Paul Revere by Cyrus Dallin, North End, Boston

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Wednesday, November 17, 2010

THESE ARE A FEW OF MY FAVORITE THINGS:

UPDATE:  Lisa Murkowski Defeats Joe Miller In 2010 Alaska Senate Race! 


Palin's own network "pals" make fun of her. 

Oh Sarah, what tweets will you deliver over this embarrassing mockery of your newest teevee show? 




Here's a review of Palin's new "reality" show on TLC:


"TLC’s programming is all about babies, weddings, and families in extremis, and yet there’s something inhumane at the center of it all. It panders to our curiosity, allowing us to gawk at its subjects for as long as they are willing to be gawked at—which may be longer than is good for them. When it comes to Palin specifically, there is the fundamental problem that some of us don’t want to see or hear any more of her than we have to. And there are those whose objections have a physiological basis as well as an ideological one: the pitch and timbre of her voice, the rhythms of her speech, her syntax, and the way she coats acid and incoherence with cheery musical inflections join together in a sickening synergy that distresses the listener, triggering a fight-or-flight reaction. When Palin talks, my whole being wails, like Nancy Kerrigan after Tonya Harding’s ex-husband kneecapped her: “Why? Why? Why?”



And it appears that Palin's vendetta against Lisa Murkowski failed.  Murkowski has taken the lead over Miller in the vote count (with more to go). 


Finally:

Sarah Palin as Unpopular as Ever



"A recent Gallup Poll shows that Americans view Palin more unfavorably than they ever have. A full 52 percent of those surveyed by the Gallup organization have unfavorable views of the half-term governor of Alaska. At the same time, her 40 percent favorable rating ties her with the lowest rating of favorability that she has shown.



Numbers taken from a CNN/Opinion Research Corporation national poll conducted before the midterm elections were comparable: 49 percent unfavorable, 40 percent favorable."

26 comments:

Charlene said...

Oh thank you so much for a good laugh this morning. I have not watched this train wreck but I may have to tune in to get more humor into my life.

As to FOX eating it's siblings, that's SOP for them, isn't it? The whole network is a joke and everyone faithfully watching know all "news" is delivered tongue in cheek.

libhom said...

The 40% of people who have favorable opinions of her scare me.

Leslie Parsley said...

We have always had serious nut jobs throughout our history, but can anyone remember any that have lasted?

Arthurstone said...
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Arthurstone said...

Just of the top of my head I can think of a few who have been around a while and exert considerable influence.

Newt Gingrich. Rush Limbaugh. William Kristol. Donald Henninger. Ann Coulter. Michelle Malkin. Dorothy Rabinowitz. Peggy Noonan. Tom Tancredo. Tom DeLay. James Inhofe. Jon Kyl. Grover Norquist. Tony Perkins. James Dobson. Frank Gaffney. John Bolton. Clarence Thomas. Antonin Scalia. Samuel Alito. Linda Chavez. Charles Krauthammer. Lawrence Kudrow. David Horowitz. Charles & David Koch. Elliot Abrams. G. Gordon Liddy. Max Boot. Roger Ailes. Daniel Pipes. Michael Reagan. Michael Medved. Edwin Meese. John Poindexter. Roger Simon. Victor Davis Hanson. Pat Robertson. Phyllis Schlafly. Donald Wildmon. Gary Bauer. Richard Scaife. Midge Decter. David Addington. Sheldon Adelson. Richard Allen. John Ashcroft. William Bennett. Robert Bork. Lewis Libby. Richard Perle. John Podhoretz. Dan Quayle. Condloleeza Rice. Donald Rumsfield. Dick & Elizabeth Cheney. Karl Rove. Rick Santorum. Ahmed Chalabi. Jeb Bush. Sam Brownback. Dinesh D’Souza. Michael Gerson. Various Kagans. Michael Ledeen. Rupert Murdoch.

Joe "Truth 101" Kelly said...

Snowflakes that fall on my nose and eyelashes. Whiskers on kittens and girls with nice asses.

Did you notice that Sarah Palin was not among the few of my favorite things?

Sue said...

damn Arthurstone that is frightening!

That woman makes my skin crawl,and she thinks she can beat Obama in 2012. You Betcha!

Infidel753 said...

Palin presents the right with a conundrum. The majority of the country is sick and tired of her, but she still has a dedicated fan base, which makes up too large a chunk of the Republican political base to ignore.

Her meddling this year cost the Republicans at least three Senate seats and drove a wedge between Murkowski and the party. She shows no sign of backing down when this is pointed out. They're probably all terrified of what she might do in 2012, especially if she tries for the Presidential nomination and doesn't get it.

Palin: Oh, you are going to see all this subtleties all throughout the next eight episodes.

But not much in the way of subtleties of grammar, apparently.

Shaw Kenawe said...

We've seen enough of Palin to understand the sort of character she has.

