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Friday, August 29, 2008

Sarah Palin Is an Anagram for “A Sharp Nail”

posted by on August 29 at 10:12 AM

palin-in-the-car.jpg

A sharp nail straight into my heart. She’s killing my longstanding fantasy—that McCain would rediscover his maverick backbone and use this campaign to hurl evangelicals off the Republican train and put out the call to Goldwater conservatives to take back their hijacked party.

But this Palin is a “conservative Christian,” fiercely pro-life, and pundits on the Christian Broadcasting Network are wetting their tight little khakis over her selection. From Dr. Land, at the Southern Baptist Convention:

Governor Palin is a vice-presidential selection which shows that John McCain at the age of 72 today is still able to think outside the box. Governor Palin will delight the Republican base. She is pro-life. She is an avid hunter and member of The National Rifle Association and is both a conservationist and someone who avidly believes in exploiting our fossil fuel resources as well as developing other forms of energy. A mother of five and a background as a television commentator makes her appear to be a very solid candidate for appealing to a lot of women who feel that Senator Clinton was treated disrespectfully by the Obama camp.

Great. Just great. Nothing would’ve been better for the party than to ditch its social-conservative/fiscally-spendy/Rapture-Ready wing and embrace its better, more Goldwater half. (Plus, McCain, as a former POW, could’ve killed the sharpest criticism of Goldwater—that he was dumb about Vietnam—by saying he understands all too well the cost of that war, blah blah blah.)

But this Palin chick is suffocating the dream. And sucking all the dramatic tension out of the Convention, which I’d hoped would be a Night of Long Knives, in which McCain and his band of secret agnostic assassins slit the throats of jerkbags who look like this:

brody-MD.jpg

I blame Obama and the wedgies he shoved into the evangelical base.

Now, by picking Palin, McCain’s put himself in bed with people who write crap like this (from an evangelical blog):

I have been amazed at the number of younger evangelicals (early career and college) that are flocking to Obama. He has the mark of cain and is proud of it, yet that seems not to matter to them.

(Mark of Cain? Real classy, Christian guy. American Evangelicals: Marrying Idiocy and Bigotry Since the Flood™.)

McCain could’ve done the right thing—lost the election while getting rid of the most pernicious force in American politics since racism. But he had to go and pick Palin for vice president.

But she’ll always be McCain’s vice to me.

RSS icon Comments

1

The mark of McCain?

Posted by Zach | August 29, 2008 9:46 AM
2

or La Piranhas.

Posted by cochise. | August 29, 2008 9:47 AM
3

She looks like Karen Walker from Will & Grace.

Posted by Darrell | August 29, 2008 9:50 AM
4

Boy, talk about being surprised ... I didn't know Tina Fey was a Republican.

Posted by Moose | August 29, 2008 9:51 AM
5

The talking heads on TV are also salivating because they say this effectively neuters Joe Biden because if he is nothing but nice to her at the debate the Democratic pare will look like wife-beaters.

Posted by elswinger | August 29, 2008 9:53 AM
6

@5, but will McCain call his running mate a cunt like he does his wife?

Posted by Cato the Younger Younger | August 29, 2008 9:54 AM
7

The NPR commentators on KUOW were at a total loss to explain this choice and McCain's introduction of her in Dayton made me laugh out loud when he mumbled something about how she's taken on the oil companies - HA HA HA, WHAT??!?

The best part was that as she was supposed to come to the mic and say something, NPR's feed was cut and there was dead silence on the channel.

Posted by Just Sayin' | August 29, 2008 9:58 AM
8

If Goldwater was such a libertarian, why were southern segregationists the only folks who voted for him in large enough numbers for him to win electoral delegates? Oh yeah, small government meant states' rights... Oh and anti-government meant anti-UN, go-it-alone foreign policy. Doesn't sound like it was all that different from the party of today.

Goldwater wasn't the antithesis of socially conservative Republicans. Nelson Rockefeller was. Or maybe Dan Evans, who actually drove the John Birchers out of the state party here after Goldwater went down in flames.

Posted by Trevor | August 29, 2008 9:58 AM
9

@3 Apt comparison, since she and McCain together look like a bad sitcom. Vote for gramps and his live-in caregiver!

Posted by whatevernevermind | August 29, 2008 9:59 AM
10

My favorite was when he slipped and said she would 'Put her own interests over your needs'.

Posted by Darrell | August 29, 2008 10:01 AM
11

Better knock off the cheap shots. Sorry to say it but Palin, in her debut national speech in Dayton, just knocked it out of the park. She cited her union credentials and the fact that she killed the Bridge to Nowhere. She matched Biden's son going to Iraq with one of her own. She congratulated Hillary and said disaffected Democratic women now had a choice. She's confident and smart and is going to be a terrific campaigner.

