Strollerderby : is sarah palin the next oprah

Sarah Palin Speaks To Esquire About Kids And Things

Brett Singer — Fri, 06 Feb 2009 04:15:00 GMT

Sarah Palin is back. In truth, the Hockey Mom/Lipsticked Pitbull/former Vice-Presidential candidate never left. So before anyone hits me with a "Why don't you leave that nice woman alone!", remember that all of these quotes are from Palin herself, via an interview in Esquire Magazine. It's not like people put a camera in her house. We'll stick with the quotes that are about her kids. Here we go:

On Trig:
I'll tell you, yesterday the Anchorage Daily News, they called again to ask — double-, triple-, quadruple-check — who is Trig's real mom. And I said, Come on, are you kidding me? We're gonna answer this? Do you not believe me or my doctor? And they said, No, it's been quite cryptic the way that my son's birth has been discussed. And I thought, Okay, more indication of continued problems in the world of journalism.

Now, I don't want to feed the beast here. And there are certainly problems in the world of journalism. But in that paragraph, she doesn't say that she's Trig's mom. I understand what she means. But she doesn't actually say that she is Trig's biological mother. Just sayin'. (UPDATE: per the comments below, this was meant as a joke, not serious journalism.)

On Bristol's pending nuptials:
This is what I've been telling Bristol, before she gets married, is, Bristol, there are definitely gonna be tough parts in marriage. You have to look at those tough times and remember that you have essentially a business contract with this person. You've signed an agreement: You're going to be together. And you look at it that way as you work through the tough times, because I guarantee the better time is there on the other side. That's how we've looked at it.

To quote another song by Heart (who sang her theme tune, Barracuda), what about love? I kind of hope that there was more to this one because if that's how she feels about marriage, that's kind of a bummer. Not that I'm all flowers and puppy dog tails when it comes to marriage. But it's more than just a "contract." Isn't it?

On Bristol's name:
Two meanings in Bristol's name: I worked at the Bristol Inn, and Todd grew up in Bristol Bay. But also, Bristol, Connecticut, is the home of ESPN. And when I was in high school, my desire was to be a sportscaster. ESPN was just kicking off, just getting off the ground, and I thought that's what I was going to do in life, is be one of the first woman sportscasters. Until I learned that you'd have to move to Bristol, Connecticut. It was far away. So instead, I had a daughter and named her Bristol.

OK. Hang on. First, she says "two meanings" and then provides three. Second – ESPN? Does that mean that she considered naming the girl Boomer, after Chris Berman? This might seem like another opinion from a "pathetic blogger" (another quote of hers), but that's a strange choice. I mean, I like the Cartoon Network but I'm not naming my son Mojo Jojo. (I did suggest that the name Luke, so I could say, "Luke! I am your father!" But then my wife hit me really hard and I gave up.)

Lastly, a general comment on parenting and kids:
A courageous person is anyone who loses a child and can still get out of bed in the morning.

No disagreement there. I do wonder what prompted her to say that, but that's one thing she and I can agree on. (She was really worried about finding common ground with me, y'know.)

One thing that can't be said enough – when Palin says that she wants us to leave her kids alone, she has to realize that she puts them in the spotlight every time she does press like this. She doesn't have to do the interview. And if she does the interview, she doesn't have to mention her family all the time. I said it before and I'll say it again – if you don't want people to write about your kids, you should stop talking about them in the media.

There's a lot more, including the statement "Everything I've ever needed to know I learned through sports," a bit of "y'all" and "ya", and that she doesn't think of herself as "hot." Oh, and to make a good chili, you need mooseburger. The full interview is online at Esquire.com. G'wan. Read it. You know you want to. Y'all. Ya.

Source/Image: Esquire

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Sarah Palin Says Leave My Kids Alone

Brett Singer — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 19:00:00 GMT

Remember Sarah Palin? Republican Vice-Presidential candidate, kind of overshadowed John McCain for a while, said the word "maverick" a lot? Tina Fey did an impression of her on Saturday Night Live? Ring any bells?

