Posted on 10/14/2008 10:52:03 AM PDT by Chet 99
By JEFF E. SCHAPIRO
RICHMOND TIMES-DISPATCH
Published: October 14, 2008
Vice-presidential pick Sarah Palin dashed into the conservative heartland of Virginia yesterday, likening the struggling Republican ticket to a stock-car racer revved for a come-from-behind victory.
Standing on a sun-baked stage on a dusty field on the edge of Richmond International Raceway, Palin referred to Jimmie Johnson’s squeaker win last month in the Chevy Rock & Roll 400 at the sprawling NASCAR complex in Henrico County.
Dismissing polls that show her and presidential nominee John McCain trailing nationally—and in traditionally Republican Virginia—Palin said, “It’s looking a lot like that Rock & Roll 400 on the checkered-flag-waving day, November 4th.”
Signaling the importance of Virginia’s 13 electoral votes for the GOP ticket, the Alaska governor swung through the state yesterday. She started in military-rich Virginia Beach with McCain before stopping in suburban Richmond en route to heavily Democratic Northern Virginia.
“They know Virginia is a swing state, and they have to play—and play hard—here,” said Victoria Cobb, president of the Family Foundation of Virginia, a conservative grass-roots organization.
Speaking to a crowd that Henrico County’s police chief, Col. H.W. Stanley Jr., estimated at 20,000 to 25,000, Palin was at once loyal soldier and fierce critic, talking up McCain’s economic-recovery plan and putting down Democrat Barack Obama as a tax-and-spend liberal.
Palin, accompanied by her husband, Todd, attributed the financial crisis and continuing credit freeze to “Wall Street bankers and brokers . . . and the predatory lenders who so took advantage of so many Americans.”
Palin said Obama favored a “trillion [dollars] more” in new spending that would force higher taxes for working families and small businesses. Those claims were greeted with lusty boos from a crowd largely turned out in red—the television color-code for the GOP.
Palin—wearing a dark skirt and a white shirt, the sleeves of which were turned up—drew hearty cheers when, referring to her son, Trigg, who has Down syndrome, and special-needs children, she said, “There are the world’s standards of perfection, and there are God’s.”
After praising the troops in Iraq and Afghanistan, Palin alluded to protesters in the audience—none, however, were spotted. The crowd thundered when Palin said, “Thank those veterans who have given them the honor to protest.”
The Associated Press reported that Palin accidentally mistook some of her own fans for protesters. People on the perimeter could not hear Palin and shouted, “louder, louder.”
Hank Williams Jr., a country-western star, skewered the Democratic ticket with a send-up of his hit, “Family Tradition.” Williams, wearing a cowboy hat, sunglasses and a Washington Redskins jersey, intoned about a favorite target of Republicans—the “left-wing, liberal media.”
Williams compared Palin to a bear protecting its young: “If you mess with her cubs, she’s gonna take off her gloves. That’s an American female tradition.”
Del. William R. Janis, R-Henrico, attending the rally with son Robert, said the event would energize the Republican rank and file and was a “tangible demonstration that Virginia is not Obama-Biden country . . . This is still a reliably red state.”
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus
It was a great rally. Sarah was great and Hank was great. I got to watch it on the internet. This election is like a NASCAR race. McCain-Palin is going to win it at the finish line.
she is the most dynamic political figure of the next 18 years.
she is wow
“Reporter” JEFF E. SCHAPIRO is the Democrat point man in Virginia media.
An astonishingly sensible account from him.
The slide show at the link has great pictures!
I took my wife and my 14 and 11 year old daughters out of school for this. We got there at 10:45am and there were already thousands. By 2:00 there were 30,000+ and there wasn’t even standing room. Virginia is NOT going blue! If it does, you can thank ACORN. Otherwise, NO WAY!!
Plugs and Hussein can’t attract a couple of thousand. Palin is absolutely electric! Her appearance in Richmond was as exciting as ANY concert I’ve ever been to!
DO NOT LISTEN TO POLLS! YOU HAVE TO GO TO A PALIN RALLY TO UNDERSTAND IT! WE ARE BEING SNOOKERED BY THE MSM!
Odd then, that they were standing next to my sister-in-law who had to move to be able to hear.
What Shapiro is referring to however is a group in the back yelling "we can't hear you." The sound for Governor Palin was horrible. I don't think she was able to understand what they were saying.
I agree. She is the dynamic figure of the future (and now) for the Republican Party, and the new face of the newly revamped, re-energized and reformed Republican Party along with younger people like Bobby Jindal. If this election goes south (I don’t think it will) I hope she doesn’t listen to the liberal media and just go back to Alaska to be out of national politics forever. That’s what they want. They FEAR Palin coming back because they know that she can win. Whether it be 2012 or 2016 she needs to run for President. She has a legion of supporters. The day she declares a possible future run for the presidency is the day I join and support the campaign.
Thanks for your post! And indeed we are being snookerd by the MSM... but come November 4th, 2008, we SNOOKER them a good one, and celebrate on November 5th!
It is going to be funny watching all of the msm types and talking heads saying in unison that they don’t know anyone who voted for Mac and Sarah.
The good news is that the rally was a success. The bad news is that we are defending Virginia three weeks from the general.
It is going to be funny watching all of the msm types and talking heads saying in unison that they don’t know anyone who voted for Mac and Sarah.
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Of course they don’t - they have been hired by the Communists to try and takeover America.
If we win it, we win it.
We were pretty far back, next to the truck handing out the McCain-Palin yard signs, and we could hear her just fine. The microphone dropped out a few times, but when it was working it was plenty loud. There were some protestors on the other side of the truck, but not many. There were more outside the track when we were leaving.
I was at the rally yesterday and saw and spoke to Bill. It was all that the previous threads have said and more. In spite of some of the MSM reporting, there was at least 25,000 people there to see Sarah. Not bad for such short notice and the change of venue.
Louisa County - beautiful downtown Bumpass!
It is going to be funny watching all of the msm types and talking heads saying in unison that they don’t know anyone who voted for Mac and Sarah.
God help us and McCain/Palin this Nov. Save the country AND put an end to the MSM.
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