. In 2007, no one had heard of Sarah Palin. Glenn Beck was still toiling on Headline News. There was no Tea Party or health-care reform. The only climate of hate was the pervasive post-Iraq campaign of vilification of George W. Bush, nicely captured by a New Republic editor who had begun an article thus: “I hate President George W. Bush. There, I said it.”

Now, if any of you still have any doubts as to Mr. Loughner’s state of mind, then look no further than the video below where Loughner rambles in a disconnected stream of consciousness about “the torture of students”, “illegal wars”, “mind control by using currency”, “losing his freedom of speech”, his school being a “genocide school”, how “they control the grammar” at the school bookstore….well, you get the picture. The saddest part of the video is halfway through where Mr. Loughner utters the phrase, “I’m in a terrible place”. I have no doubt in my mind that he was/is. (H/T to The Other McCain for the video.)

On a personal note, in my third year of medical school, I did a psychiatry rotation. Now, I would never pretend to know as much about psychiatry as Dr. Krauthammer, but do I know a heck of a lot more than the average MSNBC pundit. In my psych rotation, I saw plenty of paranoid schizophrenic patients. I saw patients who called 911 when they had a bad dream, because they thought they were being murdered. I saw patients who thought that the Bush Administration was out to get them, because of something as simple as maybe a policeman giving them a ticket. And, I saw patients who threatened their spouses with weapons, but couldn’t tell you why they did it. Oh, and I even read about a patient in a medical journal who would see a python on the wall, in place of a curtain rod, if the patient missed their meds. So basically, what I’m trying to tell you is that both nothing and everything sets these patients off. You can ban target maps, Glenn Beck, Moveon.org, policemen giving people tickets, 911 calls, dreaming and curtain rods; however, unless these patients get the help that they need and are properly medicated, they will still have uncontrollable psychotic episodes.

Robert Stacy McCain has done some excellent work on his blog this week reporting on the sanity component of this story. And, one of the things that McCain reported on was the fact that Jared Lee Loughner took Salvia and watched a paranoid 9/11 truther film called Zeitgeist. However, taking Salvia and watching Zeitgeist didn’t make Loughner crazy–Loughner was already mentally unstable, which is why he became obsessed with Zeitgeist and self-medicated with Salvia in the first place.

Does anyone remember James Lee, the mentally unstable man who took hostages at the Discovery Channel headquarters and was eventually shot by the police? Lee claimed that he was motivated by Al Gore’s movie, An Inconvenient Truth. You didn’t see conservatives blaming Al Gore for that insane act, did you? That is because A.) it goes against our nature to try to blame people after a tragedy (as if anyone had any control over Lee’s actions in the first place)–or try to ban things, like documentaries or political speech–and B.) because Lee didn’t become crazy by watching An Inconvenient Truth. He was already mentally unstable, which is why he became obsessed with An Inconvenient Truth in the first place. You see, a sane mind can take in all kinds of information and stimuli, and it won’t drive him or her to murder.

2.) It is the raison d’etre of many liberals to control people. They think that if they can control more people and create a larger nanny state, then they can stop bad things from happening.

Don’t believe me? Well then, just take a look at the recent ban on Happy Meals in San Fransisco as proof. (The video below is hilarious.)

<td style='padding:2px 1px 0px 5px;' colspan='2'San Francisco’s Happy Meal Ban

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You see, a lot of liberals have good intentions. They think that if they ban Happy Meals, then there won’t be anymore obese children. However, what they don’t realize (and what I learned on my pediatrics rotation in medical school) is that most obese children have obese parents, and consume the majority of their fatty foods at home.

Liberals also think that if they ban guns, then crime will automatically go down. However, what they don’t realize is that criminals still will find a way to get guns, and then 76 year old men will become defenseless prey to street gangs.

So therefore, it’s only natural for liberals to also think that if they can control what people, say, watch or listen to, then that will somehow stop paranoid schizophrenics from going on murder sprees. (Well, not what they say so much–just what you say. Liberals want to be able to use “target” maps and have pundits on MSNBC be able to use incendiary rhetoric–they just don’t want you to be able to do the same thing, because….well, you know, they are just so much smarter and more enlightened than you, so they can do it, but you can’t.)

Liberals always talk about wanting to help the downtrodden. Well, this tragedy in Tuscon would have presented a perfect opportunity to discuss mental illness. The other night on The O’Reilly Factor, Charles Krauthammer discussed how, since the deinstitutionalization of mental hospitals that took place in the 1960′s, many mentally ill people have been left homeless and freezing to death on the streets. John Hawkins also made similar points in an excellent column. It seems that if liberals really cared so much for the poor and the downtrodden, then they would have first mourned the victims of the shooting, and then tried to find some good in this tragedy by using it as an opportunity to provoke a national debate with regard to mental illness (i.e., how to get people the help that they need without violating anyone’s civil liberties). Instead, they used it as an opportunity to bash Sarah Palin and act like the thought police by suggesting that we should “bring back the fairness doctrine”. These actions demonstrate, beyond a reasonable doubt, that the primary focus of modern liberalism is not helping the “little guy”, but bashing Sarah Palin and controlling how people live their lives.

3.) This whole Tuscon Tragedy was the big, red “Do Not Push” button for liberals.

What do I mean by the above statement? Simple. Somehow or another, liberals were able to drag Sarah Palin and the Tea Party into this story (even though they had absolutely NOTHING to do with it). Furthermore, they were able to use this tragedy to discuss gun control, as well as speech control (two ideas that are dear to their hearts). Palin, gun control and controlling conservative speech is the liberal trifecta; therefore, with regard to this story, they just couldn’t control themselves.

David Brooks (of all people) explained this phenomenon perfectly when he wrote the following:

“All of this evidence, which is easily accessible on the Internet, points to the possibility that Loughner may be suffering from a mental illness like schizophrenia.

In short, the evidence before us suggests that Loughner was locked in a world far removed from politics as we normally understand it.

Yet the early coverage and commentary of the Tucson massacre suppressed this evidence. The coverage and commentary shifted to an entirely different explanation: Loughner unleashed his rampage because he was incited by the violent rhetoric of the Tea Party, the anti-immigrant movement and Sarah Palin.

Mainstream news organizations linked the attack to an offensive target map issued by Sarah Palin’s political action committee. The Huffington Post erupted, with former Senator Gary Hart flatly stating that the killings were the result of angry political rhetoric. Keith Olbermann demanded a Palin repudiation and the founder of the Daily Kos wrote on Twitter: “Mission Accomplished, Sarah Palin.” Others argued that the killing was fostered by a political climate of hate.

These accusations — that political actors contributed to the murder of 6 people, including a 9-year-old girl — are extremely grave. They were made despite the fact that there was, and is, no evidence that Loughner was part of these movements or a consumer of their literature. They were made despite the fact that the link between political rhetoric and actual violence is extremely murky. They were vicious charges made by people who claimed to be criticizing viciousness.