She's back. Well, to be fair, she never went away. But the Associated Press has published a story talking about how Palin "is going on the offensive against news organizations as well as bloggers she says are perpetuating malicious gossip about her and her children." They say she has, "personally reached out to media outlets such as People magazine and The Associated Press to complain about information she claimed is wrong."

What information? Well, that her daughter Bristol Palin and her fiancee, Levi Johnson, have dropped out of high school. She says that isn't true since they are taking correspondence courses. That sort of thing. Palin says that she is doing this to "set the record straight" and not because of political ambitions.

American University professor Leonard Steinhorn, described as "an expert on the presidency," isn't buying it. He says that Palin is positioning herself to run for Prez in 2012, and is "attacking the media as a way to generate support among a base she hopes will support her." (He's an expert, so he must be right.)

Here's the thing. I don't think it's fair to go after her kids. But someone needs to explain to the Governor of Alaska that if you don't want "the media" to talk about your family, you probably shouldn't invite them into your home, which she did with the Today Show in November after losing the election. No one forced her to do that. And if she wanted to do the interview, she could have done it alone. But she chose to do it in her kitchen while she cooked dinner. She clearly wants to have her family be part of her image, but she also wants to pick and choose what people write about them.

The problem is, it doesn't work that way. You can't have your cake and bake it on national television too. There are plenty of ways to keep your family out of the spotlight. One of them is very simple: keep them out of the spotlight.

Source: AP via HuffPo

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Matt Lauer Talks To Sarah Palin In The Kitchen

Brett Singer — Tue, 11 Nov 2008 13:35:00 GMT

Sarah Palin is off the campaign trail but not out of the spotlight. Now that she isn't running for anything, she's doing interviews left and right (that's not a political reference, by the way). This morning, NBC aired the first part of Matt Lauer's interview with the Alaska Governor; part two airs tomorrow, and there's even more coming on NBC Nightly News.

Sarah sat down with Matt in Alaska for a traditional interview (as morning news gigs go, I think Matt Lauer has it the worst – dude has to travel a LOT). He also spent some time at the Palin home, sharing a salmon and halibut casserole, which he said was quite tasty.

Some of the video is below (click here if the embed doesn't work).

Here are some highlights:

Matt says that the Palin family was, “down to Earth.” Palin herself is, “a working mom...making dinner for her family.”

As for Governor Palin, she was thrilled to be, “representing middle-class, hardworking American families” as part of the McCampaign. (I'm waiting for a candidate to say that they represent lazy people who don't care about money.) She “did not know” that the media scrutiny would be as intense as it turned out to be, and she was upset about the rumors that Trig was not her son. Still, it was all worth it because, “I knew we were on the right path...offering me and my family in service of my country.”

Todd weighs in, kind of. Asked about how the Palin family dealt with the crazy campaign schedule, the First Dude said, “our family is very adaptable.” As for the criticisms? It's just “part of the business.” It sounds like Sarah was more interested than Todd in tearing some of her critics a new one. Still, the Governor says that it's all, “part of this beast called politics in America.”

So what about all of the post-election mud that's been flying around our heads? And did the McCampaign keep her from doing interviews? Palin doesn't want to get into “inside baseball” with regard to “who was calling the shots in the campaign.” She makes it pretty clear that she, “loves doing interviews” because she wants to tell the American people what she plans to do to/for them. “You have to be able to speak through the media.” Lauer points out that she answered his question, “without answering it.”

Then we hear from Piper. She awkwardly answers Matt's questions about the campaign, saying that the hardest part was going to the rallies. She missed “a lot” of school, and its been hard to catch up now that she's home again. How would she feel about another campaign, like, say, in four years? “I don't know,” is the 7 year old's answer. Then mom jumps in and asks her daughter, “Would you want to do it again, sister?” Piper, without missing a beat, says, “Yes.” (UPDATE: apparently Piper was wearing high heels.)

I have several thoughts about this of course, but one thing comes to mind immediately. Governor Palin expressed frustration with what she calls a “double standard” regarding how the media covers her. “I don’t know if anybody’s asking Barack Obama, for intance, ‘Who did your makeup before you went on stage?’ But they’ve been asking me.” True. But when John McCain goes on Jay Leno tonight, I don't think he's going to be doing a cooking segment. Live by the mixing bowl, die by the mixing bowl, y'know?

