They're off and running for the 2008 GOP nomination:

[SPasse]

Hi All,
Now that I have decided to Vote for McCain… ;)

Below is an excerpt from one of the typical e-mails floating around in the Republican part of the Blogosphere regarding Palin.

“One of our State's major problems is that its Capital is in Juneau, 500 miles from the nearest road and 800 air miles from the population base which is Anchorage, Wasilla and Fairbanks. Our legislature and most of the State government is in Juneau and they ALL behave like a bunch of freshmen in a college town. It has been this way since Statehood in 1959. When Sarah moved to Juneau, so did accountability and responsibility. When the oil revenue started flown and a barrel of North Slope Crude hit $23.00, these people began spending money like drunken sailors. You can only imagine what was happening when oil hit $100.00 a barrel, about the time Sarah took command. My wife Kathy has first-hand experience with this fiasco, as her father and also her ex-husband were Alaska Legislators who served in Juneau as Senators, Senate President, or members of the State House for a combined period spanning nearly three decades.

About the time Sarah took the HELM as Governor of Alaska, about half of the State legislature was in the pocket of big oil companies or contractors doing big projects for Native Corporations around Alaska, all funded by State oil revenue. Alaska government was nothing but a good old boys club riding the perpetual wave of prosperity. This filtered down from the legislature, through the Department of Natural Resources, Department of Labor and even spilled in to the Public Safety who are supposed to "preserve and protect".

When Sarah walked into the Governor's Mansion, she promptly dismissed the State Trooper detachment assigned to Governor and had her and her husband's gun case brought in from Wasilla. Then, she got rid of the former Governor's STATE Jet and told legislators that there were no more free rides, they would have to fly Alaska Airlines, just like her and her family if they wanted to travel. Next came the nut cutting (the Barracuda part) the heads that rolled were too numerous to name, but when Sarah finished cleaning house, a number of our legislators ended up in jail for on corruption charges, or tendered their resignations along with numerous department heads and those who have been riding the gravy train for way too long, AND THEN SHE HAD LUNCH. By the end of the day, Sarah Palin had saved the people of Alaska millions and has not yet slowed down.

She has truly brought CHANGE to Juneau. I personally know several persons in the private sector in Alaska, which hold her in high esteem. She surrounds herself with smart people, many from my hometown of Anchorage; she listens to them but makes her own decisions. Sarah Palin is a no B.S. Politician. It is refreshing that there is such a thing anymore. You want to talk about CHANGE? You should see a before and after picture of the State government in Alaska.That's CHANGE! Sarah will bring a number of things to the election. I am sure she will appeal many voters who my otherwise could have gone the other direction on Election Day. The conservative block will not be for Barack. We have their vote. We need what Sarah will bring, first to the election and second, what she will bring to Washington D.C. McCain has been advised well, Let's just hope the American people can get the straight scoop on her in the weeks ahead. This is just the opinion of one Alaska Bush Pilot and Guide, who pays attention to national politics, watches the news and is deathly afraid of the direction our nation is headed. I guarantee that if Sarah gets a chance to dig her spurs into the flanks of the liberal Washington types, they will know that she is in the saddle.

Butch King
Pilot/Guide
Butch & Kathy King
Proprietors
Wildman Lake Lodge”


Is Sara Palin really that kind of “maverick”?


Regards,


Scott

[Ninong]

Now that I have decided to Vote for McCain… ;)

Haha! Very funny. You're in agreement with Palin on one issue and only one issue. And there is no way that you would want to see this woman a heartbeat away from being commander-in-chief.


Scott,

The more you get to know Sarah Palin, the more you get to know that she is a different sort of politician but not in the way the McCain Campaign is portraying her.

The local Alaska TV stations know she's lying about the Bridge to Nowhere. They've caught her in lies before, like when she lied about her involvement in trying to get her sister's husband fired from his job as a state trooper. It wasn't until the emails came out that she hurriedly released a statement retracting her previous lies. She fired the commissioner who refused to fire her brother-in-law (now former brother-in-law). He says he was fired because he refused to fire her brother-in-law, who was involved in a messy divorce with Palin's sister at the time. She says she fired him because it is the governor's prerogative to replace appointed officials and she doesn't need to give a reason.

The situation with the former brother-in-law is complicated by the fact that apparently he was guilty of personal conduct that justified disciplinary action, such as a suspension, if not outright dismissal but this was the guy Sarah Palin recommended for the job in the first place. She knew about his personal problems when she asked that he be hired as a trooper and then turned on him when he and her sister broke up.