Yet such is the state of things. We have a news media that is psychologically ill informed but politically inflamed, so it naturally leans toward political explanations. We have a news media with a strong distaste for Sarah Palin and the Tea Party movement, and this seemed like a golden opportunity to tarnish them. We have a segmented news media, so there is nobody in most newsrooms to stand apart from the prevailing assumptions. We have a news media market in which the rewards go to anybody who can stroke the audience’s pleasure buttons.

I have no love for Sarah Palin, and I like to think I’m committed to civil discourse. But the political opportunism occasioned by this tragedy has ranged from the completely irrelevant to the shamelessly irresponsible.”

4.) Ever since Obama has come on the scene, liberals have gone overboard with their incivility and have gotten in the habit of substituting slurs, libel, personal attacks and name-calling for actual political debate.

We are all familiar with the vitriol directed at George W. Bush and Dick Cheney. Now, fast forward to the 2008 Democratic primary where the Clintons were accused of racism, and Chris Matthews called Hillary Clinton “witchy” (see the image below that was popular on many liberal blogs). Then, other Democrats tried to pressure Mrs. Clinton to get out of the race and accused her of wanting to have Obama assassinated (sound familiar?). And finally, Keith Olbermann got fed up and demanded that someone just kill her/beat her up. (To be specific, Olberman said that, “Someone should take her in a room and only he comes out”.)

Next, came the general election where John McCain and Sarah Palin basically faced the same sentiment from the liberal media that the Clintons faced. (That sentiment being, “How dare they actually try to beat Obama!”) To be specific, one liberal blogger captured the Left’s sentiment perfectly when he wrote that his “jaw dropped” when John McCain brought up Bill Ayers in the debate. In other words:

“How dare that mean, old fart try to actually win the debate?! Why doesn’t he just walk away and let Obama win the election already? Don’t he and his stupid supporters know that we liberals know what’s best for them and the rest of the country anyway?”

However, nothing quite prepared me to see members of the MSM calling patriotic Americans, who were private citizens exorcising their First Amendment rights, “teabaggers” (which is a vile sexual slur) night after night after night. I recoiled in horror, and thought that this was lowest that the liberal MSM could possibly sink–but I was wrong.

This past week, when liberals in the MSM accused Sarah Palin, the Tea Party and conservatives in general of being somehow complicit in a mass murder…..well, that was their bottom, which is why they are now experiencing such a strong “backlash” (to quote Peter Wehner).

The liberal MSM so badly botched the coverage of the Tuscon massacre, because–for so very long–they have been trying to throw water on that “witch” Sarah Palin, but she simply refuses to melt like the Wicked Witch of the West from The Wizard of Oz did.

Instead, Palin is more like Elphaba from the Broadway musical Wicked–she just keeps coming back stronger and stronger after each setback and attack, managing to fly above it all and help the Republicans win elections. (H/T to the Hillbuzz for the video.)

And now, here was finally their chance–nay, their golden opportunity–to have someone take Palin into a room and only he comes out. The liberal MSM finally thought that they could be rid of Sarah Palin once and for all. And, it was more important to them than anything else–even more important than mourning for the victims of this senseless tragedy.

So, in conclusion, if I had to get inside the mind of the average liberal journalist/elitist and translate their thoughts into liberalese, it would sound something like this:

“Why don’t these stupid racist, redneck teabaggers just sit down and shut up? Why do they even think that they have a right to participate in the political process anyway? Don’t they realize that we liberals know so much more than them? Besides, the Founding Fathers would have hated their guts. I mean, they are so crass and vulgar with their “target” maps and using phrases like, “Don’t retreat, just reload.” Sure, we use target maps, gun metaphors and incendiary rhetoric (like wishing someone would blow up Rush Limbaugh’s head with a CO2 pellet), but we are so much more educated, so it’s less offensive coming from us. And sure, we might have over-reacted with the whole “Sarah Palin and the Tea Party are accessories to murder” bit, but those teabaggers should just turn the other cheek when we attack them, because they listen to white trash like Sarah Palin and talk radio, so they kind of have it coming anyway.”

OK–well, maybe I might be a bit guilty of stereotyping liberals in that above paragraph. But hey, liberals have been stereotyping conservatives for the last two years with the whole “racist, redneck teabagger” bit. It stings a tad when someone does it back to you, huh?

So, if you lefties are really serious about the whole “new tone” thingy that you all have been whining about this entire week, might I suggest that you do two things. First off, you all really need to apologize to Sarah Palin, the Tea Party and conservatives in general for implying that we were all accessories to mass murder (as well as for all of the degrading insults that you’ve thrown our way for the last two years). I mean, that was really appalling behavior and was totally beyond the pale. To quote Charles Blow (who I never thought that I’d quote):

“Within hours of the shooting, there was a full-fledged witch hunt to link the shooter to the right.

“I saw Goody Proctor with the devil! Oh, I mean Jared Lee Loughner! Yes him. With the devil!”

Now we’ve settled into the by-any-means-necessary argument: anything that gets us to focus on the rhetoric and tamp it down is a good thing. But a wrong in the service of righteousness is no less wrong, no less corrosive, no less a menace to the very righteousness it’s meant to support.

You can’t claim the higher ground in a pit of quicksand.

Concocting connections to advance an argument actually weakens it. The argument for tonal moderation has been done a tremendous disservice by those who sought to score political points in the absence of proof. “

Second of all–and most importantly–you guys in the liberal MSM really owe the victims of the Tuscon shooting, their families and the American people an apology. Most Americans probably didn’t even learn the names of the victims until the president’s Wednesday night speech–four days after the shooting took place. Michelle Malkin has the victims’ names and ages on her blog, but I will list them here so that we may mourn them and pray for them–as well as for Congresswoman Giffords:

The deceased have been identified as: Judge John Roll ,63; Dorthy Murray, 76; Dorwin Stoddard, 76; Christina Greene, 9; Phyllis Scheck, 79; and Gabriel Zimmerman, 30.

Furthermore, until several days after the incident, most Americans probably had no idea about Jared Lee Loughner’s obvious signs of mental illness. So therefore, the American people were denied the debate that our country deserves with regard to how to recognize the signs of mental illness, as well as what to do about it (as Benjamin Kerstein explained in his poignant column).

In other words, the media’s need to “get the witch” was so strong, that it overpowered even their need to report the basic facts of the case. Everyone was talking about Sarah Palin’s “target” map, but no one even knew the victims’ names. (And to make matters worse, Sarah Palin is now getting death threats.) Seriously, shame on you guys in the press. If you all want your “new tone”, then you need to man up, suck it up and apologize first–otherwise, all of your pleas to “end the divisive rhetoric” will sound insincere. Like Mr. Blow said, you can’t claim the moral ground while standing in quick sand. Your “by any means necessary” approach has failed. If you call out for help and reach out an arm by offering a sincere apology, then we will help pull you up. Otherwise, you can all continue to sink in the muck together. The choice is yours.