Source/Image: NBC/MSNBC

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UPDATE AGAIN: Palin Prepper Defends The Gov

Brett Singer — Mon, 10 Nov 2008 05:15:00 GMT

ANOTHER update to the "McCampaign staffers can't seem to stop talking" story. From Gawker:

Republican and former Bush executive secretary of the National Security Council Steve Biegun has gotten in touch with National Review editor/wonderboy Rich Lowry to redeem the former vice presidential candidate by repudiating recent claims she has no idea who's in NAFTA and thinks Africa's a country. He calls the allegations "absurd," while managing to note that she had a "steep learning curve on foreign issues," as Lowry formulates it. It's nice someone is stepping out on Sarah's behalf, but is this half-hearted defense simply part of the larger scheme to discredit her for 2012?

I really am fascinated by this whole thing. The word I keep coming back to is childish. Someone bashes her, someone else defends her, the woman herself uses the words "jerks" and "stinkers." Now the person responsible for preparing the former VP candidate for her interviews says, "there's no way she didn't know Africa was a continent, and whoever is saying she didn't must be distorting 'a fumble of words.'" What does that even mean? Steve Biegun offers a theory about the charge that Palin didn't know beans about NAFTA:

He was briefing Palin before a Univision interview, and talking to her about trade issues. He rolled through NAFTA, CAFTA, and the Colombia FTA. As he talked, people were coming in and out of the room, handing Palin things, etc. She was distracted from what Biegun was saying, and said, roughly, "Ok, who's in NAFTA, what's the deal with CAFTA, what's up the FTA?"—her way, Biegun says, of saying "rack them and stack them," begin again from the start. "Somebody is taking a conversation and twisting it maliciously," he says.

Gawker says that, "this can only be the work of a Republican faction that wants Palin never to speak on behalf of their party again." I guess this could be Karl Rove sneaking his way back into the hearts and minds of the GOP. But after everything we saw this campaign season, I think there is a distinct possibility that the people speaking out about what went on behind the scenes at the McCampaign are NOT the best our country has to offer. At the very least, they're behaving very badly. Is it just me or do they sound like children, and not terribly well-behaved children at that?

Original post and updates are below. This is like "The Neverending Story." (Which, by the way, is only $4.99 on DVD. Not a bad deal.)

*-*-*

UPDATE: Palin Says Critics Are Jerks, Some Media People are Stinkers

Updating the earlier news regarding the comments made by one of Sarah Palin's aides, the New York Times is reporting that Governor Palin has made the bold move of referring to the "unnamed McCain campaign aides who have been maligning her in recent days" as "jerks." Also, some members of the media are "stinkers." No word on whether either group is made of greasy grimy gopher guts and mutilated monkey feet. It is also possible that the unnamed sources are, in fact, poopyheads infected with massive amounts of cooties. We'll stay with this story all night if we have to.

OK, OK, we're being silly, but so is everyone else. And we weren't involved in a Presidential election campaign.

Here's the direct quote from the Times:

Referring to the McCampaign staff members who have criticized her: "that’s cruel and it’s mean-spirited, it’s immature, it’s unprofessional, and those guys are jerks, if they came away with it taking things out of context and then tried to spread something on national news. It is not fair and not right."

As for the media: “For the most part, absolutely, media persons, reporters, have been absolutely right on and there has been fairness and objectivity...There have been some stinkers, though, who have kind of made the whole basket full of apples, once in a while, smell kind of bad.”

And there you have it. The original post continues below:

*-*-*

An aide to Alaska Governor Sarah Palin has fired back at sources in the McCampaign who claim that Palin was, well, something other than a good VP candidate.

"This is so unfortunate and, quite honestly, sickening," Palin aide Meghan Stapleton said Thursday in a written statement. "The accusations we are hearing and reading are not true, and since we deny all these anonymous allegations, there is nothing specific to which we will respond.
"We have the highest regards for Sen. John McCain. Gov. Palin was honored to be chosen as McCain's running mate. And as governor of Alaska, Gov. Palin looks forward to working with President-elect Obama on securing energy independence for America."