The fact that she may have minimal presidential qualifications is of little consequence in an electoral sense. The Republicans are looking for a slice of votes on the margin that everyone agrees will make the difference.

Palin will absolutely energize the right wing. Obama can forget about conservatives staying home. This is a Rovian choice, pure and simple, and much as it pains me to say it, a brilliant one. At least on Day One.

Posted by Mr. Viking | August 29, 2008 10:01 AM
12

Did McCain pick his VP or his next wife?

Posted by crazycatguy | August 29, 2008 10:03 AM
13

I'd love to see McCain explain his Pro-choice-ness right next to Palin's pro-life-ness.

Cellophane is less transparent than this VP choice, even to concerned Republicans.

Why didn't he choose Condi Rice, then?

What if Palin wasn't a woman? Bet you "he" wouldn't have been even looked at.

Posted by mackro mackro | August 29, 2008 10:04 AM
14

Anal ash rip.
Piranha Sal.
P.S. Anal Hair
A phars. A nil. (stretch)
Alas! HR pain! (also a stretch)
Ha! Liar 'n' sap!

Posted by Spoogie | August 29, 2008 10:11 AM
15

uh, yeah.

OK, this choice is going to make the Evangelicals happy and maybe insure that they vote, but was there any doubt of that? They'd either have ended up voting for McCain anyway, or at worst, not voting at all. But this choice doesn't make much sense when it comes to going after the indie voters. I think people like to think they're dumb, or wishy-washy about voting unless a candidate appeals to them, but that's just not so. She is an unknown, she's completely inexperienced in national affairs and with McCain as a very elderly president there's a good chance she could end up as president herself. And by picking Palin, the Republicans just cut themselves off from using the "Obama is not experienced enough to be president" charge as an effective campaign tool.

And, do you really think Hillary supporters are going to ditch Obama by the droves to vote for this woman because she has a vagina, "just like Hillary!"?

It's a bizaare choice.

Posted by michael strangeways | August 29, 2008 10:11 AM
16

@4 Um, were you not paying attention to the Democratic primaries? A female politician on the national stage has a dual role to fill more complex than Madonna/whore. If Biden smacks her down, America will tut-tut at Joe Biden, and then turn around and talk about how weak Palin is. If she manages a comeback, America will joke about how she's trying to be a man. Get ready for more talk of cankles, pantsuits, sagging tits.

Posted by Gitai | August 29, 2008 10:13 AM
17

from you post, it sounds like you'd like the GOP to save itself instead of destroying itself. i advocate the latter.

Posted by max solomon | August 29, 2008 10:18 AM
18

She shore has a purty mouth.

Posted by LDP in Cincinnati | August 29, 2008 10:19 AM
19

Sarah Palin, the Anagrams
a poem

Has anal rip?
Hi, anal rasp.
I, a harsh rasp,
As a harsh pair.
Aha! Lips ran!

Posted by elenchos | August 29, 2008 10:23 AM
20

Biden will destroy her.

Posted by meggers | August 29, 2008 10:24 AM
21

I want America to have good conservatives—there is such a thing—instead of shitheads. It would be better for the country, better for liberals, better for everyone. Instead, we get these shitheads who are dragging everyone down.

Imagine, for a second, a conservative party that was pro-legalization, pro-gay rights, pro-all the good social issues. And their fights with liberals would be over degrees of foreign entanglement, free trade, big vs. small government—you know, they way it's supposed to work in a two-party democracy. Instead everyone's wasting time on blowjobs and marriage rights and Drug Wars—shit that either doesn't matter or doesn't work or is so self-evident it doesn't require debate.

I want the conservatives to be better than they are, for our sakes and for theirs.

Now I'm even nauseating myself. Excuse me while I go change my Pollyanna panties.

Posted by Brendan Kiley | August 29, 2008 10:28 AM
22

uh... we have been edited.

apparently their is no internet.

Posted by zip the cat | August 29, 2008 10:28 AM
23

It's probably best for Biden to go after "McCain's judgement", since we're electing a *president*, not a vice president.

I don't see why people think Biden will be forced to debate Palin one on one.

Posted by mackro mackro | August 29, 2008 10:29 AM
24

I want to fuck her

Posted by meks | August 29, 2008 10:31 AM
25

And the ever-hopeful: "Ran! Slip! Haa!"

Posted by Brendan Kiley | August 29, 2008 10:31 AM
26

@23 - I think a vice-presidential debate has already been scheduled.

Posted by LDP in Cincinnati | August 29, 2008 10:32 AM
27

@11 Thanks for the free advice.

Hillary, Jr. won't be voted for by Evangelical housewives who will resent her because she's a woman and/or because she's abandoned her family; won't be voted for by bigot class voters who don't want anyone but white men in the White House; and won't be voted for by anyone with a brain.