Cross-posted from Parcbench.

For some odd reason, Sarah Palin causes liberal elites to rabidly foam at the mouth. Professor William Jacobson of the blog Legal Insurrection wrote an insightful piece about how conservatives seem to reflexively defend Palin, because liberals seem to be perpetually attacking her. Furthermore, not only do liberals seem to revel in finding weird reasons to attack Sarah Palin, but they also seem to only be happy when they are attacking her family as well (probably because they see them as little “spawns of Sarah”). Now, why is this? I haven’t a clue. However, I can state beyond a reasonable doubt that it’s not helping them.

For example, a couple of days ago, comediennes Kathy Griffin and Margret Cho both attacked Bristol Palin as “fat”–although Cho was a little more subtle about it than Griffin was. (Robert Stacy McCain wrote an excellent piece about both incidents here.) In fact, Griffin was dumb enough to trash Bristol Palin and refer to her as “the white Precious” in front of a group of servicemen who promptly booed her.

Question–does Ms. Griffin not know her audience at all? These are not liberal elites, like Bill Maher, who think that it’s OK to call Bristol Palin a “Hillbilly Heroine”. These are US soldiers who won’t find calling someone’s twenty year old daughter “fat” at all funny.

Moreover, a few weeks ago comedienne Sandra Bernhard called Bristol Palin a “hooker” on Joy Behar’s show because she placed in the finals on Dancing With the Stars. (Ms. Behar seemed very distressed, herself, and said that “Fred and Ginger died last night”.)

Surprising to say, Behar and Bernhard weren’t the only liberals to get so wee-weed up over Bristol Palin making it to the finals on Dancing With the Stars. Washington Post columnist, Sally Quinn, wrote a long piece about how her head was about to explode because Bristol Palin made it to the finals of Dancing With the Stars. Ann Althouse best described Quinn’s disingenuous hyperventilating when she wrote the following:

And this strangely sanctimonious journalist — she’s writing in the always awful “On Faith” section of The Washington Post — condemns Palin voters for “cheating” 7 paragraphs after she confesses to doing something that is at least as much cheating as what the Palin fans are said to be doing.

“Not only that, but I vote. Under the show’s rules, you’re allowed to vote five times on one line. I have six lines at home and my cell, so I vote as many times as I can for my favorite. “

So this lady, this longtime Washington powerbroker, has 6 phone lines, and she maxes each line out, each week, voting 30 times. But that’s the show’s rules. They can’t tell how many individuals vote are voting. They can only see phone numbers. So if your family of 5 watches the show and you — you economic losers — only have one phone, you can make 5 calls. Sally Quinn happens to have 6 phone lines, so she gets 30 votes — under the rules.

“Commenters on the conservative blog Hillbuzz.org said they had figured out how to enter more votes than the rules allow by creating fake e-mail addresses. One person posting on Hillbuzz said “Lord have mercy, I voted for three hours online! I got 300 in.”

What is a “fake e-mail address”? The rules say you are allowed 5 votes from each email address, just as you are allowed 5 votes from each phone number. Some people have multiple phone numbers and some have multiple email addresses. What’s the difference? All I can think of is that you have to spend money to have multiple phone numbers, and you can get multiple email accounts free. It feels so right for rich folk to get more. I love when liberals slip up like that.

Question–hey Lefties, first of all, you have to know that calling Bristol Palin a “fat hooker” is not a good way to win friends and influence people, right? I mean, Bristol Palin probably wears a size six or a size eight–most American women wear a size ten (Marilyn Monroe wore a size twelve). Do you really think that calling the majority of American women “fat” is a winning strategy for you?

Second of all, you guys do realize that this is just a television show and that normal people don’t freak out or want to shoot the TV because Bristol Palin won, right? Full disclosure here–I’ve never seen an episode of Dancing With the Stars (I’ve watched clips on YouTube), but if one of the Obama girls happen to make it to the finals in a few years, I would be quite happy for her (even if she wasn’t that great of a dancer).

Now, having your head explode over Bristol Palin making it to the finals on Dancing With the Stars is not the only symptom of Palin Derangement Syndrome–apparently, Sarah Palin’s Facebook postings are enough to give a lot of liberals the vapors. For instance, Andrew Sullivan recently wrote a piece whining about Sarah Palin mocking Barack Obama’s famous “57 states gaffe”, and accused her of “trashy behavior” (but, he didn’t say what was “trashy” about her behavior).

[Hey Andrew, by "trashy behavior", do you mean spreading internet rumors that a woman's baby is not really her own, and is that of her teenage daughter? Because that would be you Andrew, not Sarah Palin. But, I digress.]

Well, if Sullivan had any sense of humor at all, he would have written that Palin’s Facebook post was funny and admitted that she had a point that the media tends to give Obama a pass on his gaffes, but tends to hammer everyone else on theirs (as even SNL pointed out during the Democratic primary). Normal people like people who can laugh at themselves and respond very well to self-deprecating humor.

However, Sullivan was not only upset by Sarah Palin’s recent Facebook post, but her daughter Willow’s as well (where she gets involved with trash-talk with another teenager when she defends her sister Bristol). First of all, does Sullivan realize that Willow Palin is a sixteen year old girl, and that normal Americans find it to be very strange and distasteful when grown men pick on other people’s children? Even Jon Stewart told liberals to back off and to “stop making me feel sorry for the Palins”.

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Second of all, does Sullivan realize how weird it is to obsess over Sarah Palin and her family’s Facebook postings? I mean, Sarah Palin was only a vice-presidential nominee –she was never even the vice-president. You don’t see us conservatives obsessing over Joe Leiberman’s or John Edward’s Facebook postings, much less their kids Facebook postings. This is very strange behavior. I would suggest that if reading the Palin family’s Facebook postings upsets you so much, then stop reading them.

Finally, speaking of weird behavior, Charles Blow recently wrote a column about how he wasn’t going to talk about Sarah Palin anymore, but then spent the entire column writing about how much Sarah Palin sucks. Hey Charles, I thought that you said that you weren’t going to talk about Sarah Palin anymore? You see, if most people say that they aren’t going to talk about someone anymore, then they just don’t talk about them anymore–they don’t proceed to, then, write an entire column about how terrible the person is.

In fact, this column of Blow’s is almost as weird as Keith Olbermann naming Bristol Palin his “Worst Person in the World”, or Aaron Sorkin comparing Sarah Palin to Michael Vick for hunting a Caribou. (I’m sure that the millions of hunters all across America deeply appreciate that comparison.) Oh, and Keith, really???!! Bristol Palin is your “Worst Person in the World”? Not Kim Jong-Il, not Ahmadinajad, but Bristol Palin for discussing abstinence?! No, that’s not at all strange to most Americans. (Rolls eyes.)