Palin herself says she will not respond to "individual accusations."

"I won't comment on anyone's gossip or allegations that are based on anonymous sources," she said. "That's kind of a small, evidently bitter type of person, who would anonymously charge something foolish like that -- that I perhaps didn't know an answer to a question. So until I know who was talking about it, I won't have a comment on false allegations."

Others in the McCampaign are bummed out that things fell apart so fast. "Despite the acrimony, many McCain aides say they are sad the campaign team dissolved so quickly." No kidding.

I'm a little surprised as well. Regardless of what anyone thinks of Sarah Palin, she was chosen by the McCampaign. So if they had problems with her, wouldn't before the election have been a good time to figure that out?

Not to get too silly about this, but don't we tell our children to be good sports when they lose? And isn't this type of behavior the exact opposite of that? Frankly, the Presidential election is a hell of a lot more important than a soccer game. Sometimes talking about it doesn't help.

Source: CNN

Image: HuffPo

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They Say: Sarah Palin Knows Nothing

Brett Singer — Fri, 07 Nov 2008 19:15:00 GMT

Let the backbiting begin!

As Madeline reported over in Morning News, some members of the McCampaign is seemingly saying that Sarah Palin is to blame for John McCain not being elected President of the United States. Even you think that's going too far – I haven't heard anyone say that directly – McCampaign staffers are certainly telling tales out of school. And none of the tales are particularly flattering to Governor Palin.

As Fox News reports it, members of the McCampaign are now saying that there were, "gaps in [Palin's] knowledge." Gaps like not knowing that Africa is a continent. Not knowing which countries were part of NAFTA. Little things like that. As Howard Stern said on his Sirius XM radio show the other day, maybe it's OK for an average citizen not to know these things (he did say that everyone should know that Africa is a continent). But a Vice-President candidate?

The video (at HuffPo) of Bill O'Reilly discussing these revelations with a Fox News is particularly hilarious. Responding to the notion that Palin didn't know a lot of important stuff, he says, "You can tutor people," says Bill O'Reilly. "It's gotta be more than that." It does? Why?

Regarding Palin's refusing to be prepped for her now-infamous Katie Couric interview, Bill says, "She didn't want to be bogged down with a lesson before Ms. Couric talked to her." BUT then "Palin began to attack staff… she hadn't been warned." WHAT????

When the McCampaign wouldn't allow Palin to do an appearance on The O'Reilly Factor alone, Bill said they couldn't make it work "logistically." It makes O'Reilly sound like a guy who just wanted some alone time with Sarah.

Palin was throwing "tantrums… there was the throwing of paperwork and things of this nature." Then she met McCampaign staff wrapped only in a bathrobe. "She's a bit of a shopaholic." That's what the Fox News reporter says he was told.

Do you think McCain's loss was her fault? Or is this just a lot of blame shifting?

Source: HuffPo (also image), Morning News

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They say: Obama Wins

Brett Singer — Wed, 05 Nov 2008 04:11:00 GMT

CNN, The New York Times, and even Fox News have called the Presidential race for Barack Obama. (UPDATE: so has everyone else.)

Amazing to think that it's almost all over after so much campaigning.

Not much to say. I'm still going to watch the news for awhile; I'm like Yogi Berra – it ain't over 'til it's over, y'know? Then again, McCain just conceded. Wow. (Classy speech too, for what it's worth.)

UPDATE: I'm watching Barack's speech now. I can't imagine what must be going through his mind. Think about where he was in 2004. Wow. I know I should have something more articulate to say but "wow" is going to have to do. (It's late.)

My kids don't seem to care that much, which was actually sort of nice in a way. No matter who wins, they get up, go to school, eat lunch, run around, jump on my ribs – a typical day. Eventually I'll talk to them about this election, but not right now.

What about you – how do you feel?

