that's rich, a wimp talking about wimps...
Posted on 12/02/2010 4:05:00 AM PST by 2ndDivisionVet
One prominent Republican calls on his party to drum Palin out of the 2012 race. Here's why he'll be disappointed.
"Morning Joe" Scarborough earned a splash of attention within the politerati this week with a Politico column calling on the Republican Party to "man up" and denounce Sarah Palin. His main point is that Palin is poison for the Grand Old Party:
The most-talked-about figure in the GOP is a reality show star who cannot be elected. And yet the same leaders who fret that Sarah Palin could devastate their party in 2012 are too scared to say in public what they all complain about in private.
The GOP-congressman-turned-MSNBC-host urged his party comrades to speak out publicly against the former half-term Alaska governor. Scarborough, though, is likely to end up disappointed, because when it comes to Palin, GOPers have good cause for wimping out.
In his article, Scarborough viciously derided Palin's qualifications: "What man or mouse with a fully functioning human brain and a résumé as thin as Palin's would flirt with a presidential run?" And he challenged GOPers to call her out, noting, "If Republicans want to embrace Palin as a cultural icon whose anti-intellectualism fulfills a base political need, then have at it. I suppose it’s cheaper than therapy." But, he added, if the Republican Party "wants to return to the White House anytime soon, it's time that Republican leaders started standing up and speaking the truth to Palin."
But Scarborough left something out: Who does he expect to go mano-a-mano with Palin within Republican circles? There are no big grizzlies with the strength to knock her out of the presidential contest. And the party structure does not afford a group of insiders the mechanism to bar Palin from the presidential jamboree, if she wants in. Some prominent GOPers have taken swipes at her. Karl Rove dissed her as a reality-TV star. Barbara Bush said she hoped Palin would stay in Alaska.
But all this was the political equivalent of a few mosquitoes buzzing around Palin. She can easily swat away such quips, and these stings don't have much impact. In fact, though Jeb Bush said he had to side with his mother in the Babs-versus-Sarah feud "because she's my mother," he also praised Palin for having "an incredible skill to connect with people" and for possessing "fantastic political instincts." That is, he played nice. Not exactly what Scarborough is looking for.
A few nasty remarks from W.'s mom, Rove, or anyone else won't impede Palin. If she's going to be blocked from snatching the GOP 2012 presidential nomination, it will be by her competitors: Mitt Romney, Mike Huckabee, Newt Gingrich, Mike Pence, Tim Pawlenty, Haley Barbour, and other potential presidential wannabes. Yet none of these pols will take a poke at her at this stage, because Palin, whether she runs or not, could well end up a kingmaker in the race.
In a recent poll, Palin narrowly led the GOP presidential field with 21 percent of the vote. Gingirch had 19 percent; Romney, 18 percent. And she remains popular among many Republicans, whether they are inclined to vote for her in 2012 or not. If Palin chooses not to seek the presidency, surely she will be in a position to influence the race. She could do so by endorsing a candidate—or by issuing a series of tweets and Facebook messages about the contenders. The same could happen if she runs but fails to win early and drops out. Consequently, the other probable 2012 contestants don't want to alienate Palin and her flock. (One-fifth of the GOP voting pool is a large group to tick off.) And any Republican closely associated with any of these candidates also would not want to get on the wrong side of the woman from Wasilla. That could earn Palin's wrath for the candidate he or she supports.
Thus, it was hardly surprising that Romney rode to Palin's rescue, when a Politico story last month cited unnamed GOP players assailing Palin. When Palin's new book came out, Romney kindly tweeted, "Thanks @SarahPalinUSA for the kind words in your new book about the role of faith in public life. Hope it's a bestseller."
It's not in the interest of Romney and the rest of the pack to whack Palin—until it's absolutely necessary. If she does enter the fray and goes on to become the frontrunner, at some point, the other candidates will have no choice but to fire away. Of course, it could be too late then to stop her. But as long as she is merely a presidential tease or a second-tier candidate, it will be a risky (or dumb) move for any of the candidates to slam her and upset her supporters. No doubt, each of the 2012 GOP candidates will be eager to see someone else take the first poke at Palin. But there's a basic dynamic at play: Don't strike the queen, unless you can kill the queen. And it's hard to kill a queen with so many devoted followers.