There is a bipartisan commission in Alaska looking into Troopergate but just since Palin was chosen by McCain to be his running mate, most of her staff in Juneau have suddenly decided they won't talk to the commission.

Troopergate is a reflection of Palin's peculiar style of doing business and it isn't professional, and that's putting it mildly. She allows her personal "religious" beliefs to affect her personnel decisions. Here's another example: she asked a close aide to resign ("leave the governor's office") after she found out he was having an affair with a married woman. The woman's husband, a close friend of Palin's, called her and told her that his wife was "dating" the staffer. Palin called him in and told him that she was extremely upset to learn of this and she didn't know yet what she would do about it. A couple of days later, her chief of staff informed the staffer that it would be best if he simply left. This guy was another very close friend of hers since they were in junior high band together. He has been contacted and asked about this story. He says he has no regrets. He still considers himself one of Palin's friends and he understands completely why she took the action that she did.

Alaska is apparently not San Francisco. When the mayor of San Francisco was accused by his campaign manager of "dating" the campaign manager's wife, the mayor simply admitted the affair, apologized publicly for his behavioral lapse and went about the business of running for re-election. About the same time he admitted that he had a problem with alcohol, entered rehab briefly and then managed to get re-elected to a second term with something around 80% of the vote. At the time of the affair, the mayor was divorced. The same can be said for Palin's staffer. He was divorced at the time he was "dating" some other guy's wife. Palin, according to the staffer, was upset that he had not informed her about his "dating" problem.

Sarah Palin not only wants to allow the killing of wolves in Alaska by shooting them with shotguns from airplanes, she encourages it. She offered to pay a $150 bounty for the left front paw of every wolf shot from a plane. Just hack off the front left paws and turn them in for a payment of $150 each. A judge ruled that she didn't have the authority to do that, so the bounty plan was killed. When people at Fish & Game tried to tell her that wolves were not a problem in Alaska, Palin removed the "predator-control program" from Fish & Game and turned it over to a board whose members are all appointed by her. She calls shooting wolves from airplanes "predator control." She says they need to kill more wolves so that there will be more moose for people like her to shoot for fun. Baby Trig's mother has apparently never met an animal she didn't think needed shooting.

YouTube video clip showing what Sarah Palin wants to see more of in Alaska. She was pissed that only 162 wolves were shot from the air in one particular area, which is why she offered the $150 bounty. Environmentalists claim that the reason only 162 wolves were shot in that area was because they had already been nearly wiped out there by aerial shooting. Sarah Palin has not shot any wolves herself, as far as I know, but she definitely wants to see more wolves shot from planes and has said so. She says she "didn't enjoy" smoking pot but she has admitted that she enjoys shooting an occasional moose for "sport." Palin is one of those people who still enjoy the "sport" of shooting animals just for the fun of it. Sick!

P.S. -- It's already well known that she is opposed to listing polar bears as endangered because it will impact oil and gas interests. Since she doesn't believe in global warming, she doesn't believe polar bears are endangered.

It's not true that she wants to see Adam & Eve taught as science in public schools in lieu of evolution, only that she wants it offered as an alternative to the evil evolution. In other words, she wants creation science offered as a possible alternative explanation whenever evolution (actual science) is taught. You know, talking snakes, 900-year-old Noah and his magical Ark, etc.

[Ninong]

Palin's Impact On Independents

While it is certainly true that the "base" loves Sarah Palin, I'm not sure the rest of the country is ready for her to be a heartbeat away from the presidency.

Her views on abortion are extreme and not in synch with the majority of Americans. In fact, they're not even in synch with McCain's views. He supports exceptions for rape, incest and to save the life of the mother. Palin does not. No exceptions. Period. If your 11-year-old daughter is raped by an intruder, she must have the baby. No morning-after pill.

McCain favors federal funding for embryonic stem-cell research. Sarah Palin refers to that as murder.

McCain is not campaigning as a religious type, like George W. Bush did, but Sarah Palin is as fundie as they come. She used to be a Catholic but she switched to Assembly of God, the same outfit John Ashcroft, his father and grandfather were ministers in -- speaking in tongues and all that BS. Ashcroft himself, unlike his father and grandfather, never claimed the "gift" of speaking in tongues. However, since there is no "religious test" for any office in this country, Sarah Palin is free to believe whatever she chooses as long as she doesn't allow her crackpot religious views to influence public policy. We are not a theocracy. Not yet anyway.