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Brett Singer — Tue, 04 Nov 2008 20:15:00 GMT

So the United States is picking a President today. But there are other candidates, and also many ballot measures in play today.

A quick round-up:

ARIZONA:
- Ban same-sex marriage.
- Require that any initiative involving spending or tax hikes be approved by majority of all registered voters, not just those casting ballots.

ARKANSAS:
- Create state lottery.
- Ban unmarried couples from adopting or being foster parents.

CALIFORNIA:
- Ban same-sex marriage.
- Authorize high-speed rail project.
- Require parental notification for a minor's abortion.
- Create 14-member commission to draw state legislative districts.
- Require all utilities to generate 20 percent of their power from renewable energy by 2010.
- Ban cramped metal cages for egg-laying hens.

I think I'm noticing a trend here.

Several states are voting on ballot measures to "ban same-sex marriage." Personally, I find this bizarre. Isn't it already banned? Are people that freaked out at the possibility of two men or two women marrying each other that they need to put it on double secret probation? (For the record, I think if gay people are crazy enough to want to be married, it's fine. Go for it.)

Looking at the article on MiamiHerald.com, it looks like the to-do of an insane person. Authorize slot machine gambling, check. Allow state's first casino, check. Ban abortion and dog racing, check. Ban cramped metal cages for egg-laying hens, check. (Those are all from different states, not the same one.) That's not to say that all of the measures are insane, it's just funny to think about them out of context. "Let's see, today...Prohibit mandatory union membership and mandatory union dues, authorize slot-machine gambling, and make English the official language of government proceedings. Got it." Busy day.

Sources: Miami Herald, MTV

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109 Year Old Daughter Of Slave Votes For Obama

Brett Singer — Tue, 04 Nov 2008 19:45:00 GMT

The line to vote for President and other stuff today might be kind of long. If you get cranky, here's an inspiring story to keep you a little bit sane.

From the Austin American Statesman:

Amanda Jones, 109, the daughter of a man born into slavery, has lived a life long enough to touch three centuries. And after voting consistently as a Democrat for 70 years, she has voted early for the country's first black presidential nominee.
…
Jones' father herded sheep as a slave until he was 12, according to the family, and once he was freed, he was a farmer who raised cows, hogs and turkeys on land he owned. Her mother was born right after the Emancipation Proclamation was signed, Joyce Jones said. The family owned more than 100 acres of land in Cedar Creek at one point, she said.
Amanda Jones' father urged her to exercise her right to vote, despite discriminatory practices at the polls and poll taxes meant to keep black and poor people from voting. Those practices were outlawed for federal elections with the 24th Amendment in 1964, but not for state and local races in Texas until 1966.

First of all, the fact that anyone lived to be 109 is cool. More importantly, though, is her story. I can't imagine what it must have felt like for Amanda to cast her vote in this Presidential election.

Source/Image: Statesman.com

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Sarah Palin Gets Pranked By Canadian Radio Hosts – Video

Brett Singer — Sun, 02 Nov 2008 02:07:00 GMT

When you were a kid, did you ever make prank calls? Call a bar and ask to speak to Dick Hertz? Dial 867 5309 and ask for Jenny? Or "is your refrigerator running? Well, you'd better go and catch it!" (That last one is way old school, dude.)

Some lucky grown-ups actually make a living doing that sort of thing. And Sarah Palin is their latest victim.

Marc-Antoine Audette and Sebastien Trudel, two Canadian radio performers who go by the name The Masked Avengers, have made calls to numerous celebrities and government officials, including Britney Spears (she's a celebrity, not a government official – just wanted to clarify that.) Now Alaska's governor can add her name to the ranks of the pranked. The Canuck comedians got through to Sarah Palin herself on Saturday and convinced her – for five minutes – that she was speaking to French President Nicolas Sarkozy.

The remarkable thing is how easily they get through. Sure, one would think that Palin would have figured out this wasn't actually the French Prez when he says that he loved the "documentary" that Hustler made about her, "Nailin' Palin." But the really sad part is the staffer who puts her right on the phone. No, "Are we expecting a call from the President of France?" Nothing.