So, in conclusion, this whole Palin Derangement Syndrome definitely hurt the Left during the past mid-term election, and is continuing to hurt them now. Why? Well, for two obvious reasons. First of all, during the last election, it appeared as if liberals were spending way too much time speaking out against the Palins (none of whom were on the ballot), and not enough time explaining why people should vote for Obama’s policies and liberal candidates. Throughout the previous election, PDS proved to be a huge distraction for the Left.

Second of all, constantly attacking someone’s children as “fat, trashy, hookers” seems, well, quite mean to normal, well-adjusted Americans who aren’t weirdos. Most Americans think that mean people suck and don’t want to vote for a party that seems to embrace nastiness. Hey, you can listen to me, or you can continue smacking around Sarah Palin and her kids. The choice is yours. However, I just have one question for you guys. How did that PDS work out for you in the last election?

This column is cross-posted from Parcbench, The Minority Report, The Green Room, Hillbillypolitics and Right Wing News.

It’s official. Every liberal pundit with an ounce of credibility is either ignoring the latest Vanity Fair column about Sarah Palin, or is running like heck from it. The New York Times, The Washington Post and The Hill have all ignored the story. And now, many noteworthy progressives, such as Kirsten Powers, Ben Smith, Julia Baird and David Weigel are panning it as untrue, disgraceful, sexist blather. In fact, only the far left nutter websites, like Crooks and Liars, see it as any sort of plus for the progressive cause.

So, why the mad dash away from this column by the leftist elites? It’s bashing Sarah Palin, so one would think that they would love it. Well, without much ado and mincing any words, I can tell you the four major reasons why liberals can’t seem to distance themselves from this column fast enough.

1.) Michael Gross, the author of this column, sounds like a blithering idiot, his column is dripping with hatred, and he manages to prove Sarah Palin correct about the “lamestream media”.

First of all, Gross’ column is a poorly written, non-flowing, rambling mess mess consisting of too long paragraphs, run-on sentences, dangling modifiers and non sequiturs. Second of all, his column is completely unsourced–everyone he quotes is either “some say”, “others say”, “someone who knows Levi Johnston says”, and some unnamed woman who says that Sarah Palin used to be her babysitter. (Mr. Gross explains that the reason why nobody will go on the record with him in Alaska is that the Palins are like “the mafia”, and that everyone’s afraid of them. He refers to Wasilla as “a city of fear” that is “populated entirely by abuse survivors”. I’m not kidding–you can read all of his insane fantasies about Sarah Palin cracking kneecaps in his long and crappy article.)

Furthermore, the one person that Gross did name, Shannyn Moore (a well known Sarah Palin hater), wrote him a nasty email where she basically tore him apart for misconstruing her words and taking her out of context. Her entire email is printed below–

Mr. Michael Gross,

You just “Sarah Palined” people here.

I’m going through a list doing damage control and telling people I’m so sorry I gave you their contacts and vouched for your professionalism and credibility.

You have neither.

I don’t give a rip what you said about me – though it was so completely wrong, and put me in such a completely inaccurate and unfavorable light people are mad on my behalf.

Fine thanks for Alaskan hospitality. I have extended the Alaska Spirit to dozens of journalists and visitors, and I will continue to do so. It’s on YOU, not me, as you are the only one who has broken agreements with sources you promised complete anonymity.

I’m sure you’re thrilled to be on TV now. Just know, like Sarah, Alaskans paid a price for it. Specifically, a 79-year old woman, with failing health, who spoke to you under anonymity who hopes her adult children will speak to her again.

Shame on you. You’re not a writer…you’re a climber.

With no respect,

Shannyn Moore

Second of all, Michael Gross’ column was loaded with half-truths, innuendos and out-right lies, all not-so-cleverly disguised as facts. For example, Gross began his column with the following quote–

“Erratic behavior and a pattern of lying matter little.”

Now, you would think that if Gross was going to come out swinging like that, then he must have some serious evidence to back up such powerful assertions such as those–that he, again, makes on Hardball. (See the embed below where Chris Matthews cuts Gross off on goes to Norah O’Donnell, because he realizes that Gross sounds a little nutty and unhealthily obsessed with Sarah Palin.)

However, it turns out that his column is rich in over the top rhetoric, but deeply lacking in facts or evidence. For instance, his smoking gun that Sarah Palin is a crazed liar is that she once said that she didn’t have a lot of experience with special needs children before her son Trig was born, but at a later time mentioned that she has an autistic nephew. (Mr. Gross makes no mention of how much time Palin has spent with her autistic nephew.) Oh, and his airtight evidence that Sarah Palin is a crazy woman with a violent temper who needs to be on “psychiatric medications”, is a story from an “unnamed source” about her and Todd Palin getting in a fight and throwing canned food at the refrigerator–and the fact that one of her teenage kids was supposedly embarrassed by her praying in public and called her a “phony”.

["Coming up on Live News at Five, married couples sometimes fight and teenagers are embarrassed by their parents. Next up--dog bites man."]

However, CNN reporter, Peter Hamby, has since contradicted Michael Gross with the following Tweet where he states–

I was w/ Palin for entire VP bid. never got a hint that she “lashed out at the slightest provocation”

So, another one of Michael Gross’ accusations bites the dust.

And finally, the most embarrassing part about Michael Gross’ article is that it has two serious factual errors in it.

One major mistake Michael Gross made in his column is he referred to Dr. Gina Loudon as Trig’s nanny, when she was actual the mother of Samuel, another special needs child with Down Syndrome that was backstage at a fundraiser with the Palins. Here is an exert of Gross’ column below–

“When …Piper Palin turns around, she sees her parents thronged by admirers, and the crowd rolling toward her and the baby, her brother Trig, born with Down syndrome in 2008. Sarah Palin and her husband, Todd, bend down and give a moment to the children; a woman, perhaps a nanny, whisks the boy away; and Todd hands Sarah her speech and walks her to the stage.”

Now, here are some exerts from Dr. Gina Loudon’s column rebutting the above statement by Michael Gross (be sure to click on the link to her column to see an adorable picture of Piper)–

“Unfortunately for Mr. Gross, it happens that I shared the stage with Sarah Palin at that event.”

“As I stood backstage with the Palins I remember a reporter asking me if I were “Trig’s Nanny” with a hint of something I didn’t trust in his eyes. I coldly retorted, “no, I am Samuel’s mother.” He looked confused, and had more questions to follow. In his VF story, he said that no one is willing to speak about Sarah “on the record” unless they are paid by her, or afraid. I was one of the people you interviewed Mr. Gross. I am not paid, or afraid. But since you opted not to print what I told you, here is the rest of the story:Since the first time the Governor saw my son Samuel (who also has Down syndrome), she bolts across the room to greet him every time she sees him. She nuzzles him like a mother who loves children with Down syndrome does. I remember commenting to my husband that she always “does the mama smell” of Samuel, that only moms understand.