From his comfortable perch in cable TV-land, Scarborough can try to foment an anti-Palin movement within the Republican Party. But given the political fundamentals—pols tend to be risk averse and refrain from taking bold steps that can hurt their career prospects—he's not going to find too many GOPers manly enough to heed his stop-Sarah call to arms. But his crusade should make for good TV.
As proof of that last sentence, watch this:
(VIDEO AT LINK)
Why such condescension when one asks a legitimate question about a potential candidate? That’s not how you win someone over to your side, something you would need for the primary.
Joe Scarborough’s only comrades are fellow liberal America haters.
that's rich, a wimp talking about wimps...
“What man or mouse with a fully functioning human brain and a résumé as thin as Palin’s would flirt with a presidential run?”
Where is your brain matter?
Really?? Which one? I didn't see one mentioned in the article.
She quit for the good of her State.
She could not get anything done because of spurrolous charges and it was costing her State and herself money defencing herself instead of allowing her to get her work doen.
How hard is that to understand. If the idiots who kept making asses of themselves had left her alone she would now still be Governor. She did the right thing for her State and herself. It was a brave and brilliant move and anyone but a troll could see that and understand it.
The Democrats keep bringing it up like it was an essential issue, and it is not.If you are fooled by it then you are falling right into their hands.
I think there were something like 26 charges against her and she beat them all flat out.
Oh how cute.You know the deal about Palins resigning as governor dont you? You have been here since 1999 you ought to know.
You are right. It is a fairy tale.
Scarborough has rounded the bend....he must really need this job.
"Mrs. Palin, we know what it took to get you to quit as governor...what would it take to get you to quit as president?"
There is no good answer for that. This is why I consider her to be unelectable and why I do not support her for the nomination.
I think that she herself fully understands this and will not run.
She would be good because Liberals hate her. Anything Liberals hate is good.
The fact is that she did not walk away from her constituents, she did what was best for them. While the charges against her were costing her personally they were costing the state much more. Every one of the charges required massive amounts of paperwork, research and documentation, since she was the Governor we the residents were paying for that. State employees spending most of their on the clock time doing this.
She did the right thing in stepping back, looking at the whole picture, and making a very difficult decision. Sean is a good guy, she knew that the state would be in good hands with him and that the people who were trying to bring her down would be stopped in their tracks.
How would she know for sure that she would have a gig at Fox or that her book would be a huge best seller? It is just as possible that after she “quit” she went home and lived on Todds income and vanished into obscurity.
Bottom line is that she did what was right for the state and the people in it, and not for the first time either.
Nothing cute about it, no ulterior motive, no agenda on my part- and I get my news at a lot of places, including here. Much of what I consider to be news is not politics at all
Just never have been all that interested in SP until recently, until I see how all of the Elites on both sides of the aisle hate her so much. If they hate her, then I want to know why and probably will support her. I’m really not that much into the minutia of Palin, at this point.
She represents the middle class, IMO, and that’s a good thing, I think.
Interesting to me how polarizing my question was. Truly did not mean to ruffle feathers around here.
Thanks for all the responses!
I’m really surprised you do not know the reason Palin gave for leaving the governorship.
Alaska has unique system wherein any gadfly with an ax to grind can file an “ethics” complaint. I’m not sure if it’s against any elected official, but obviously against the governor.
As the left has made it their mission to destroy Sarah Palin, because they fear her more than the average geek fears zombies, the ethics charges came thick and fast after the ‘08 election.
All of these must be treated seriously, no matter how bogus, and so the legal bills, time & effort, etc. mount up.
As another poster has pointed out every single charge filed proved to be baseless.
She felt it was bad for Alaska, bad for the tax payers, and quite obviously a waste of her own time.
http://us4palin.com/accomplishments/master-list-of-governor-palins-2009-accomplishments/
Plug (copy and paste) the above url into your taskbar and hit "Enter."