Another good line: "We have the equivalent of Joe the Plumber in France. It's called Marcel, the guy with bread under his armpit."

The campaign released the following statement: "Governor Palin was mildly amused to learn that she had joined the ranks of heads of state, including President Sarkozy and other celebrities, in being targeted by these pranksters. C'est la vie."

So I guess if you catch your children on the phone asking some stranger if they have Prince Albert in a Can (let him out! Ha ha!), maybe you should encourage them? OK, not really.

Here's the entire Sarah Palin prank call for your listening pleasure.

Source: miamiherald.com, huffingtonpost.com

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Brett Singer — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 21:00:00 GMT

This is really ugly.

I hope that whomever you happen to be voting for, this isn't something you can condone.

As the blog We Are Respectable Negroes (the name comes from the Forty Acres and a Mule document) puts it: "It seems that Barack Obama was finally called a 'nigger' at a recent Republican presidential rally."

Palin will get a lot of flack for not responding, and while I can't argue otherwise, I don't know what she should have said. (In a Palin voice: "Oh, come on now! That's a bad thing to say!") Then again, how do you stand in front of a crowd that screams out something like that?

Michelle Malkin is claiming that the person was actually shouting, "Redistributor!"

Yes, of course. I make that mistake all the time.

(Aside: in case anyone is planning to leave a comment along the lines of, "What about that Sarah Palin hanging effigy? Why aren't you railing against that?" It's terrible and should be taken down immediately.)

I'll ask you -- what do you think you heard? I actually closed my eyes so I couldn't see the captioning on the video. Send the kids out of the room and tell us what you think was said.

Source: We Are Respectable Negroes, MichelleMalkin.com

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Brett Singer — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 20:00:00 GMT

Kim Mance breaks down some of the key points in the Obama and McCain health care plans. I have a few thoughts to add.

I didn't realize this, but the debate about a national health care system goes back much further than when Bill Clinton attempted to implement one when he was first elected way back in 1992. "Both Roosevelt and Truman called for health care to be an 'economic right.' Truman then proposed a single-payer health program to cover all Americans. But it was called a 'Communist plot' by a House subcommittee after the American Medical Association denounced it." Funny (not ha-ha funny) how one of the current digs at Obama is that he's a "socialist". I guess socialist is the new communist.

A key difference between their proposals is, "how to ensure that all Americans have access to health insurance. Both want there to be no 'state lines' as there are now, so families can shop around for the best plan. However, Obama will regulate and require insurance companies to cover patients regardless of pre-existing conditions, and McCain will not. McCain will instead work with Governors on (fifty separate) plans to optimize access to health care within each individual state."

One thing that I find very interesting, and encouraging, is that at least both sides are talking about getting more people covered. Back in the 1990's, it was much more of an "us against them" situation, with the Democrats wanting a national health care system and the Republicans wanting everything to stay the same.

To me, a sign that the McCampaign is out of touch on this particular issue is the notion that a family can purchase health coverage for $5,000, or even that they can purchase it at all. First, as Mance points out in her Babble article, $5,000 covers less than half of the typical family's yearly health insurance bill. Obama says that the cost is $12,000, Mance cites a study that puts the number at $12,680. Second, as someone who has run a small business and offered health insurance to employees, I can tell you that it is not that simple to just go buy a plan the way McCain says it is. For an individual, it is significantly more difficult. Health insurers simply don't want to talk to individuals about coverage, they prefer to deal with "groups", meaning employers. So while it sounds nice to say, "hey, here's five grand, you can buy whatever health plan works best for you", it's just not that simple.

There are more details discussed in Mance's article, which is very much worth a read. The bottom line? It's hard to tell what will happen no matter who gets elected, but they agree that the current system isn't good enough. "Neither presidential candidate's health care plan brings us anywhere near a true socialized medicine or single-payer system. But they do both point out the many ways our own health care structure can be improved." That's at least something.

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Palin Speaks Out On Special Needs Trusts

Brett Singer — Sun, 26 Oct 2008 14:00:00 GMT

Republican Vice Presidential candidate Sarah Palin gave a speech in Pittsburgh on Friday where she discussed the challenges facing children with special needs.