[Ninong]

McCain Campaign Stoops To New Lows

On Tuesday, Barack Obama criticized McCain's economic policies as similar to those of President Bush, saying: "You can put lipstick on a pig ... it's still a pig. You can wrap an old fish in a piece of paper called change. It's still going to stink after eight years."

Obama was clearly talking about McCain's economic policies being similar to Bush's, which is why he said it's still going to stink after eight years. John McCain is trying to stir up a stink where none exists. He wants to make Sarah Palin the topic of discussion for the next two months instead of the failed policies of the Bush administration that he supports and will continue.

The McCain campaign contended that the comments were directed at Sarah Palin. Accusing Obama of "smearing" Palin in "offensive and disgraceful" comments, the McCain campaign demanded an apology — though McCain himself used the folksy metaphor a few times last year, including once to describe Democratic Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's health care plan. In fact, McCain not only used the "lipstick on a pig" metaphor to refer to Clinton's health care plan, he went much further in attacking Mitt Romney saying: "Never get into a fight with a pig because you will both get dirty and the pig likes it."

For McCain to claim that he is against Washington lobbyists when his campaign is being run by lobbyists is hilarious. At one time he had more than 50 lobbyists working on his campaign until he decided that they would have to temporarily quit their day jobs to remain on the campaign. Many of them left at that point but all of his top guys are lobbyists. In fact, his campaign manager represented many of the special interest groups that McCain now pretends to be against.

Sarah Palin pretends to be against lobbyists and earmarks yet as governor of Alaska she hired a very expensive Washington lobbyist to help the state get more earmarks. And she praised Sen. Ted Stevens for his success in getting so much pork for Alaska. When the Republicans were in the majority, Stevens was chairman of the Appropriations Committee.

[Ninong]

John McCain: Biggest Male Chauvinist Sexist Pig In The World!

If the McCain Campaign wants to play this game, maybe it's time to bring up all of John McCain's off-color, sexist comments and jokes over the years. Believe me, it's a rich field.

We could start with McCain telling a public gathering that the reason Chelsea Clinton is so ugly is because her father was Janet Reno. And that was when Chelsea was only about 12 years old. It was a direct dig at the child's appearance and the unfounded rumors that Hillary might be a lesbian. Janet Reno is definitely a lesbian. That's as obvious as the FACT that Charlie Crist is gay. Speaking of Charlie, I wonder if the engagement is still on?

And we could bring up all the times McCain lost him temper on the floor of the Senate and in the Senate cloakroom and shouted obscenities (including the F-word) at fellow Republican senators. There are at least three different episodes that I can recall and they have all been reported and verified. In fact, before he became the nominee, more than one GOP senator expressed horror at the prospect of McCain in the White House.

McCain told the so-called joke about President Clinton and First Lady Hillary Clinton's child as part of a speech to a Republican gathering. Another favorite joke of his is about a gorilla raping a woman and the woman later asking where's that marvelous gorilla. McCain believes that all women really want to be raped, especially by a huge gorilla.

[Ninong]

McCain Wrong Again On U.S. Military Policy

First of all, Barack Obama was right about NOT going into Iraq in the first place. Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11 and they had no weapons of mass destruction. George W. Bush and Dick Cheney lied their way into Iraq. Now that we're there, Barack's proposals for a timely and safe withdrawal of our forces is finally being accepted by the Bush administration mainly because the Iraqi government is insisting that we get the hell out of their country as soon as possible.

The Iraqi government agreed with Obama's timetable for withdrawal but the Bush administration was pushing to stay there another five years. Finally George W. Bush caved in and agreed to a compromise that amounts to the Obama timetable plus one year. McCain wants to stay there indefinitely.

Obama has been saying for the past couple of years now that we are losing the battle in Afghanistan and that we needed to shift more military assets from Iraq to Afghanistan. Guess what boys and girls?

Adm Mike Mullen, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff just told Congress that we are losing the battle in Afghanistan.

No sh!t. Ray Charles could have seen that one coming.

"I'm not convinced we are winning in Afghanistan. I am convinced we can," Navy Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said in sobering testimony before the U.S. House of Representatives Armed Services Committee. The testimony came nearly seven years after U.S.-led forces toppled Afghanistan's former Taliban regime following the Sept. 11 attacks.