Her worst problem is that she believes in the mythology she has constructed about herself--that she is just a humble little homemaker and that she's an underdog fighting for what a majority of Americans want.

Her pronouncements on subjects she knows nothing about are hilarious, but at the same time appalling, since her rampant ignorance seems to enhance her popularity with her fans rather than diminish it.

She's a very clever publicity hound and knows how to manipulate the media--give her that.

But presidential hopeful?


Again, she's too self-absorbed and ignorant to understand how preposterous that prospect is.

I guess she doesn't get "all this subtleties" that are working against her ambitions.

Arthurstone said...

I can certainly imagine a United States where Sara Palin has been elected President. If RR and GWB can become 'leader of the free world' why not Palin?

Delusion is a useful tool for the politician. Self-absorption is a necessity. Any politician worth his/her salt has self-regard in abundance.

Couple confidence with bat s**t crazy (in a 'folksy', 'homey' way) and you've got electability.

That the construct is utterly false is beside the point.

Malcolm said...

Although anything is possible, this country would have to undergo a catastrophe of historic proportions in order for Sarah Palin to defeat Obama. I think her statement that she could beat Obama is just a tease for her base. I doubt if she really believes it.

(O)CT(O)PUS said...

Malcolm,
I would have believed a solid win for President Obama any day over Apocalypstick Palin ... until this election. Now I am not so sure. This year, American voters have acted like flies attracted to offal, and I have even less faith in the electorate now than in our leadership.

The latest in political projection: The GOP has introduced a bill to defund public broadcasting as Roger Ailes ratchets up the rhetoric. Ailes is calling NPR a fascist news source, and Faux News stands to gain market share in the event of PBS's demise. Who is acting the fascist in this gambit!

The GOP better damn watch out. There will be a progressive backlash ... and it will turn out to be brutal. Guaranteed!

Shaw Kenawe said...

(O)CT(O), this past election only 30% of the voting public voted (I think that number is correct, but in any case, less than half the voting population voted, and the TPs were the most motivated.

Presidential elections are different from mid-terms, and historically more of the voters come out to vote in them.

The people who love Palin's ignorance are a small part of our voting population. They can't make her president.

And so far she has not shown any improvement on her grasp of complicated issues, preferring to Tweet and facebook her uninformed opinions, which are more often than not wrong. See the dust-up with the Wall Street Journal just last week.

I don't think America would want as president someone who does not value education and who sees nothing wrong with her daughter making a spectable of herself on some pop-teevee equivalent of American Idol.

I would think that with all the money she's made, Palin would do all she could to encourage and help her daughter to get an education, instead of going after the spotlight.

Most responsible parents would encourage that instead of being judged on how good a ballroom dancer their child is.

I think Palin will run and split the GOP--the Tea Party will follow her down the path of defeat and then blame everyone but Palin and themselves for it.

Oh, and Palin will whine about how brutal the media will have been to her.

Count on it.

Malcolm said...

Octopus: As Shaw said, mid-terms have a lower turnout than presidential elections. I'll also add that as rabid as Sarah Palin's base is, her popularity outside of that is too low for her to win the presidency. I think the GOP nomination is Palin's if she wants it. However, she will get dusted going up against Obama.

The right-wing noise machine's efforts to shut down NPR and PBS are shameful. You know we can't have any media outlets that promote education, serious journalism, and civil discourse. I'm willing to bet that many people who criticize NPR as a far-left outfit rarely, if ever, listen to it. They usually just repeat the talking points uttered by O'Reilly, Beck, Limbaugh, etc.

(O)CT(O)PUS said...

Shaw, while I certainly share your character assessment of Palin (a lousy parent on top of her angry, self-centeredness), I regard her as too dangerous to take a risk. Here is a diabolical thought experiment: Suppose she actually won? And what then?

Joe "Truth 101" Kelly said...

This is a conundrum Octo. The suspicious cynic in me thinks the republicans may want Palin to win the nomination but lose the election to Obama.

The republicans have shown they can run government by merely obstructing. They will get what they want and as long as Obama is president they can blame him when their agenda cause misery as it always has.

The rich will get richer. The deluded right wing sheep will continue to be swayed by right wing propagandists.

Sarah palin will be rewarded with more book deals and reality shows.

I hope you're correct about the left being more brutal. The right has the monopoly on brutality. It's long past payback time.

I do have some local experience with this and it works. Sadly, that's the only thing that works now.

Shaw Kenawe said...

"Here is a diabolical thought experiment: Suppose she actually won? And what then?"--(O)CT(O)

National seppuku?

dmarks said...

"The right-wing noise machine's efforts to shut down NPR and PBS are shameful."

In an era of budget problems, and even Obama admitting that there is a decifit problem, the last thing we need is official government news organs. Zero out the funding, get rid of this government interference/tampering with the free press. Let PBS and NPR survive on their own, but not as the official government news.

"You know we can't have any media outlets that promote education, serious journalism, and civil discourse."