Here is a video clip with a few choice digs at the Obama-Biden tax plan:

If the clip does not appear, try clicking here to see it.

And a couple of pertinent lines from the speech:

As families across America know, the care of special-needs children requires long-term planning, and especially financial planning. A common practice among these families is to establish financial trusts. These are known as special needs trusts, covering years of medical and other costs, and for parents they bring invaluable comfort.
Understandably, then, many families with special-needs children or dependent adults are concerned that our opponent in this election plans to raise taxes on precisely those kinds of financial arrangements. They fear that Senator Obama's tax increase will have serious and harmful consequences -- and they are right. The burden that his plan would impose upon these families is just one more example of how many plans can be disrupted, how many futures can be placed at risk, and how many people can suffer when the power to tax is misused.

I’m unfamiliar with special needs trusts, but it sounds to me like something only someone with money can do. That is, if a family lives paycheck to paycheck, how much financial planning can they really do? Like most political rhetoric, what Palin says is short on specifics and long on fear mongering. (That's true of both sides; lack of details is non-partisan.) Also, "the power to tax"? Oy vey. You would think no Republican administration had ever raised taxes, or that the tax cuts in recent years actually worked. (That's another conversation, but really. Oy vey.)

She also makes this claim:

In a McCain-Palin administration, we will put the educational choices for special needs children in the right hands their parents'. Under reforms that I will lead as vice president, the parents and caretakers of children with physical or mental disabilities will be able to send that boy or girl to the school of their choice -- public or private.

Just like that? Come on. We're not electing a Supreme Ruler; we're electing a President. And anyone who thinks that a school voucher law like the one that Sarah Palin describes (I know that may be an oversimplification, but hey, I can do it too!) will get passed quickly and easily is at best naïve.

A commenter on the nationaljournal.com article says it pretty well:

I find all these promises far too vague and general to mean much of anything. … What about health insurance? … Sorry, I don't need a 'friend' -- I need someone with a plan that does more than 'hope' that 'market forces' will allow me to afford insurance for my child.

I will say that I think it's interesting to hear this much talk about autism/special needs children during an election year. It's possible that this issue was front and center in the past, but if so, I didn't notice.

Text of the full speech is here if you want to read it.

If anyone has more direct experience with special needs trusts, or any of the other issues Palin raised in her speech, I'd be curious to hear your take on what she had to say.

sources: MSNBC, National Journal

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Is Sarah Palin the next Oprah?

Brett Singer — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 18:45:00 GMT

This story from the Hollywood Reporter is making the rounds. It's very odd.

According to HR, "as more and more polls cast doubt on the McCain-Palin ticket, producers and agents across the entertainment world are discussing possibilities for capitalizing on her fame, ranging from an Oprah-style syndicated talk show to a Sean Hannity-like perch in cable news or on radio."

I suppose I could see a Fox News-style show. But Oprah? Come on.

I'm not a big Oprah fan. I think she promotes some questionable stuff, is highly materialistic, and never gets criticized even when her actions might warrant it (she really made some big mistakes with that school she started, for instance). But there's no denying that she is the most successful television host in history, and someone whom millions of people adore. She is also somebody who can say, "I like this book" or "I like this movie" and suddenly that book or movie is number one. (Howard Stern Show producer Gary Dell'Abate told a story on the air about how he tried to get his wife to watch the movie 'Crash' with him. She wouldn't even consider it. Then Oprah said it was great. They watched it that night.) Again, it's not my thing, but Oprah clearly connects with a broad range of people. Sarah Palin is an extremely divisive figure. While that sort of thing plays really well on Fox News and right-wing radio, it doesn't usually work on network or syndicated television. (Anyone remember Rush Limbaugh's late night TV show? I thought so.)

Also, I think Palin has more political aspirations. That's pure speculation on my part, since Sarah and I haven't talked lately. (Actually, we haven't talked ever.) But I'm not the only one who thinks she might want to move into the White House on her own.

Would you watch a show called "Sarah!" starring Palin?

Source: Hollywood Reporter