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"Pals Around With Terrorists": Palin Wasn't That Rogue, After All
theAtlantic.com ^ | July 10, 2009 | Marc Ambinder

Posted on 07/10/2009 1:47:45 PM PDT by Al B.

In the mail this morning was an advanced copy of Dan Balz and Haynes Johnson's extremely well-reported history of the 2008 presidential campaign: The Battle for America is what the two veteran Posties have called it. The book will be published on August 4; Balz and Johnson will talk about it on Meet the Press on August 2. There are plenty of scoops, and I can't resisting sharing just one involving a critical phase of the campaign in early October of 2008.

Whose idea was it for Gov. Sarah Palin to attack Barack Obama as a guy who "pals around with terrorists?" Palin's camp has always insisted that the McCain high command endorsed the stratagem, while folks close to McCain have accused Palin of going "rogue" and pointed to the "pals around" attack as an example of how Palin simply could not be controlled. The idea that Palin was hard to manage as a candidate and ignored the advice and wishes of McCain's senior advisers is explicated in some detail by Todd Purdum.

But on the subject of linking Obama to ex-Weatherman Bill Ayers, it turns out that Palin hadn't gone rogue.

[...]

Turns out that the McCain campaign was a week away from running an ad linking Obama to Ayers. The e-mail from Wallace, according to Balz and Johnson, reads as follows: "Governor and Team: rick [Davis], Steve [Schmidt] and I suggest the following attack from the new york times. If you are comfortable, please deliver the attack as written. Please do not make any changes to the below without approval from steve or myself because precision is crucial in our ability to introduce this."

(Excerpt) Read more at politics.theatlantic.com ...


TOPICS: Politics/Elections; US: Alaska
KEYWORDS: 2008veep; balz; billayers; bookreview; nicollewallace; obamaayersconnection; palin; pentagonbomber; proterrorist; waronsarah; weatherunderground
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Another canard squashed.
1 posted on 07/10/2009 1:47:45 PM PDT by Al B.
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To: Al B.

Darn. I was hoping “pals around with terrorists” was her idea, not Wallace’s.


2 posted on 07/10/2009 1:50:05 PM PDT by nomoremods
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To: Al B.

Sarah going rogue...hmmmmmmm...let me think about that for about twenty three minutes.....


3 posted on 07/10/2009 1:51:55 PM PDT by jessduntno (NEVER say Cap and Trade Bill. It's the Electricity, Heating Oil and Gasoline Tax Bill....)
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To: Al B.

Sarah was the ONLY one in the train wreck known as the McCain campaign who ever wanted to WIN. Nicole Wallace and Steve Schmidt were loyal to Mitt Romney and ONLY to Mitt Romney. McCain never wanted to win, he wanted a scapegoat. That entire campaign was the most idiotic campaign I have ever seen. It is a shame that Sarah’s name has been dragged through the mud when all she wanted to do was help McCain win when he never had any intention of doing so. Besides, I liked the “Palling around with terrorists” quote, all of Obama’s buddies are all terrorists and marxists. It fit him to a T


4 posted on 07/10/2009 1:52:06 PM PDT by Sarah Barracuda
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To: Sarah Barracuda

Exactly


5 posted on 07/10/2009 1:56:04 PM PDT by Venturer
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To: Al B.

Check out this quote..

“Governor Palin herself was too classy to leak the emails that could have proved her innocent of these leakers’ charges.”

THAT, among so many reasons, is why we LOVE SARAH PALIN and will crawl over broken glass for her!

INTEGRITY!

She could have leaked the email and proven herself innocent, but she has too much CLASS to do so, even though she knew how much all this BS was hurting her. That is why I admire this woman. You can all say what you want about her, but she has something we haven’t seen in a long time in Washington D.C and that is INTEGRITY and HONESTY


6 posted on 07/10/2009 1:56:25 PM PDT by Sarah Barracuda
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To: Al B.
Balz and Johnson are "sticking it" to the McLame liars.


7 posted on 07/10/2009 1:57:07 PM PDT by RasterMaster (DUmocrats - the party of slavery, sedition, subversion, socialism & surrender)
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To: Al B.

Palin was the only competent campaigner in that campaign. John was a disaster.


8 posted on 07/10/2009 1:57:22 PM PDT by texmexis best (uency)
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To: Sarah Barracuda
Obama's love of madbombers and their funny little frieds is boundless. His first Supreme Court nominee, Sotomayor, was involved deeply with La Raza (the Mexican KKK) back when one of their units in Colorado was engaged in a serious bombing campaign.

Interestingly enough their bombs were like the one Bill Ayers designed and went off in their hands.

7 young terrorists met their fates.

It's inescapable that Obama is attracted to Sotomayor as a consequence.

9 posted on 07/10/2009 2:01:38 PM PDT by muawiyah
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To: nomoremods

The more the McCain camp makes these sniveling excuses, the angrier I get.

I am Sarah Palin — not good enough to shine her funky monkey shoes, but I’ve got her back! These ridiculous, sniveling McCain aides remind me of the local campaign artistes who — the worse they perform — the higher they are promoted.