That leaves the Fox viewers who were going to vote Republican anyway and the Hillary voters who are completely out of their minds -- which, media appearances to the contrary, are a tiny minority of American voters.

Nothing's changed, except that McCain has acknowledged he has no chance of ever being President and has made himself look more pathetic and irrelevant than ever.

Posted by whatevernevermind | August 29, 2008 10:35 AM
28

She looks like Tina Fey, without the awesome scar. I'll bet SNL is talking to Fey this very minute, she would murder it as Palin.

Posted by kerri harrop | August 29, 2008 10:38 AM
29

Wow, she looks like a bitch.

Posted by J | August 29, 2008 10:47 AM
30

A harp slain

Hairs in lap

Posted by Andrew | August 29, 2008 10:48 AM
31

KH@28:

Hee! I sought out this thread just now to make that exact same comment. It'll be nice to see Tina Fey on SNL until November.

Posted by pox | August 29, 2008 10:50 AM
32

How in the hell can you say "conservationist" and "believes in exploiting our fossil fuel resources" in the same sentence? Have we disconnected from reality??

Posted by UNPAID BLOGGER | August 29, 2008 10:50 AM
33

Alaska is the size of the City of Seattle. Just one-third the size of King County. And she has been Governor of this people-free expanse for only two human gestation periods. And before that the mayor of a "city" just about two-thirds the size of Enumclaw. And now you're going to put her one hot-headed geezer's heartbeat away from the nuclear trigger? Really?

Posted by Makes Quayle Look Like BIDEN | August 29, 2008 10:52 AM
34

@27: thank you. my sentiments exactly. I know I should be LOLing at the McCain VP choice, but because Palin is young and is female, the Web 2.0 inflammations are going to be REALLY bad. :( (re: "i want to fuck her")

Posted by mackro mackro | August 29, 2008 10:52 AM
35

"Sarah Palin" = "A SNL pariah"

Posted by DOUG. | August 29, 2008 11:00 AM
36

@33 Just to clarify, I assume you meant the POPULATION of Alaska is the size of the city of Seattle. Alaska itself is big enough that if you cut it in half, Texas would be demoted to the third largest state.

Posted by UNPAID BLOGGER | August 29, 2008 11:00 AM
37

She looks like Monica Lewinsky.

Posted by Miss Poppy Hussein Dixon | August 29, 2008 11:01 AM
38

M.S. @ 15 has it right. The evangelicals were already going to vote for McCain. They swallowed their pride a long time ago (see: James Dobson) and resolved to fall in line behind their candidate. Because, really, when evangelicals say they want a "born-again Christian" in the White House, it really means they want a "conservative Republican".

Posted by Hernandez | August 29, 2008 11:03 AM
39

NPR and some other national radio shows couldn't find words to express their confusion over this pick. They hadn't received the sealed package with instructions from the RNC yet, so I'll give them time.

Posted by namvetted | August 29, 2008 11:35 AM
40

Eh, Brody isn't that bad compared to the rest of the evangelical tastemakers. He's been fairly measured in the past week.

Posted by hohoho green giant | August 29, 2008 11:36 AM
41

@38:
Is there a difference????

Posted by Dodi | August 29, 2008 11:42 AM
42

she looks like an older version of britney spears.

ugh now i'm really scared now.

Posted by apres_moi | August 29, 2008 11:59 AM
43

how long before Cindi gives her a makeover?

Posted by michael strangeways | August 29, 2008 12:20 PM
44

I look forward to her being John Glenn's running mate.

Posted by NapoleonXIV | August 29, 2008 12:45 PM
45

How can Palin be a good evangelical mother, if she's not home with her kids all the time?

Posted by eliza | August 29, 2008 1:19 PM
46

So, evangelical xtians now believe oil is a "fossil fuel resource"?

Does that mean they now believe dinosaurs DIDN'T appear on earth a mere 6,000 years ago?

Or does it mean they believe oil can be created from fossilized biomass in less than 6,000 years?

I'm really confused on this one...

Posted by COMTE | August 29, 2008 1:43 PM
47

Mark of Cain? So anyone who kills him will suffer vengeance seven times over?

Posted by east coaster | August 29, 2008 2:56 PM
48

I'm in a diner in Ely, NV, with one eye on my bike and the other on Fox fucking news, but just had to write in and say that Palin's voice makes me want to drive railroad nails through my eardrums. Worst. Veep pick. Evar.

Posted by Big Sven | August 29, 2008 3:14 PM
49

I say let her loose in the debates and watch her go down in flames.

Posted by Greg | August 29, 2008 4:37 PM
50

Well Brendan, I guess that's what you get for living in a fantasy world.

Posted by Jay | August 29, 2008 8:22 PM
51

21: Yeah, the Republicans would be libertarian shitheads instead of God-fearing shitheads.

Posted by Jay | August 29, 2008 8:23 PM

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