All of the Palin children circle around Samuel the moment they can get close, but Piper, in particular, cannot seem to get enough of him. She literally plays with him (Gross does say she played with “the children” in his story) from the moment she sees him, until the moment she is pressed to let go of him. It is so sweet, and it speaks to the parenting in her life. She has obviously been taught a real, tangible love for “special children” by her parents, and it shines when she lights up at the sight of a baby with Down syndrome. This is not an ordinary reaction in children. Most children step away, look curious, or frightened, or confused. Not the Palin children, and especially not little Piper.

After an event in Nashville, the Governor went to the trouble of making a special call to me to thank me and tell me how much Piper enjoyed “loving on” my Samuel.

One more thing among your errors: “the boy” in the excerpted quote above, was not Trig Palin. That was my Samuel, also a beautiful boy with Down syndrome. No “nanny whisk(ed) the boy away.” I am his mother. I took my son, Samuel from Sarah before she went on stage. I told Mr. Gross that fact, but he didn’t let that divert him from his pathetic narrative.

That is not journalism. That is just gross.”

Ouch–that’s gotta sting a bit. I mean, Dr. Gina Loudon makes Mr. Gross look like he was so busy with his witch hunt on Sarah Palin, that he couldn’t even bother to get his facts straight–you know, like who the child in question really was, or who his mother was (however, he probably thinks that all Down’s Syndrome children look alike).

Now, the second major mistake in Michael Gross’ column is that repeats a rumor about Sarah Palin supposedly wanting a shotgun wedding for her daughter Bristol and Levi Johnston, that everyone who’s anyone in the media and blogs knows is total bunk. Both Ben Smith and Dave Weigel call Gross to the carpet on printing this known fabrication. To be specific, Michael Gross wrote the following with regard to the supposed plans that Sarah Palin had for a shotgun wedding for Bristol and Levi–

“Soon after her nomination, she brought up with McCain aides the subject of Bristol’s out-of-wedlock pregnancy by Levi Johnston: “Would it be good for the campaign if they got married before the election?” she asked, and went on to wonder whether one weekend or another would be more advantageous for media coverage.”

Dave Weigel responds to this unsubstantiated rumor in Gross’ column by writing the following–

“Smith explains that the quote came from a wild yarn in a UK Times story, passed on by a McCain campaign source, even though “the idea was never brought to Palin, much less seriously considered.” I can confirm that because I heard it from the same source, albeit after the campaign was over. It was, as I understand it, a goof, and it went to print because, basically, UK papers have more lax standards on what they print than American papers. Of course, it’s not like American papers have covered themselves in glory when “analyzing” Palin’s family based on rumors.

Point is, this anecdote is bunk, and it makes me wonder about the rest of the story.”

Dave Weigel just took the words right out of my mouth–I couldn’t have said it better myself. In a nutshell, what it looks like, is that, at best, Michael Gross was so obsessed with his witchhunt to paint Sarah Palin as Lucifer, that he engaged in some really sloppy journalism–and at worst, that he was outright lying (I vote for all of the above).

Now, on to the second reason why liberals are running scared from Michael Gross’ disgusting column.

2.) Michael Gross’ hit piece on Sarah Palin was just dripping with blatant sexism.

Gross goes out of his way to paint Sarah Palin as a bad mother, which everyone knows is classic sexism 101. One example that he gave was that she missed her children on the campaign trail, so when they were with her, she hung out with them too much and didn’t insist that they do their homework (someone needs to call child protective services…rolls eyes). Oh, and she insisted that her little girl get the pink and purple markers that she wanted to sign autographs with, and that a hairdresser do hair and make-up for another daughter. Please, allow me to put this another way. Could any of you imagine if someone wrote a column implying that Barack Obama was a bad father because he wasn’t around his daughters much during the 2008 campaign, and because he got them some pink markers to sign autographs?! Liberals would be screaming at the top of their lungs that the column was ridiculous garbage–and they would be right.

However, Gross’ disgusting sexism doesn’t stop at attacking Sarah Palin’s parenting skills. He goes on to say that “someone” (his favorite source) told him that an aide asked if Sarah Palin needed psychiatric medication–again, a classic and very transparent sexist technique implying that she’s some unstable “harridan” with raging hormones. Furthermore, Gross even goes so far as to write that “some say” that Todd Palin is “henpecked”. (I’m not kidding–he actually wrote the word “henpecked”.) Progressive Newsweek columnist, Julia Baird (who is certainly no Sarah Palin fan), wrote a column titled, Will Feminists Rally Around Sarah Palin?, where she did an excellent job defending Sarah Palin from these pathetic attacks. The excerpts below from her column pretty much say it all–

“It’s just about the lamest card in the pack of criticisms leveled at powerful women: you must be a Bad Mother. Just when you think we’ve accepted that a woman can have a job and still love her children, along comes another piece of reporting to remind us that some people still think it’s fair to judge a female public figure on the basis of what kind of parent—and wife—she is. This is something male politicians, who have long perfected the role of absent father, deal with very, very rarely.

While all politicians are vulnerable to personal attacks, some attacks are particularly shameful. So what is the substance of these allegations?

First, Palin may have something representing a modern marriage, which has prompted some locals to speculate that Todd may be “henpecked.” Fancy that charge being leveled at the husband of a woman with opinions. It’s striking that while the husbands of successful women are frequently portrayed as emasculated by their wives’ success, the women who marry powerful men are usually seen to benefit from their greater status.

Second, Palin’s work has affected her closeness to her kids: we are told that “at least since the start of the 2008 campaign, Todd has been shouldering the bulk of the parenting and that Sarah’s relationship with her children has grown more distant.” And yet a few sentences later we also learn that when she grew lonely on the campaign trail, Palin wanted her kids to travel with her because she “seemed comforted” by having them around. But instead of empathizing—who wouldn’t hate to be separated from their kids?—the implication is that she is selfish: the kids came, but not much homework was done. What choice would you make?

The third allegation is that she was a sloppy parent when her kids traveled with her, and she failed to discipline them adequately, at least in the eyes of some observers: “On the road, aides say, Sarah spared the rod.” She reportedly demanded one child use the pink and purple Sharpies the youngster wanted to sign autographs with (not the black one that was provided) and insisted another have hair and makeup done by a campaign stylist. She was hardly being cruel; it’s stupid to judge such trivial incidents without context.”

