Needlenose

Sorry Sarah, not only was there be no ‘talent portion‘ to the beauty contest, but there will be no consolation prize either.

Arctic temperatures are at record highs.  And just for the record, the McCain/Palin ’solution’ to global warming?  Drill, baby, drill!

…if you can afford to wear a $2,500 custom tailored Valentino jacket. Remember what a big deal the asshole Repugnants made over John Edward’s $200 haircut? Their media shills kept that story around for a whole month - but the $2,500 hockey mom ‘costume’ story gets buried.

After continually ragging on Obama as a ‘one speech wonder,’ McBush has counseled Anna Nicole Palin to avoid all questions and just parrot soundbites from her attack convention speech at all press events. If we had an free and aggressive press, I wonder what type of questions they’d ask? Would they probe into her links with disgraced Alaska Senator Ted “Sleezy” Stevens?

Tip of the ‘Nose to regular and frequent commentor “Kilgore Trout”

P.S. - As if validating the Exiled article linked above, apparently Alaskans still love Sleezy - Palin’s popularity has given him a ‘bounce’ in his re-election bid. Can we strip them of statehood?

(Via Reuters.)

(Sarah Palin during her speech at the Republican national convention last night, via the Albany Times Union.)

Check out reactionary talking heads on McBush/Palin ticket: “It’s over!”

Josh Marshall cuts through the GOP’s machine-produced smoke today:

Since there is widespread agreement that the children of candidates should not become topics of campaign debate, it behooves us to note that the McCain campaign has almost singlehandedly made Sarah Palin’s daughter a central figure in the Republican convention.

It was the McCain campaign that announced Palin’s daughter’s pregnancy. It was the McCain campaign, entirely on its own, that dished up unsubstantiated claims about maternity tests and all sorts of other lurid nonsense that had never been seen in print anywhere. . . .

Overwhelmingly, reporters are pressing eminently reasonable questions — her role in troopergate, her lack of experience, her connections to the AIP, her history of earmarking and lobbyists, etc. Meanwhile, the McCain campaign is going absolutely non-stop about Palin’s daughter. It is unmistakable.

Time magazine’s Joe Klein concurs:

This is a smokescreen, intended to divert attention from the fact the very real and responsible vetting that is taking place in the media–about the substance of Palin’s record as mayor and governor. . . . it is important for the public to know that Palin raised taxes as governor, supported the Bridge to Nowhere before she opposed it, pursued pork-barrel projects as mayor, tried to ban books at the local library and thinks the war in Iraq is “a task from God.”

But the Rovian B-teamers guiding the McCain plane crash campaign probably don’t feel like they have a choice. As much as some people may consider a Palin withdrawal inevitable, the McCainiacs are probably all too aware that throwing her under the bus would only intensify the criticism for having picked her in the first place. And for someone running on a vote-for-strong-daddy platform like McCain is to admit a mistake this big would be tantamount to conceding the election.

The only circumstance that could force such a desperation move would be if a stream of continuing revelations — as the media performs the vetting the McCain camp cut corners on — keeps chatter about Palin’s flaws alive, drowning out all serious consideration of McCain’s candidacy to the point where getting a new veep is the only way to change the subject.

To prevent that, two things need to happen: First, Palin has to stonewall the investigation into her abuse of power as governor of Alaska, so its findings don’t come out before November, and second, the press has to be intimidated into silence. (It’s notable that Joe Klein says, “Those of us who have criticized the candidate–and especially those of us who enjoyed good relations with McCain in the past–have been subject to off-the-record browbeating and attempted bullying all year”; this is all about getting the sheep back in the fold.)

And so, to distract attention from the first objective and to help accomplish the second one, tonight at the Republican convention we’ll be treated to the spectacle of an entire political party trying to hide behind a pregnant 17-year-old girl.

If you happen to think there’s something unseemly about using an unborn fetus and its teenage parents as the political equivalent of human shields, well, get over it. Haven’t you noticed that shamelessness has always been an essential part of McCain’s strategy?

And I was worried this was going to be an acrimonious but essentially dull election! Thank you McCain for picking an incompetent loon for a running mate! Dem Buddy sends me this article about Palin’s wacky church and her religious extremism. Want to see what foreign policy and energy policy might be like under a President Palin?

Pray for our military men and women who are striving to do what is right. Also, for this country, that our leaders, our national leaders, are sending [U.S. soldiers] out on a task that is from God,” she exhorted the congregants. “That’s what we have to make sure that we’re praying for, that there is a plan and that that plan is God’s plan.”

Religion, however, was not strictly a thread in Palin’s foreign policy. It was part of her energy proposals as well. Just prior to discussing Iraq, Alaska’s governor asked the audience to pray for another matter — a $30 billion national gas pipeline project that she wanted built in the state. “I think God’s will has to be done in unifying people and companies to get that gas line built, so pray for that,” she said.

Tooth of Jeebus!! But if you think she’s nuts, check out some of her Pastor’s ‘greatest hits’:

But Pastor Kalnins has also preached that critics of President Bush will be banished to hell; questioned whether people who voted for Sen. John Kerry in 2004 would be accepted to heaven; charged that the 9/11 terrorist attacks and war in Iraq were part of a war “contending for your faith;” and said that Jesus “operated from that position of war mode.”

The faithful (e.g. the Repug base) will probably be energized by this news. I’m guessing the independents probably won’t hear much about this from the wrong-wing media, and for the rest of us - who is surprised?

Still comedians everywhere are probably secretly contributing oodles to McBush/Palin in the hopes of a Palin presidency.

Talk about trashy! Read the full dirt on Governor & Veep Wannabe Sharah Palin’s jihad against Officer Wooten (who had a trashy breakup with Sarah’s sis) and anyone who has gotten in her way in her attempts to get him fired.

Talk about vindictive! Her vendetta makes Cheney/Rove’s smears against Joe Wilson and Valerie Plame seem tame by comparison. And if McCain wins, this bit of nastiness is just one more heart attack away from the White House! She’d probably ship Wooten off to Gitmo if she gets the chance!

Hell hath no fury like a beauty queen (whose sister has been) scorned.