Mullen, who also revealed that U.S. and Pakistani military officials met Tuesday aboard a U.S. aircraft carrier, said he was already "looking at a new, more comprehensive strategy for the region" that would cover both sides of the Afghanistan-Pakistan border.

"In my view, these two nations are inextricably linked in a common insurgency that crosses the border between them," he told lawmakers.

When Barack Obama proposed this several months ago, the McCain Campaign freaked out and said it was more proof that Obama didn't know anything about foreign policy or military strategy. Then, within a few weeks, the Bush administration did exactly what Obama proposed. They attacked known Taliban targets inside Pakistan with the tacit approval of the Pakistani government.

Mullen was speaking after the United States stepped up its campaign of attacks against militant targets inside Pakistan with missile strikes from unmanned drones and a raid by helicopter-borne U.S. commandos.

The Bush administration has been coming around to Obama's proposals for an orderly and safe withdrawal from Iraq and now they're coming around to his exact proposals on Afghanistan.

Barack Obama: Right on Iraq and right on Afghanistan. John McCain: Never right on anything.

"Add to this a poor and struggling Afghan economy, a still-healthy narcotics trade there and a significant political uncertainty in Pakistan, and you have all the makings of a complex, difficult struggle that will take time," he said.

He also warned that time was running out on the ability of the West to provide Afghanistan with vital nonmilitary assistance for Afghanistan including roads, schools, alternative crops for farmers and the rule of law.

"These are the keys to success in Afghanistan. We cannot kill our way to victory and no armed force anywhere, no matter how good, can deliver these keys alone," Mullen said.

Mullen acknowledged that President Bush's announced troop increase in Afghanistan — one Army brigade and one Marine battalion, about 5,000 troops — will not adequately meet the request of three brigades announced by the ground commander in Afghanistan.

It must be very embarrassing for poor John McCain that the Republican administration is agreeing with Barack Obama's commander-in-chief judgments and rejecting John McCain's.

[Ninong]

McCain's Temperament? Is He Fit To Be President?

Here's what Dr. Philip Butler thinks about John McCain

Dr. Butler attended the Naval Academy with John McCain and he was a POW with John McCain. In fact, he was captured two and a half years before McCain. He's a former Navy pilot and a retired Commander.

P.S. -- Butler graduated in the top one-fourth of his class at the Naval Academy, not the bottom one-half of one-percent like McCain.

[Ninong]

"Skin cancer is caused, overwhelmingly, by over-exposure to ultraviolet radiation from the sun and from tanning beds." -- Gov. Sarah Palin, when she declared May 2007 to be Skin Cancer Awareness Month in Alaska




Okay, so Sarah Palin had a tanning bed installed in the governor's mansion shortly after she moved in. So what?! She says she got a good deal on a used one from a health club. It didn't cost $35,000 like a new one would have.

Besides, who cares. It's certainly not elitist to have a tanning bed in your home. Doesn't everyone?

Sarah needs to keep up her beauty queen looks. She can't spend all her spare time looking at Russia from her front porch.

If she brings that thing with her to the White House, they will have to make sure John McCain doesn't get anywhere near it. After two four bouts with skin cancer the last thing he needs is a tanning bed treatment.



I bet Barack Obama doesn't have a tanning bed.

[SPasse]

Hi All,

Palin gets blessed against Witchcraft:

http://news.spreadit.org/palin-witchcraftsarah-palin-thomas-muthee-witch-video/

Regards,

Scott

[Ninong]

Scott,

I didn't realize witchcraft was still a problem in Alaska. I understand Sarah Palin still holds to some primitive ideas, such as murdering mammals for the fun of it, but I had no idea she was a full 320 years behind the rest of the country. We ditched witchcraft in the late 17th century.

Hey, look on the bright side, at least she didn't have this dude laying his hands on her.

Besides, after viewing Palin's interview with Katie Couric, it's obvious that the witchcraft gris-gris didn't work. That witch, Katie Couric, deliberately asked Palin a difficult question, like how her proximity to Russia gives her experience in foreign policy.

Does everyone in Alaska have a Canadian accent?

P.S. -- Wake me up if you find a video of her speaking in tongues.

[schrocat]

Scott,

P.S. -- Wake me up if you find a video of her speaking in tongues.