Furthermore, liberals now have a perception problem that they seem to tolerate blatant sexism within their ranks–as long as it aimed at any woman that gets in Barack Obama’s way. Throughout the 2008 Presidential election, many prominent liberals seemed to gleefully participate in a dogpile of sexism and misogyny directed at both Hillary Clinton and Sarah Palin. In fact, liberal sexism became so rampant during the 2008 election that Democratic strategist, Kirsten Powers, (one of the many progressives currently running away from this Vanity Fair hit piece) was alarmed enough by it to write a column in the summer of 2008 titled, A Brilliant Trap Makes Dems The Male Chauvinists. To be specific, Powers wrote the following with regard to the appalling behavior of many Obama supporters–

“One Obama supporter and political operative blogged, “In picking an unknown, untested half-a-term governor from Alaska . . . John McCain is following in a long line of reckless men who have rolled the dice for a beauty queen.”

Do we really have to do this again?

No sooner was Hillary Rodham Clinton out of the race, and a new woman is in the cross hairs.

On CNN, during a discussion about whether it was appropriate for Palin to accept this job when she has a baby, Dana Bash pointed out it’s unlikely anyone would ask this of a male candidate.

I can’t help wondering if this is a trap. The McCain camp watched and learned as Obama supporters offended Hillary supporters by their treatment of her. The McCainiacs had to know that this group is incapable of behaving, that Palin would bring out their worst instincts.

One top Republican said to me: “Just wait until she is debating Joe Biden and he starts attacking or condescending to her. Hillary voters are going to say, ‘Oh yeah, I remember this.’ “

Ironically, two feminist, leftist bloggers recently wrote an op-ed in The New York Times titled, A Palin of Our Own where they lament the rise of Sarah Palin as a feminist icon. However, what is so ironic about this column is that liberals helped to create the superstar that is Sarah Palin by sending moderate, suburban women (some of them former Hillary Clinton supporters) running into her arms with their obnoxious, misogynistic behavior (for example, Keith Olbermann hoping that someone would beat up Hillary Clinton). And, deep down inside, they know that this is true–which is why they are running like heck from this recent vicious, sexist hit-piece on Sarah Palin.

Now, on to the third reason why liberals are throwing Michael Gross under the bus with gusto.

3.) When Michael Gross is not attacking Sarah Palin in his column, he is attacking her supporters–who are his fellow Americans.

Gross paints Sarah Palin’s supporters at her rallies as a bunch of incurious simpletons who “cling to their guns and their religion”. To be specific, Gross writes the following about the people who attend Sarah Palin’s rallies–

“People who admire her believe she is just like them, and this conviction seems to satisfy their curiosity about the objective facts of her life.”

Whoa. If that’s not a round about way of calling Sarah Palin’s supporters a bunch incurious, uneducated dumb dumbs who don’t understand “the objective facts of life”, then I don’t know what is.

Moreover, Gross writes in his column about how Palin is sending out a “dog whistle” to Evangelical Christians in her speeches when she uses the phrase, “Leading with a servant’s heart”, and then prattles on about how she gets emails from Evangelical Christians who pray for her and call themselves “prayer warriors”. Mr. Gross is clearly bothered by the prayer warriors and thinks that they are a bunch of dangerous crazies–it is painfully obvious when he writes the following–

“The term “prayer warrior” describes a person who offers a specific kind of supplication: asking God to direct an unseen battle between forces of light and darkness—literal angels and demons—that some Christians believe is occurring all around us.”

Yeah, those Christians have always been a delusional, dangerous bunch. Remember how they were personally responsible for ending the African slave trade? They’ve always been unpredictable and crazy like that. You never know what they’re going to do next (rolls eyes).

Now, do I really need to explain to anyone why attacking and mocking random American citizens is a big no-no for a journalist? This really should be common sense. It is one thing to attack a politician, a journalist, a blogger, or any other public figure. It is quite another thing to show such disdain–as well as religious bigotry–towards your fellow Americans. In other words, private citizens who are minding their own business should be able to attend a Sarah Palin rally, or attend any church that they want to, without some know nothing, liberal elitist journalist mocking them in Vanity Fair.

And finally, on to the fourth reason why liberals are high-tailing it in the the opposite direction of Micheal Gross.

4.) Franky speaking, Michael Gross sounds like a pervert who is way too interested in Sarah Palin’s undergarments, as well as her sex life.

For starters, Gross writes about how “this person” told him that Sarah and Todd Palin don’t always sleep in the same bed and that Todd once supposedly said, “I don’t know how she even gets pregnant”. Yuck. I feel like I need to take a shower now. I mean, could any of you imagine if some right wing journalist started asking local people in Chicago about the Obama’s sex life?! I rest my case.

Furthermore, Mr. Gross admits to having dinner with Joe McGinniss at his house–you know, the weirdo who moved in next door to the Palin family in order to stalk, I mean, report on them? Now, right away, Gross freely admits that McGinniss is lying about not being able to see into the Palin’s home. Gross writes that, when he was standing on McGinniss’ deck, “it was possible to see several of the Palins’ windows, a fair bit of the yard, and much of the lakefront edge of their property”. However, Gross then goes on to sympathize with Joe McGinniss and paint him as a victim who has received over 5000 hostile emails and has had one of his truck windows shot out. Oh, oh, I have an idea! Pick me Teacher, pick me. How about not stalking the Palin family, and then you won’t have to worry about receiving hostile emails by people calling you a “stalker”? But, I digress.

However, by far the creepiest part of Michael Gross’ column was when he not once, but twice referenced what kind of undergarments Sarah Palin wears. Specifically, Gross writes about how “a friend” of Sarah Palin supposedly told him–

“Once, while Sarah was preparing for a city-council meeting, she said, ‘I’m gonna put on one of my push-up bras so I can get what I want tonight.’ That’s how she rolls.”

OK–why would anyone who calls himself a journalist even bother to write down smut like this? But Mr. Gross was just getting warmed up. Further down in his column, Gross wrote that Sarah Palin spent $3000 on Spanx girdles during the 2008 campaign. Oh for crying out loud! It’s so obvious what Gross is trying to do here (besides acting like a real creep/weirdo)–he is clearly trying attack to Sarah Palin’s beauty and imply that her looks are just a mirage, and she’s really kind of fat. Yeah, that Sarah Palin–she’s a real uggo and a fatty. What is she? A size four? What a cow! (Rolls eyes.)

By the way, just an explanation here. You don’t have to be “fat” to wear Spanx or a girdle occasionally (especially after you’ve just had a baby). Every woman has that unforgiving dress that, on a “fat day” when you might be retaining some water, can make even the most svelt, toned woman look like she has a bulge. Full disclosure–I am a size two and even I have to sometimes use “help” when I wear an unforgiving dress on a bad day. If not, then even a very attractive, tall, slim woman with toned arms can wind up looking like this in a unforgiving dress–

And that’s no good, because that just doesn’t do any woman justice. Every well brought up red state woman knows that the right undergarments are essential to dressing well and presenting your self with style–otherwise, you can wind up looking like your letting it all hang out a bit too much. (Just ask Dolly–see 1:18-1:49 in the embed below).

However, let’s move on from this topic of conversation, because Michael Gross might be getting turned on–uh, I mean some of the guys might be getting bored.

