Sarah's back. And she's back with more political theatre because she never left the political stage. Oprah is only one of many stomps and stops that Sarah Palin will be making on the road to the White House or home to Wasilla, Alaska. Her route will wind through many of the battleground states in the South. Governor Palin is not running for exercise or running for office but busing with books. Does this better answer the question why she quit the governorship of a large state in the first place? Will the voting public buy this new role, the new openness?
Her latest interview with Oprah is a 180-degree turn from the Katie Couric one. Can Sarah salvage her image with a book, a ghostwriter and a softball interview on the biggest stage in television — Oprah? Sarah stands to make millions from walking out on Alaska and holing up in Southern Calfornia and penning this book (with help) at break-neck speed. Her book tour appears to be off to a good start. Who knew?
Oprah's first task, after hugging Sarah, pointing out that she never "snubbed" Sarah and that Sarah never felt snubbed. Why? Because she did not ask to be on Oprah or expect to be invited.
Her message on Oprah and in the book is all about the McCain team and handlers — they took over her life. Press releases were not to her liking. For example, she wanted to clarify that it's not okay for an unmarried teenage girl to have a baby., but the McCain campaign press released that she was happy to become a grandmother.
Oprah asked about Todd's response to Trig. Sarah's answer was awkward to my ears. No one delivers one-liners like Sarah. When she told Todd that the baby was male and that it had Down's Syndrome she said he was "over-the-top esctatic about that..." Huh? When I first used that term in an article a long time ago the implication and my understanding was not "happiness" rather synonymous with a situation that was veering out of control in a bad way. Here's a better use Sarah — the McCain team's micromanagement style was over the top.
Article comments
— go to most recent comments1 - Arch Conservative
Hey at least she didn't promise us hope and change only to give us 10% unemployment and a worthless dollar.
2 - El Bicho
that was going to happen no matter who was in office. take off the blinders
3 - Glenn Contrarian
Arch -
As usual, you won't do any research to find out who's right or wrong.
FYI, if you'll RESEARCH, you'll find out that, when measured from the point where the stock market bottomed out (March) to the point where most economists agree that the recession was officially over (August, even according to Fox News), the economy took LESS time to recover than after any other recession since at least the end of WWII.
Not only that, but NOT ONCE has unemployment began to lessen following a recession until AT LEAST a year after the recession ended. That means, sir, that if we start getting POSITIVE employment gains before August 2010, President Obama will have led the economy to recovery faster, and helped national employment to improve after a recession faster than any other president since 1900.
You see, Arch - if you do your RESEARCH, you find out all kinds of interesting things...like just how wrong Reaganomics is, and how a bit more regulation and a few higher taxes on the rich actually DO help the whole nation's economy.
4 - Dave Nalle
FYI, if you'll RESEARCH, you'll find out that, when measured from the point where the stock market bottomed out (March) to the point where most economists agree that the recession was officially over (August, even according to Fox News), the economy took LESS time to recover than after any other recession since at least the end of WWII.
Glenn, you might want to do some research of your own, because if this is recovery then we're in deep and serious long term trouble.
Real economic recovery is impossible without restoring the value of the dollar. You seem not to grasp what the effect of a decline in value of 30% in a six-month period means. That's the equivalent of 80% inflation. It may not all be reflected in consumer prices yet, but that's just a matter of time. The economy CANNOT float for very long as the dollar continues to decline.
What you have right now is a false recovery which will likely be followed by another substantial decline accompanied by hyperinflation. Enjoy it while you can.
Dave
5 - Glenn Contrarian
Y'know Dave, that a maybe - definitely a maybe. Nobody knows for sure, including you. I seem to remember such dire predictions before...but I see NO indication that we're spiraling our way down to hyperinflation.
But what I do think will happen hearkens back to one of my earlier articles wherein I pointed out that perhaps the only benefit to Reaganomics was the rise (and accompanying stability) of many third-world countries, particularly in Asia. What I see happening is a partial (at most) decline of America (thanks to the conservatives' wars on education and the middle class) which, when compared to the rise of Asia, will make it seem as if we've taken a fall.
But we won't have fallen. Instead, it's like a race where the guy in the lead slows down - the other guys pass him by even though he's still running at a pretty speedy clip. A generation from now, much of Asia will have surpassed us, just as most of western Europe and the British Commonwealth already has.
Of course this is barring any worldwide catastrophe or nuclear war. Come to think of it, in my opinion, the countries who will be most powerful and most influential a century from now will be those who are now striving to prepare for the very worst of global warming and the decline of petroleum reserves.
6 - Ruvy
El Bicho has it on the money. It made no difference who you elected in 2008 - or what he promised. The only question was, "would the winner have the intelligence to figure out how to pull you out of the deep toilet the bankers on Wall Street had stuck you all in?"
Obama obviously didn't. But this was no surprise to me, seeing the idiots he appointed, and seeing how he has set you all up for a very nasty fall in January 2011.
What you have right now is a false recovery which will likely be followed by another substantial decline accompanied by hyperinflation. Enjoy it while you can.
Quoted for truth.
Glenn, you can toot your horn and blow hot air out of your smokestack all you want. Between January and March in 2011, the American economy will tank. May G-d help you all when it does.
7 - Mark
...Jan. 2011
Well, that gives us about a year to preempt the fascists and restructure the fundamentals of our productive processes to ensure a continued, sufficient and more equitable flow of necessities.
