McCain staffers push back on Vanity Fair's Palin profile

Alaskan Governor and GOP 2008 vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin may be nice looking, but she sure wasn’t a very good candidate is the bottom line of Vanity Fair’s 9,920-word profile about her released Tuesday.

The comments about her beauty weren't entirely complimentary, either. Vanity Fair writer Todd S. Purdum said her looks probably hurt her as much it helped win voters during the campaign.

The brunt of his article, the notion that she was never suited to run nationally, relied heavily on unattributed quotes from McCain campaign staffers who felt she wasn’t up to snuff and refused properly study up on policy issues.

The Democratic National Committee quickly seized on the story and it was the first “nondorsement of 2012.”

Three McCain staffers, however, were immediately willing to go on the record with the Washington Times in their support for Mrs. Palin after the Vanity Fair piece was published online.

Randy Scheunemann, director of foreign policy and national security for the McCain-Palin campaign and who played Joe Biden in Mrs. Palin’s debate prep, was happy to push back against the Vanity Fair piece, saying she was an impressive and capable candidate.

He recalled her performance in the vice-presidential debate where she “held her own and went toe-to-toe” against Mr. Biden, a candidate with much more experience in debates and decades of public service. She was “incredibly hard-working and concerned she’d do a good job for John McCain who was a national hero and plucked her from obscurity,” Mr. Scheunemann said. “That weighed on her every day.”

Late in October, The American Spectator's The Prowler revealed:
"Former Mitt Romney presidential campaign staffers, some of whom are currently working for Sen. John McCain and Gov. Sarah Palin's bid for the White House,
have been involved in spreading anti-Palin spin to reporters, seeking to diminish her standing after the election.
'Sarah Palin is a lightweight, she won't be the first, not even the third, person people will think of when it comes to 2012,'
says one former Romney aide, now working for McCain-Palin.
'The only serious candidate ready to challenge to lead the Republican Party is Mitt Romney.
He's in charge on November 5th.'"
The Prowler added: "Some former Romney aides were behind the recent leaks to media, including CNN, that Governor Sarah Palin was a 'diva' and was going off message intentionally."
The Romney supporters in the McCain campaign had access to internal polling which indicated well in advance of the November 4 election that McCain had no chance to win.
So they began working to position their man Mitt for a run in 2012. Just two days after the election,The Palmetto Scoop reported:
"One of the first stories to hit the national airwaves was the claim of a major internal strife between close McCain aides and the folks handling his running mate Sarah Palin."
"I’m told by very good sources that this was indeed the case and that a rift had developed, but it was between Palin’s people and the staffers brought on from the failed presidential campaign of former Gov. Mitt Romney, not McCain aides."
"The sources said nearly 80 percent of Romney’s former staff was absorbed by McCain and these individuals were responsible for what amounts to a premeditated, last-minute sabotage of Palin."
These aides loyal to Romney inside the McCain campaign, said The Scoop, reportedly saw that Palin would be a serious contender for the Republican nomination in 2012 or 2016, which made her a threat to another presidential quest by Romney.
Erick Erickson, who organized Operation Leper, said:
"Here’s what I think: I think there are some staffers on the McCain campaign who seriously screwed up the roll out of Sarah Palin, to which Governor Palin herself objected.
These staffers are now out trying to finish her off thinking, as typical D.C. types do, that if they don’t do it to her, she’ll do it to them. They just never understood who Palin is or what she is about."
"Likewise, I do think there are some staffers and others who expect Mitt Romney to run again in 2012,
they decided McCain could not win, and decided to undermine Sarah Palin and her chances hoping it would ingratiate themselves with Mitt Romney."

"Schmidt was importuned by several of the Republican aspirants for president earlier this year.
Mitt Romney sent him an antique chair to symbolize a seat at the table."

"Romney would not say whether he’d been vetted,
but did insist that the vice presidency was a subject he had never even so much discussed with McCain,
with whom he often tangled bitterly in the primary campaign.
So I tried another tack, recalling that I had been in a car with McCain and his then aide John Weaver,
reporting a piece for V.F. in the fall of 2006,
just after McCain delivered an address at Boston College’s opening convocation.
Weaver’s phone rang, and it was someone at B.C.,
informing him that Romney’s office had just called to ask when he would be invited to speak."

"Texan helped McCain secure Romney endorsement
AUSTIN – The decision by Mitt Romney to endorse John McCain didn't just happen, of course. It took a Texan who knows something about uniting fierce political rivals.
John Weaver, Mr. McCain's former political guru, was the intermediary who initiated talks between the two sides that led to Mr. Romney's announcement of support.
...Here's how the two came to make a joint appearance Thursday in Boston: Last week, Mr. Weaver got a call from McCain aides Charlie Black and Steve Schmidt, who asked if he would help broker an endorsement.
Mr. Weaver, who had left the McCain campaign in last year's shakeup, is a longtime friend of Beth Myers, Mr. Romney's campaign manager.."

Who benefits most from Sanford meltdown? Californian (that's right) Mitt Romney

"Peeking Out From the McCain Wreckage: Mitt Romney"

"Someone's got to say it: IS MITT ROMNEY RESPONSIBLE FOR OBAMA'S VICTORY?"

"Vanity: Team Romney Sabotaged Palin and Continuing to Do So?"

"Romney Supporters Trashing Palin"

"Romney advisors sniping at Palin?"

Poor sport spoiler Romney doing what he does best:

Novak: "Fred Thompson drop-out rumors traced to Romney campaign"

Said Novak: "The rumors were traced in part to Mitt Romney's campaign,
trying to stir up strife between McCain and Thompson."

"Despite outspending his rivals by huge margins throughout the primaries,
(Mitt Romney, Carpetbagger UT,CA,MA,NH,Mexico) lost Iowa, South Carolina, Florida and California.
The only primaries he won were in Michigan, where Dad was governor; LDS states;
and a few states on Super Tuesday in which his California-obsessed rivals
couldn't spare the cash to advertise.
Only John Connolly in 1968 had a worse cash-to-delegates ratio.
And John McCain rightly did not like Romney's tactics during the primaries.
(W)hen (Romney's early leads) started slipping away, he resorted to unfair,
distorted, scorched-earth negative ads, betting that his opponents couldn't
afford to spend enough for the truth to catch up to his charges."
[Romney: A Mistake for McCain, 7/23/2008, Dick Morris]

It is remarkable to me that the press can not seem to leave her alone. If she didn’t sell newspapers or TV time, we would never hear about her; and her political future would be in doubt.

As long as the MSM keeps her in the news, and the DEMS keep trying to bash her potential, the more Palin becomes viable in 12 or beyond. The limp-wristed attacks against her from disenfranchised rinos who worked on the McCain/Palin campaign, is only going to draw the attention of voters. Once those voters get the Palin/conservative message they will stick with her.

The MSM is blowing it. Remember the old political adage, “Print anything you want about me, just spell the name right.”

What happened to the GOP listening tour, heard any news from them lately?

It is horrible reading, but may not ultimately hurt her to get the press she is.

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