So, in conclusion, Michael Gross not only not only made a flaming ass out of himself, but he also totally humiliated the liberal mainstream media. He managed to bring every caricature of an elitist, egotistical, out of touch, liberal journalist to life. And the worst part was that he was incredibly sloppy with many of the facts–which in turn, discredits his entire piece. Credible leftist/progressive journalists and columnists can’t flee from his disaster of a column fast enough–and I don’t blame them.

However, sad to say, this isn’t the first time that Vanity Fair has written an outrageous, totally unsourced hit piece on a politician. During the 2008 campaign Todd Purdum wrote a totally unsourced hit piece in Vanity Fair about Bill Clinton, implying that he was openly dating while campaigning for Hillary in South Carolina. (Whatever you may think of Bill Clinton, I live in SC. If Bill Clinton was going out publicly clubbing and picking up women, someone, somewhere would have seen him. SC is a small state.) Furthermore, Purdum then wrote a totally unsourced hit piece on Sarah Palin a year later. Surprise, surprise. (Has anyone ever noticed that Vanity Fair has never written an unsourced hit piece on Barack Obama?)

But now, Vanity Fair’s chickens have come home to roost. They have gotten away with writing unsourced hit pieces for so long, that they got over-confident. This time, they gave Michael Gross carte blanche to pretty much write what ever he damn well pleased–muddled facts, sexism, stalkers, underwear and all. To tell the truth, I’m not at all surprised that some columnist, somewhere, would write something like this; however, I am surprised that any editor would actually go through with publishing it. Basically, Vanity Fair unintentionally gave Michael Gross just enough rope to hang himself, and Vanity Fair’s credibility in the process. Michael Gross’ column should serve as a cautionary tale for progressive journalists everywhere. Don’t let your love of all things Obama and your hatred of Sarah Palin get the best of you–or you will wind up proving Sarah Palin correct about the “lamestream media”.

Update: Michael Gross has now come out and admitted that he was wrong about “the nanny whisking Trig away”, and he has now admitted that he wrote about the wrong baby–and the wrong mother. However, the fact that he would make this kind of ridiculous “mistake” in the first place, tells me that he really didn’t go to Alaska to find out the facts about Sarah Palin. Gross obviously went there to try to dig up dirt–and he failed miserably and made fool out of himself in the process.

This column is cross-posted from NewsReal, The Minority Report and 73 Wire.

Whether you agree with her conservatism or not, this was a well done video; uplifting in an activist sort of way. It’s not big on policy issues because it was never meant to be about policy issues but a renewal of the American voices that seem to be fading away in the cacophony of liberal angst. If those who shout loudest are the only ones heard, the next video fails miserably.

I can think of only one word to describe this one: Infantilism. There’s the nurse, the teacher, the therapist, and the entertainment lawyer. It’s scary to think these people are in charge of anything in any one of those fields. It’s even scarier to realize that at least one of them is in charge of someone’s children somewhere.

The last video reminds me of the old saying: “Babies raising babies.” If not their own, yours.

Crossposted at Redstate.com



Throughout the 2008 election cycle, after Sarah Palin was chosen to run as VP, Democrats consistently compared Palin to Obama as if she were running for president instead of vice president, there are many reasons for tactic that have been well documented but suffice it to say Democrats felt more comfortable with that match up.

That was then, this in now…

With Obama’s approval ratings on a downward spiral for months now a new CNN/Opinion Research Poll shows the gap between the president and Palin in down to 1 percentage point.

Facing double-digit unemployment, rising spending, deficits and Afghan war casualties plus a keystone but stalled healthcare reform effort that caused a rare Sunday presidential visit to Capitol Hill, Obama recently fell below 50% job approval for the first time.Then, last week’s deft dance of rhetoric over sending reinforcements to Afghanistan but, on the other foot, bringing them home quickly maybe gave him a brief boost. That, however, collapsed with equal rapidity.

Obama’s new Gallup Poll job approval number is 47%. Last month it was 53%.

Regular Ticket readers will recall how in this space in late November we pointed out that Obama’s closely-watched job approval slide was coinciding with Palin’s little-noticed rise in favorability. And it appeared they might cross somewhere in the 40s.

Well, ex-Sen. Obama, meet ex-Gov. Palin.

The new CNN/Opinion Research Poll shows Palin now at 46% favorable, just one point below her fellow basketball fan.

(The same poll, btw, has bad news for Dick Cheney-haters; the outspoken former VP has climbed out of the 29% basement back up to 39% now. How do you suppose he’s done that without a new book? But that’s another story.)

Not that either Palin or Obama will admit caring about such trivial things as disparate political polls….

What a change a year can make, just 56 weeks, and the presidents approval ratings are going south like a duck in winter. Supporters will claim that it’s George W. Bush’s fault, citing the same tired talking points that have been echoed now for years “the failed Bush policies” and pointing to an inherited rescission.

Critics will claim that the bloom is off the rose and American’s, having seen the type of policies Obama has instituted and supports, have not lived up to the hype (in many cases failing altogether) along with the promise of jobs that have failed to materialize.

While this poll may give some hope and others woe, it’s just a blip on the radar screen of time and in politics one never knows what could happen tomorrow.

Cross-Posted from 73wire.com

….[or High School Musical 4: The Beltway]

I’m sure that many of you have read David Brooks’ recent column in The New York Times (or should I say tirade), where he rants on and on about the evils of Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, Sean Hannity and Bill O’Reilly. However, what Mr. Brooks also did in his column—either intentionally or unintentionally—was to display intense disdain for the listeners and viewers of the above entertainers and pundits when he wrote that those entertainers expressed themselves using “spittle-flecked furor” and that they “represent a mere niche of the Republican Party”. Robert Stacy McCain wrote an excellent blog about Mr. Brooks’ obvious disdain for conservatives titled, “David Brooks Hates You” that is a must read. But, I feel that David Brooks displayed another emotion in his dreadful column besides just hatred, and if you will bear with me, I would like to translate Mr. Brooks’ column by reading between the lines and deciphering what he really means.—

“For the life of me, I can not understand why all of those bitter, xenophobic, Bible-thumping clingers love O’Reilly, Limbaugh, Beck and Hannity so much—particularly Limbaugh and Beck. I mean, why do hayseeds love those two chubby, former addicts more than me?! Don’t they all know that I am the favorite “conservative” of the liberal elites? Sure, O’Reilly , Limbaugh, Hannity and Beck might all have sky-high ratings and millions of listeners/viewers (and Beck has unheard of ratings for an afternoon slot), but I write for The New York Freaking Times!! And, I’m frequently on Meet the Press and PBS (shows so prestigious that they do not need actual viewers)—and people who listen to NPR love me (they can listen to me and get a free tote bag). That’s got to mean something. You see, I’ve got the much more sophisticated audience, so the Republican base should really appreciate me and listen to me more, instead of paying so much attention to what bloviators like Limbaugh and Beck have to say. But hey, all of us over at The Times realize that the Republican party is “no party of Einsteins”, so they really don’t know what’s best for them, do they? Oh well, you know what “they” say—a prophet is least appreciated in his own land.