All of which exists just fine without PBS or NPR. Only you don't have to rob people to pay for them.

Malcolm also said:
"I'm willing to bet that many people who criticize NPR as a far-left outfit rarely, if ever, listen to it. They usually just repeat the talking points uttered by O'Reilly, Beck, Limbaugh, etc."

I listen to them a lot more than O'Reilly, Rush, Beck, etc. While not far left, they are definitely left of center. However, I don't care where they are on the political spectrum.

Octo said:

"Ailes is calling NPR a fascist news source, and Faux News stands to gain market share in the event of PBS's demise. Who is acting the fascist in this gambit!"

Actually, NPR is more fascist, as the government news source. And I don't blame Ailes for opposing the unfair competition of people being forced to pay money for NPR's news, while Fox does not have this advantage.

Say what you will about Fox, you are not being forced to support it. You turn the channel, and it is gone. But when you turn the knob from NPR, they are still robbing you whether you like them or even know they exist.

Level the playing field. Government news organs are for North Korea, not a free country.

As for "The right has the monopoly on brutality", it was Rahm Emanual, a left-winger, who famously refers to the mentally disabled as "f***ing retards". Hard to get more brutal than that.

Arthurstone said...

NPR is more than news, commentary and analysis.

Once upon a time it's conceivable one could consider NPR 'left of center' but truth be told that is yet another case of 'say something often enough and people believe it.'

Corporate sponsorship and a plethora of uncritical business 'reporting' put NPR square in the right center.

The one thing NPR still does pretty well is cultural programming and it is perfectly acceptable for the government to fund such work.

In fact, I expect it.

That the world still can enjoy and appreciate Roman ruins, the Mexico Museum of Anthropology, the British Museum, the Hermitage, etc. etc. is that, thank goodness, most people realize the importance of supporting our cultural patrimony.

dmarks said...

NPR is still left of center.

"Corporate sponsorship and a plethora of uncritical business 'reporting' " has nothing to do with anything.

"The one thing NPR still does pretty well is cultural programming and it is perfectly acceptable for the government to fund such work."

Here, I strongly disagree. I want culture to be left to the people, not the State. I oppose any such efforts at the government controlling culture, whether it ranges from bans on non-English language use, to government picking and choosing which art is "acceptible" and worthy of forced taxpayer subsidy.

Where I think NPR excels is not in reporting of arts matters that few people care about, but is in the incredible variety of their programming. You might turn on Sean Hannity and for a half hour he might be ranting about some obscure thing about Harry Reid. In the same amount of time, "All Things Considered" will be covering several different subjects.

Nice as it may be, I'd rather have no forced contributions to it. I used to donate myself willingly until I realized I was already donating against my will. If the taxpayer subsidy was zeroed out, I might again donate on my own.

Arthurstone said...

One of the more enduring American myths is that of people victimized and discriminated against who bravely set out to colonize this continent.

Fact is much of the crowd who settled here in the early days had quite rightly been shown the door from the old world and encouraged to take their heresies and their anti-social behaviors elsewhere. They had long since worn out their welcome in enlightened era Europe and needed new horizons to expand their religious fanaticism. A fanaticism which insisted on their religious rights and denied others theirs.

The tension between that crowd and those who really were products of the enlightenment exists until this very day and is played out between alleged 'conservatives' for whom individual rights and 'liberty' trump everything and the social contract and common goals pursued with the help of government is anathema.

The spiritual offspring of slave owners and those who gleefully exterminated the aboriginal population and wreaked unimaginable environmental havoc on an entire continent because God willed it now whine about taxes, health care reform, the deficit, immigration etc. and drone on endlessly about the evils of our government.

dmarks said...

Actually, complaining about bad government policies, and trying to do something about them is very enlightened.

"for whom individual rights and 'liberty' trump everything and the social contract and common goals pursued with the help of government is anathema."

Not at all. Nothing wrong with protecting human rights, and objecting when the "social contract" idea is abused by the ruling class in order to get more power.

It's all about individual rights, after all. In capitalism and liberty, these are retained by the people. In socialism, only the ruling elites are allowed rights.

Shaw Kenawe said...

dmarks,

You really believe we the people have "individual rights" in a capitalistic society where 1% of the population owns over 50% of the wealth?

"Here, I strongly disagree. I want culture to be left to the people, not the State."--dmarks

Great idea. Left to "the people" we can look forward to more Palin daughters appearing on tacky teevee dance contests. It's much easier to watch a Bristol Palin show us how untalented she is than to give attention to, say, a Schubert lieder. Much easier.

Arthurstone said...
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Arthurstone said...

We both know better Shaw.

dmarks said...

"You really believe we the people have "individual rights" in a capitalistic society where 1% of the population owns over 50% of the wealth?"

That has absolutely nothing to do with anything. It does not infringe my individual rights if someone else has 50 cars as opposed to 1.

"Great idea. Left to "the people" "

Great idea. If you don't like it, change the channel.