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Townhall.com...
No Off Button on
Sarah Palin
By Debra J. Saunders
This is a free country. If Sarah Palin wants to run for president in
2012, she is free to try. But she will not win the GOP nomination
because Republican voters are not going to choose a middle-aged version
of Britney Spears -- a figure whose most evident talent is to attract
attention to herself -- to challenge Barack Obama.
It's this simple: Republicans are too smart to nominate a candidate
with a 50 percent unfavorable rating, according to the latest NBC
News/Wall Street Journal Poll, before she has declared for office.
Cue to Palin's latest video, in which she countered left-wing nuts who,
with no proof whatsoever, tied her to the Tucson shootings.
"Journalists and pundits should not manufacture a blood libel that
serves only to incite the very hatred and violence that they purport to
condemn," she said.
For close to three days, Palin had handled the brouhaha tastefully. On
Saturday, she issued a short statement offering her condolences to Rep.
Gabrielle Giffords, the other victims and their families; then she kept
her mouth shut. By Tuesday, cooler heads prevailed. News coverage
rightly focused away from the blame game and turned to reporting on
Giffords' recovery, the other victims and information on the man -- I
won't name him; that's what he wants -- charged in the crimes. Without
saying a word, Palin had won that round.
That is, until Wednesday, when Palin released her video, which turned
the spotlight back on her and added a new element. Now cable TV news
can noodle over whether Palin was deliberately provocative or clueless
in using the words "blood libel" -- a term coined to describe the
spurious and ancient charge that Jews murdered non-Jewish children and
then drank their blood in rituals. (And yes, I know a Wall Street
Journal opinion piece used the same term Monday.)
The sorry episode confirmed the suspicion that Palin is addicted to
getting attention, while her boosters are addicted to defending every
thoughtless utterance she releases. And even her boosters know what
most Republicans know: Palin is not a serious thinker.
It always makes me sad to think about what Palin might have been. What
if, knowing she might be chosen, she had done a better job of preparing
to be a presidential running mate? What if John McCain had not asked
her to join the GOP ticket? What if she had entered the spotlight
without having her personal life smeared on the Internet?
I think back on her as the Alaska governor, with a 90 percent approval
rating and a maverick's commitment to taking on the corrupt elements
inside her own party. I think of the pragmatic Wasilla mayor who
championed a sales tax to pay for law enforcement. If McCain had chosen
someone else, in a couple of years, Palin might have become a seasoned
politician, a smaller target and more surgical debater.
Instead -- as pundits dissected Palin's performance as a mother and
feasted on her daughter's teen pregnancy -- an ugly trial-by-fire
brought out the worst in Palin. With her tweets and Facebook
pronouncements, she's become a virtuoso at pressing liberal buttons.
It's too bad that, like the people who live to hate her, she doesn't
know how to stop.
Townhall.com
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