Now, about Glenn Beck—God I hate that chubby, weeping Mormon, and all of his stupid viewers. Beck thinks that he’s so cool just because he was able to expose corruption in the NEA and ACORN, force Van Jones to resign, and inspire hundreds of thousands people to descend on DC in order to protest the Obama Administration’s big government programs. But so what? That’s nothing really. Don’t these bitter clingers who watch Beck know that I wrote “Bobos in Paradise”? Sure, nobody really read it, but all of the elite intelligentsia bought it to put on their bookshelves so that people who attend their cocktail parties would think that they were smart and well-read.

Furthermore, I am famous for my pearls of wisdom, such as saying that Sarah Palin isn’t ready to run for vice president because “experience matters” and calling her a “fatal cancer on the GOP” simply because she doesn’t think like me (see embed below). Now granted, Senator Obama had less real experience when he ran for president than Sarah Palin had when she ran for vice president. However, that’s really neither here nor there, because Barack Obama is much more like ME and runs in MY circles, whereas Sarah Palin does not—and that’s what those hayseeds who watch Beck, instead of listening to me, don’t understand. I mean, don’t they know who I think I am?

Also, I wasn’t a big fan of how Hannity, O’Reilly, and particularly Beck, yammered on and on about Van Jones until he resigned. (By the way, you all know that I really do have enough influence to get someone to resign if I wanted them to, right?) OK—so Van Jones may be a nutty 9/11 truther and a self-avowed communist, but he’s a friend of my colleague, Thomas Friedman. And besides, Van Jones is a lot like me in that we are both Ivy League educated elites. Furthermore, Jones also wrote a book that no one really read, but that elites like to display on their book shelves in order to create the impression being well-read. You know, come to think of it, maybe Thomas Friedman was on to something when he floated his idea of the US having a one party autocracy similar to that of China. I mean, it would be nice if me, Thomas Friedman and Van Jones ran things, because we know so much more than the troglodytes in the Republican base who listen to Limbaugh, Beck, O’Reilly and Hannity, but I digress.

And finally, I am no fan of the way O’Reilly, Limbaugh, Hannity and Beck relentlessly attack Barack Obama, because I have a serious man-crush on him. We have exchanged emails and I was extremely impressed by him. Unlike the Republican base who likes Beck, Limbaugh, O’Reilly and Hannity better than me, Barack Obama understands me and respects me. He can even read my mind.

Maybe President Obama will invite me to go with him to the next big White House gala. That would be awesome! We could talk all night about me, and then HIM, and then me again. (I just hope Obama doesn’t ask Chris Matthews to go with him instead of me. I know—next time President Obama calls me, I can three-way call Chris Matthews and I can trick him into saying something bad about Obama, but I digress.) Then, all of those bitter hicks in the Republican base can see how cool I really am, and then they will be sorry that they never listen to me.”

—Translation: You’re David Brooks and you’re jealous.

(H/T to Stuart Schwartz of The American Thinker for the title.)

This diary was originally posted on The Minority Report.

Even after Sarah Palin, as a private citizen, had won the battle against “The Death Panels” by having the language stricken from the Senate version of the bill, in one weeks time… Far-left union-backed group Americans United For Change are targeting Sarah’s fans on Facebook fan with an Ad calling her a lair.

Starting today thousands of Palin fans will be treated to this ad while on Facebook

The ad takes you to to this page on the Americans United For Change website asking you to send Sarah Palin a letter telling her to stop lying…

Dear Sarah,

Americans Need Real Health Insurance Reform. Please stop lying about “Death Panels.”

They then so on to show three links that reportedly debunk the claims made about these panels. Problem is the language is in both bills and although you won’t find the phrase “Death Panels” (liberal would never be that blatant in a bill) these panels remain part of the House bill that passes and were removed from the Senate version as a direct result of Sarah Palin calling them on it!

This latest attempt by Americans United For Change is a silly last ditch effort to try and regain some sort of advance after having been clobbered by a former politician they despise and the American people who obviously don’t hold any value to e group if they aren’t towing their socialistic propaganda line.

My feeling is that this ad will be about as successful as their previous failed attempt:

THE REAL DEATH PANELS: Insurance Companies That Deny Care

By the way, I might add, that it is always dangerous to put your faith (or look for “the Truth”) in another human being, because they will always eventually disappoint you. For example, if you wanted to put your faith in me, I would strongly advise against it and would warn that it would end quite badly for you. Not that I don’t try to be a good person–I do, but I am also a fallible human being with many flaws who constantly makes mistakes (just ask Steve Foley, George Claghorn, Caleb Howe, and Mike DeVine who I perpetually annoy to help me embed cornball videos on to my blogs for my own amusement)–oh, and by the way, so is Obama. In fact, he is already in the process of disappointing his followers by destroying business confidence (as our own Francis Cianfrocca (Blackhead) points out in his excellent column), by screwing up the stimulus bill, and by simply appearing to be in over his head (as Michael Wolff points out in his excellent column). In fact, just today, The Politico’s Jonathan Martin wrote a column titled, “Friendly Fire: NYT Hits Obama”, about how it is “unprecedented for him to get hit on the same day by columnists Frank Rich, Thomas Friedman, Maureen Dowd–and the paper’s lead editorial”. Martin further added that, “These are friendly voices that have been sympathetic, and even at times, gushing toward Obama during the campaign and in his administration’s early days”. But, what was most damning, was when Martin wrote that, “The sentiment, coming just two months after the President was sworn in, reflects elite opinion in the Washington-New York corridor that Obama is increasingly overwhelmed, and not fully appreciative of the building tsunami of populist outrage”.

So, in conclusion, the far-left and the MSM can only make excuses for Obama for so long. Eventually, they will run out of columns to write about Levi Johnston (the last time that I checked, he is not responsible for the economy), Rush Limbaugh, and bonuses going to “greedy AIG executives“ (that have been planned for months), and they will have to start covering the Obama administration for real–and they will probably be disappointed (he can’t possibly live up to the expectations that were set for him), and will turn on him. In fact Frank Rich, who last week wrote a column comparing Bristol Palin to a sexual deviant, wrote a column today about the Obama administration titled, “Has a Katrina Moment Arrived?”. However, I think that for the MSM to blame Barack Obama for their unethical journalism is a cop-out. In my opinion, they should blame themselves (which they probably won’t do) for thinking that by projecting all of their hopes on to, and by putting their faith into, an inexperienced Chicago politician, that they could somehow fill the void in their pathetically empty lives.

This diary is cross-posted on The Minority Report.