It'll take you a couple days to hit and read all the links provided for articles on Palin's earth-shaking accomplishments as Governor of Alaska and beyond.
To synopsize the high points:
1) After beating Frank Murkowski to win the Alaska governorship, she hunted down, prosecuted, amd jailed those of her predecessors who had run afoul of the Law, regardless of Party affiliation. Many of them still languish in prison today. Unheard of in modern politics, despite being the right thing to do given The Oath all elected officials take.
2) As Governor, she negotiated with the largest corporation on planet earth (Exxon-Mobil) to return a fair share of the windfall profits from Alaska's oil resources to the owners of that resource; the Alaskan people. Tried before a number of times, never accomplished. Exxon-Mobil threatened Palin that, if she persisited in this, they would pack up and leave the North Slope. Palin told them, "Don't let the door whack you in the ass on the way out." Exxon-Mobil caved.
3) She successfully negotiated the single-largest construction project in history, sealing the deal for the pipeline to bring Natural Gas to the "Lower 48." Four major oil companies and three countries had to be brought to the table and into consensus; tried by two prior Governors, Palin succeeded where they failed.
She does what needs to be done, and does it without fanfare or grandstanding. These are a few of the vast array of her remarkable accomplishments; things others had attempted and failed at. That she accomplished all the things listed on the site I posted the url to is, frankly, superhuman. That she did it all in half a term as Governor is ridiculous. That she also, during that same timeframe, had a baby and ran for Vice Persident with John McCain transcends the ridiculous into the sublime.
Never in American political history has such a dynamo of human productivity been recorded in Statewide elected office as an Executive Administrator.
America is at a dire corssroads right now. We need someone with a demostrated ability to make executive decisions on the fly, and get things done quickly, if we are to avert the End of The American Dream.
There is no other possible candidate out there who brings to the table her resumé, her dedication or miles-long shopping list of brilliant Executive prowess.
When the Left started launching dozens of frivolous lawsuits against her, claiming bogus "Ethics" breaches (which have since been thrown from court), tying up her time and ability to do her job as Governor, she made the extrememly selfless decision, for the good of the Alaskan people, to step down as Governor and turn the reins over to her Lieutenant Governor, Sean Parnell.
Because she has been very successful since then with her book "Going Rogue," the Left (and many GOP sour grapes imbeciles) have claimed that she left office to "cash in." For that to be true, she would have needed a crystal ball to predict that her first book would ship 2 million copies in 6 months. Despite that no initial offering from a first-time author had ever even come close Sarah supposedly knew that this was going to take place.
These kinds of spurious, half-baked allegations stand pale, wan and limp next to the improbable litany of Palin's proven, on-the-record successes, both as Governor, and as an author, and as a "King-maker" for the GOP.
We need someone really, really special in 2012. There is only one. Sarah Palin puts the "L" in "pain," and she's coming for a whole new crop of scumbags in '12.
;-/
You say poison, I say desperately needed chemotherapy.
The GOP-congressman-turned-MSNBC-host urged his party comrades to speak out publicly against the former half-term Alaska governor. Scarborough, though, is likely to end up disappointed, because when it comes to Palin, GOPers have good cause for wimping out.
Then don't just drive her out. Put in someone better. Find someone at least as conservative with more experience and who speaks more forcefully for the cause. Far, far too many potential candidates have succumbed to Potomac fever (or its equally nasty cousin Charles River fever).
In his article, Scarborough viciously derided Palin's qualifications: "What man or mouse with a fully functioning human brain and a résumé as thin as Palin's would flirt with a presidential run?"
Well, we have President Squeaky with absolutely zero executive experience.
That is priceless!
You've been here since 1999, and this "surprises" you? I think you're probably as full of crap as a Christmas goose. You haven't ruffled feathers here; you've just proven how very vapid, and venal, and ignorant one can come across as when they try to be "controversial."
IMHO.
;-\
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