10 posted on 07/10/2009 2:04:43 PM PDT by afraidfortherepublic
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To: afraidfortherepublic
The more crap likes this comes out makes me wonder how in the hell McCain got 58 million votes. Actually I know the answer to that and it's Sarah Palin. That lady worked her a$$ off for McCain...4,5,6 rallies per day at the end 'til she was exhausted.

These spineless a_holes running the campaign might as well have been on Obama's payroll. Hell, maybe they were.

11 posted on 07/10/2009 2:19:01 PM PDT by Al B. (Dennis Miller on why he loves Sarah Palin: "She bugs all the right people")
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To: Al B.

Did you see the McCain/Palin rallies. I watched many of them online. The second after Sarah was done talking people would leave. They could have given a rats behind about John McCain, they were there to see HER not HIM.
She’d do rallies in the pouring rain, in the snow, and in the wind, I would hear her voice crack like she was getting a bad cold and she STILL went out there and gave 100 percent. McCain didn’t even give a 2 percent effort. He was jealous that she got all the attention, he hated it. I talked some people who went to McCain rallies, the second they heard Sarah would not be there they didn’t even bother showing up.


12 posted on 07/10/2009 2:27:36 PM PDT by Sarah Barracuda
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To: Al B.
Pals around with terrorists... not so bad.

Talks about it, "gone rogue".

Moral relativism, isn't it grand.


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13 posted on 07/10/2009 2:29:58 PM PDT by DoughtyOne (_Resident of the United States and Kenya's favorite son, Baraaaack Hussein Obamaaaa...)
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To: Al B.
Focusing the attention and attack on Bill Ayers was stupid. The most obvious weakness was Obama’s association with Rev. Wright. McCain, of course, refused to raise Obama’s primary weakness as an issue.
14 posted on 07/10/2009 2:35:11 PM PDT by MBB1984
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To: MBB1984

Sarah Palin was the star QB who had an adequate offensive line, runners who were too slow, and receivers who couldn’t catch and a defense who couldn’t make a stop on 3rd down when they had to.

On balance the opposition had surged ahead on two consecutive interceptions (financial meltdown)from which Sarah’s team was not able to recover them.

Several mistakes and costly penalties also prevented Sarah from making a comeback.


15 posted on 07/10/2009 2:59:58 PM PDT by techno
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To: DoughtyOne; All
If a ham and egger like myself can be a monthly donor, you can too.
C’mon, $5, $10, $15 a month. You're really gonna miss that?

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16 posted on 07/10/2009 3:04:38 PM PDT by End Times Sentinel (In Memory of my Dear Friend Henry Lee II)
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To: techno
Sarah Palin was the star QB who had an adequate offensive line, runners who were too slow, and receivers who couldn’t catch and a defense who couldn’t make a stop on 3rd down when they had to.

Sarah may appear on Mount Rushmore yet. Her getting ExxonMobil and TransCanada together on building a trans-Canadian gas pipeline seems to me to be the most worthwhile thing that's happening in this crappy Dumb era.

I'll certainly vote for her for President, and the sooner the better. She seems to have more common sense than Zerobama and the Congers (sic) combined. She probably has a higher IQ than the sum of all the congersmen combined and including Joe Gaffe Biden and the Zero Hussein Zero.

17 posted on 07/10/2009 3:29:10 PM PDT by Ole Okie (American)
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To: Sarah Barracuda

After awhile they realized people were leaving so they had McCain speak first. You know a large part of all the problems the McCains have with Sarah Palin is pure jealousy. While McCain was drawing 2000 or less to his rallies, she was drawing thousands and even tens of thousands. Whenever he wanted to be see in front of a big crowd, he had to join up with her. My bet is that at least 5 or 10 percent of those voting for McCain were actually just votes for Palin. Matter of fact, not too long ago, McCain said at the Heritage Foundation that almost 60 million people voted for Gov. Palin.


18 posted on 07/10/2009 3:29:53 PM PDT by euram
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To: Ole Okie

Sarah may appear on Mount Rushmore yet

Exactly, that that is what eats Noonan, Parker, and the rest up inside. Deep down they know that in the future there will be a monument somewhere on the Washington Mall honoring Sarah Palin, and the best they can hope for is a headstone in a forgotten corner somewhere.


19 posted on 07/10/2009 3:33:06 PM PDT by euram
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To: texmexis best

You know, the repubs really screwed up big time. They should have had Gov. Palin at the top of the ticket with mclame as her vp. She has a lot more admin experience than mclame and could have torn ozero a new one on his lack of experience. mclame was just another bob dole. IF any of you goofballs in the repub heirarchy read these, listen up. Quit putting insiders up for election because it’s their turn and look at who would be good for the country. The dim party has been hijacked by people who want to destroy this country and they have a media who is right along with them.


20 posted on 07/10/2009 3:46:05 PM PDT by Texas resident ( Cut n Shoot Texas: Mayberry for rednecks)
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