Truth (plus lies) » sarah palin

Conservapedia is not falling for Sarah Palin’s bullshit

Jefff — Mon, 06 Jun 2011 19:14:27 +0000

Even the often-misguided editors of Conservapedia aren’t going along with the effort to spin history to match Sarah Palin’s understanding of it.

Their mission was to warn the colonist, not the British. Bells ringing or not there was no 2nd Amendment for Revere to protest to the British about at the time, since the Constitution had not been written. English law permitted the keeping of arms for hunting and self defense (Declaration of Rights (1689 amended version)) but with the language of “as allowed by law” embedded within, which indicated that that which Parliament giveth, Parliament can take away. The Declaration of Rights permitted the possession of arms for hunting and self defense, but did not allow the stock piling of weapons for private militias. This is what the British were marching from Boston to Concord to confiscate, not individual weapons. And maybe the bells.

2012 campaign starting later than 2008

Jefff — Tue, 11 Jan 2011 22:24:59 +0000

It’s almost four years since Barack Obama announced his candidacy for the 2008 Presidential Election. David Weigel points out that at this point in that cycle, 14 candidates had already announced.

April 17, 2006: Mike Gravel (announcing a full-on campaign at the National Press Club)
October 30, 2006: Duncan Hunter (announcing he’d retire from Congress and run for president)
November 9, 2006: Tom Vilsack (announcing a full campaign)
November 13, 2006: Rudy Giuliani
November 15, 2006: John McCain
December 4, 2006: Sam Brownback
December 7, 2006: Bill Richardson (telling Fox News “I am running”)
December 15, 2006: Tommy Thompson
December 19, 2006: Jim Gilmore
December 26, 2006: John Edwards
January 3, 2007: Mitt Romney
January 7, 2007: Joe Biden (announcing his intention to create a committee, on Meet the Press)
January 11, 2007: Chris Dodd (announcing a full-on run on Don Imus’s show), Ron Paul

So far, not a single candidate has announced for 2012. What does it mean? My guess is that the candidates of 2008 were more eager to fight for an open office. By that thinking, a better comparison would be 2004. Let’s check on those dates:

May 31, 2002: Howard Dean
December 1, 2002: John Kerry
January 2, 2003: John Edwards
January 4, 2003: Richard Gephardt
January 5: Al Sharpton

Hmmmm… well, it’s not 14. But it’s still half of the eventual field of ten. And of course, it’s all the major players, including Howard Dean a full two-and-a-half years before the election. And when you count only the Democrats for 2008, you get 6, so there’s not much difference. That pretty much blows my hypothesis out of the water.

Naturally, I’d like my backup explanation to be that the Republicans are all just scared of Obama — and Fox talking points notwithstanding, I do think Obama is seen to be a stronger opponent than Bush. Still, I don’t think that’s the reason. Certainly, there are 2012 candidates out there who have already made up their minds, and I can’t see why the potential difficulty of the race would make them wait.

Perhaps there’s a very important uncertainty that they want settled before they commit? This couldn’t really be about Palin, could it?

Palin’s base

Jefff — Tue, 30 Nov 2010 21:40:49 +0000

Which Republicans most want Sarah Palin for President? The answer is not surprising:

Via The Daily Dish.

Sarah Palin denies favoriting a tweet

Jefff — Fri, 05 Nov 2010 15:31:49 +0000

Sarah Palin denies favoriting a tweet with the above photo. She says she doesn’t even know how, and it must have been an accident. If you check her twitter account right now, sure enough, no favorited tweets. Except that yesterday there were multiple favorited tweets. Oh well, I think she’s probably earned the benefit of the doubt at this point.

Sarah Palin unable to read and/or comprehend in 140 characters

Jefff — Fri, 29 Oct 2010 18:36:16 +0000

From Talking Points Memo.

Who is and isn’t responsible

Jefff — Wed, 08 Sep 2010 23:07:55 +0000

William Saletan has a pitch-perfect article in Slate about the real lessons to be drawn about the Ground Zero Mosque controversy from the Koran-burning controversy.

A pastor who preaches at a nearby Florida church is aghast at the global outrage the Quran-burning minister has provoked. “He represents only 30 people in this town,” the pastor tells the New York Times. “It needs to get out somehow to the rest of the world that this isn’t the face of Christianity.”

It will, Reverend. Right after it gets out to the rest of the world that we don’t think the 9/11 hijackers are the face of Islam.

Meanwhile, Sarah Palin gets it exactly wrong. As usual.

A cackle is a group of hyenas

Jefff — Fri, 20 Aug 2010 14:53:02 +0000

Score one for Sarah Palin and her words: A group of hyenas is called a cackle.

Via the Daily Dish.

Good solutions and bad solutions to our little mosque problem

Jefff — Tue, 10 Aug 2010 18:25:55 +0000

Fantastic, here is the worst of all solutions to a non-impasse:

New York Gov. David Paterson (D) is offering state help to the developers of the proposed “Ground Zero Mosque” if they agree to move it further from the Trade Center complex.

Thank you, oh proponents of limited government. You have compelled the state to assist in the building of a mosque just so you can keep sacred a place that you will go to maybe once or twice in your lives.

OH BUT WAIT.

While Paterson proposes a solution that will please absolutely nobody, Greg Gutfield gives us a winner suggestion that interests Andrew Sullivan of the Atlantic and Stephanie Gutmann of the National Review.

He wants to open a gay bar next to the Cordoba House. Which is to say, he gets it. Concerned that our tolerance only goes one way, he’s demanding it go both ways — while Sarah Palin and Newt Gingrich demand we stop being tolerant.

Sarah Palin vs. PolitiFact

Jefff — Fri, 06 Aug 2010 15:45:18 +0000

Sarah Palin’s gotten into a little tussle with the fact-checkers from PolitiFact. It started when they gave her a “pants on fire” rating for saying that the Democrats plan to let all the Bush tax cuts expire would amount to the largest tax increase in US history.

Palin earned her poor rating because a) the Democrats aren’t planning to let all the tax cuts expire and b) even if they did, it wouldn’t be the largest tax increase in US History. (There was a tax increase in World War II that was twice as big when considered as a percentage of GDP, the accepted way measuring the size of tax increases.)

So this made the mama grizzly really mad, and she posted all about it on her Facebook page, giving PolitiFact her own “pants on fire” rating. She said that the Democrats had no plan for renewing the tax cuts, and so absent a plan, they were “poised” to let them all expire. (She ignored being wrong about saying the tax increase was the biggest.)

PolitiFact has responded today. Well, PolitiFact doesn’t really “respond” like it’s a conversation. They just rate statements of fact. So they looked into how correct Palin was to say the Democrats have no plan. It turns out they do have a plan, and they’ve published all kinds of details about it. Palin got a rating of “false” this time.

Bill Kristol: let’s all refudiate all the time

Jefff — Mon, 26 Jul 2010 18:48:58 +0000

Here we go again. It’s time for conservatives to take yet another dumb-ass thing that Sarah Palin did (because she’s not very smart) and declare it to be an awesome thing that everyone should do constantly. Write on your hands, refuse to talk to non-conservative journalists, and now refudiate all up in this piece!

Bill Kristol says:

We need a word that captures and conjoins the meanings of refutation and repudiation. And we need it now. To save the country from the ravages of contemporary liberalism, we have to refute liberal arguments and see liberal politicians repudiated at the polls.

Now if only they would start reading ALL the magazines & newspapers.