YouTube - Sarah Palin Interview with CBS News' Katie Couric- Day 2

This comes pretty damn close IMO

[Ninong]

Palin's Poll Numbers Plunging

Sarah Palin enjoyed very high favorable numbers and very low unfavorable numbers as long as she was reading from a teleprompter or repeating punch lines from her convention speech. Supermom takes on Good Ole Boy Network and Liberal Media.

Nominated for sainthood for choosing to have Down Syndrome baby. (No mention of the reckless action on her part in choosing to get pregnant in her mid-40's in the first place.) Baby Trig held aloft and passed around on stage as some sort of holy relic.

Welcomes out-of-wedlock teenage pregnancy of her daughter and turns it into another saintly act on her part instead of a "failure in parenting," which is what the right-wing said about Lynne Spears having a daughter in that condition.

Praised for her mooseburger recipe and the fact that she killed her own moose. They forgot to mention that she offered to pay $150 for every wolf murdered by shotgun blasts from airplanes. A judge later ruled that she didn't have the authority to pay such a bounty.

Believes the end of the world is upon us and she intends to do her part to make sure that Israel fulfills biblical prophesies by retaining all of their biblical lands.

Believes in demonic possession and the power of certain pastors to protect you from witchcraft by the laying on of hands. Believes that the laying on of hands can cure sickness.

Believes that the Earth is no more than 6,000 years old and that dinosaurs roamed the Earth with Adam and Eve. Believes Noah lived to be 900 years old and managed to squeeze millions of animals onto his Ark, including dinosaurs.

Believes that she is qualified to be President of the United States.

Her poll numbers have plunged in the past week or so, especially since her interviews with Katie Couric. To know her, it seems, is not to love her.

P.S. -- Palin now has the worst poll numbers of any of the four candidates! Shortly after the convention, she was a +30 (52% favorable to 22% unfavorable). She has dropped to a +10 (47-37), which is worse than McCain, Obama or Biden.

Obama has now opened up a substantial lead (average of about 6 points) over McCain in the past week, thanks mostly to the financial crisis. Most Americans believe Obama's explanation of the cause of the crisis is the correct one. The economy is now viewed by 60% of Americans as the No. 1 issue in the campaign and Obama has a wide lead over McCain when it comes to the question of who can better handle the economy. In fact, Obama leads McCain in every category except national security.

Sarah Palin was helping McCain a couple of weeks ago but it's possible that she is now hurting him because white men have now shifted from McCain to Obama. McCain still enjoys a lead among white women thanks to Palin. Before McCain named Palin as his running mate, white women favored Obama by about 6 points but they now favor McCain by a similar percentage thanks to Palin. I don't know if these women will change their minds because the more the press exposes Palin's weaknesses, the more this group will feel that she is being picked on because she is a woman -- a dumb white woman just like them.

[Ninong]

Conservative Columnist Says It's Too Painful to Watch, Calls on Palin to Resign from Ticket

Palin’s recent interviews with Charles Gibson, Sean Hannity, and now Katie Couric have all revealed an attractive, earnest, confident candidate. Who Is Clearly Out Of Her League.

No one hates saying that more than I do. Like so many women, I’ve been pulling for Palin, wishing her the best, hoping she will perform brilliantly. I’ve also noticed that I watch her interviews with the held breath of an anxious parent, my finger poised over the mute button in case it gets too painful. Unfortunately, it often does. My cringe reflex is exhausted.

Palin filibusters. She repeats words, filling space with deadwood. Cut the verbiage and there’s not much content there. Here’s but one example of many from her interview with Hannity: “Well, there is a danger in allowing some obsessive partisanship to get into the issue that we’re talking about today. And that’s something that John McCain, too, his track record, proving that he can work both sides of the aisle, he can surpass the partisanship that must be surpassed to deal with an issue like this.”

When Couric pointed to polls showing that the financial crisis had boosted Obama’s numbers, Palin blustered wordily: “I’m not looking at poll numbers. What I think Americans at the end of the day are going to be able to go back and look at track records and see who’s more apt to be talking about solutions and wishing for and hoping for solutions for some opportunity to change, and who’s actually done it?”

If BS were currency, Palin could bail out Wall Street herself.

[...]

Only Palin can save McCain, her party, and the country she loves. She can bow out for personal reasons, perhaps because she wants to spend more time with her newborn. No one would criticize a mother who puts her family first.

Do it for your country.

Here.