Capitalism is absurd -- onward through the fog!
8 - Glenn Contrarian
Ruvy -
The only question was, "would the winner have the intelligence to figure out how to pull you out of the deep toilet the bankers on Wall Street had stuck you all in?" Obama obviously didn't.
Um, President Obama obviously DID. Did you happen to see what I posted above? If the employment begins to increase before August 2010, then "President Obama will have led the economy to recovery faster, and helped national employment to improve after a recession faster than any other president since 1900. AND it's starting to look like employment will begin to improve by May...but that's my own estimation.
Ruvy, don't you see what's happening here? You - like Dave, Arch-con, OA, and others - want to believe SO badly that Obama would fail. You want to believe SO badly that a liberal at the helm is the death knell for freedom. You want to believe SO badly that the world is going to hell in a handbasket.
As a result, the fact that President Obama has led America out of an economic free fall, from the bottoming-out of the stock market in the worst recession since the Depression to the end of the recession itself in RECORD time means NOTHING to you.
The fact that Obama - through his diplomatic efforts and by who and what he is - likely swayed the election for the moderates in Lebanon and encouraged the uprising in Iran, encouraged much of the world to pressure Iran and even got Russia to support our efforts...this means NOTHING to you, too.
That's really sad, Ruvy.
Y'know, one time I wrote an editorial for the local paper after Iraq's first election since the invasion, congratulating Bush on his efforts. Why? Because I believe in giving credit where credit is due - even when it's to someone I really, really don't like. Bush had committed a war crime by initiating an illegal invasion based on outright lies...but with the Iraqi election he had the chance to make a silk purse out of a sow's ear. Too bad it didn't work out that way.
But the point is, Ruvy, y'all - that's you and your fellow conservatives - need to learn to congratulate even those you really, really don't like when they deserve it...and so far, whether they admit it or not, Americans owe President Obama a lot of gratitude for what he's done so far with the stool sandwich of a national situation he was handed on 1/20/09.
9 - Mark
The public trough assumes massive debt to underwrite the rate of profit and you call that recovery?
btw, unemployment isn't merely a 'lagging indicator'; it's a world of hunger, insecurity, stress...and now there's talk of another 'jobless recovery'.
10 - Glenn Contrarian
Mark -
"The public trough assuming massive debt" is how we've come out of EVERY recession (and Depression) since 1900.
Every. Single. One.
And if you want to point at WWII pulling us out of the Depression, remember who it was that financed our military build-up: the "public trough". Yep! Every bit of it.
And go back to what I said earlier - if employment starts to improve before August 2010, then President Obama will have led America's workforce to positive employment recovery following a recession faster than after any other recession since 1900.
That's why I love history! It helps me to see through the political rhetoric of the day...and these days that means seeing through the false assumptions and outright lies of the Rabid Right.
11 - roger nowosielski
Missing the point, Glenn. Mark is not offering here any technical analysis of the capitalist business cycle and how we usually "recover" from them. His is an indictment of of the entire system in which terms such as "world of hunger," "insecurity" and "stress" are the real indices of human misery, aptly disguised by the economic doublespeak of unemployment serving as a "lagging indicator," to give just one example.
Consequently, his remark is on the money. Massive debt serves here no other purpose than to underwrite the rate of profit. The whole idea of a "jobless recovery" should, to say the least, strike any astute observer as an oxymoron.
12 - Mark
Hiya, Rog. Good to see you posting again.
13 - roger nowosielski
Hope I did not misrepresent your thinking.
14 - roger nowosielski
And yes, if I be allowed to stand, perhaps we can resume the Foucault's debate.
15 - Mark
#11 sums up my point nicely. And I look forward to reading what you've come up with in your study of the post-modernists.
16 - roger nowosielski
Good deal. Cindy will be happy too.
17 - Glenn Contrarian
in a rush right now, but welcome back, Rog!
18 - heloise
Dave can you fix the blurb? It should read though she's lying. It has an extra word or something.
19 - heloise
Dave can you fix the blurb? It should read though she's lying. It has an extra word or something.
20 - heloise
This am's report does not bode well for the deed Tim did with our dough. He overspent. And wtf does anybody ever do when they r not spending their own money?
Heloise pegged Tim from day one. The banks are rolling in public trough dough while the people r reeling--my fav term after meltdown.
Why do men with dirty hands get to dispense the fed money? Oh boy I just created a new series "dirty hands".
Heloise
21 - Cindy
I am game! :-)
22 - Cindy
21 was for 16...must have had this window open for awhile
23 - roger nowosielski
Thanks Glenn, and Cindy too.
24 - roger nowosielski
Interesting take on Ms Palin.
25 - handyguy
Pointing out that unemployment is always the last part of a recession to improve is not heartless. For unemployment to improve, there have to be, you know, jobs created.
The government can only do so much about that, directly, especially since everyone screams about the potential of more spending. Most jobs will have to come from the private sector, and they will, eventually.
I do wish they'd just cut the Pentagon's absurdly bloated budget by 10 or 20% and put that money to better use -- that would be at least $50-100 billion. Fat chance, unfortunately.
By the way, Dave continues to issue purely ideological [and therefore worthless] predictions about the future. One assumes Geithner and Bernanke are well aware of the dollar's value, and are ready to act when they think it's necessary -- not when libertarian blowhards say so.