The Palin effect

You go girl ...

An unprecedented number of Republican women are running for their party's nomination in U.S. House and Senate primaries — or are already on their way to battle Democrats in the fall midterm elections. So many are campaigning that many conservative women are anticipating strong gains in their congressional numbers come November.

"This is a breakthrough moment," says Marjorie Dannenfelser of the Susan B. Anthony List, which raises money for female candidates who oppose abortion.

Fourteen Republican women are in the running for the U.S. Senate. In 2008, just three Republican women competed in the general election, according to the Center for American Women and Politics. And 94 are still vying for House seats, compared with 46 at about the same time in the primary cycle two years ago.

Also telling? Sixty of the 106 women who are challenging incumbents for House seats are Republicans — a sign, says Debbie Walsh, the center's director, that GOP women are increasingly willing to "put their hat in the ring," though the fall outcome remains unpredictable.

Spin that!

In California, former eBay head Meg Whitman is expected to win the Republican gubernatorial nomination over state insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner for the seat being vacated by term-limited GOP Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger. Attorney General Jerry Brown is the Democratic candidate.

And Palin-endorsed Carly Fiorina, a former Hewlett-Packard chief, has surged to a lead in the polls over two male challengers in the party's U.S. Senate contest.

The winner will face Democratic Sen. Barbara Boxer in the fall.

Whitman and Fiorina, along with Republican Senate candidate and professional wrestling executive Linda McMahon in Connecticut, represent a new political trend, Walsh says, of female executives turning to politics.

In Nevada's Republican Senate primary, two women — establishment favorite Sue Lowden, a casino executive, and Tea Party-endorsed Sharron Angle — are locked in dead-heat combat for the opportunity to face Democratic Sen. Harry Reid in the fall. Angle is a former state legislator.

Politicos are also watching the GOP's gubernatorial primary in South Carolina, where state Rep. Nikki Haley, another Palin endorsee, leads the pack.

As for The Palin Effect ....

When Palin appeared at a recent breakfast fundraiser for the Susan B. Anthony List, Dannenfelser called her the "wind in our sails" — someone who "embodies the energy" of what she characterized the new conservative women's movement.

Palin's life story — mother of five, including a son with Down syndrome, governor of Alaska, vice presidential nominee — has proved compelling to many conservative women.

... and the Salamander did grin.

Watch Skippy's head explode ....

We all know how much he loves her.

Palin PalmGate

Some a55hats are making comments about what any successful person has done - put the important things in a place easy to get to.

It also helps when you think off the cuff without a teleprompter.

They sneer that she needs notes on her palm (just like almost all the General Officers/Flag Officers I have served with), but you know what I see? I see what is on her wrist. Her son.

Track Palin - United States Army. Served in Iraq.

Bite me moonbats.

Hat tip Steve.

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UPDATE: Via Sid in comments - I guess they would say the same thing about this guy?

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UPDATE II - Electric Boogaloo: As Brad points out, this is why most of us still luv her. As for those who don't - the below is what they do not want you to see and hear.

Ummm, yea; I still like her.

Watch the full thing. It's in the night orders.



Hat tip Allah.

Oh, and about Gov. Palin (R-UNK)

As an early supporter of Gov. Palin, I figured I owed my readers my take on her throwing in the towel.

Palin was and will not be again for a few years - at least at CDRSalamander. Things change, as do my opinion of things and people as new facts emerge, but for 2012; no.

She had a good ride, and I hope she remains happy for the decisions she has made and that in the end they are the best ones for her family. Maybe in 2016 things may be interesting, or a Senate run somewhere. Ronald Reagan was written off more than once - so who knows.

Unless there is no other option, I think Palin has now dropped on my list somewhere south of Gov. Crist (R-FL).

I think I will have something to say about him tomorrow.

Gov. Palin POSTEX

From John Ziegler's upcoming documentary.

Caption Contest

Oh, my! I am at a loss for words that won't make Kristin get mad at me.

MSNBC: where is South Africa again?

Somewhere north of your credibility.

MSNBC was the victim of a hoax when it reported that an adviser to John McCain had identified himself as the source of an embarrassing story about former vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin, the network said Wednesday.

David Shuster, an anchor for the cable news network, said on air Monday that Martin Eisenstadt, a McCain policy adviser, had come forth and identified himself as the source of a Fox News Channel story saying Palin had mistakenly believed Africa was a country instead of a continent.

Eisenstadt identifies himself on a blog as a senior fellow at the Harding Institute for Freedom and Democracy. Yet neither he nor the institute exist; each is part of a hoax dreamed up by a filmmaker named Eitan Gorlin and his partner, Dan Mirvish, the New York Times reported Wednesday.

The Eisenstadt claim had mistakenly been delivered to Shuster by a producer and was used in a political discussion Monday afternoon, MSNBC said.

"The story was not properly vetted and should not have made air," said Jeremy Gaines, network spokesman. "We recognized the error almost immediately and ran a correction on air within minutes."

Gaines told the Times that someone in the network's newsroom had presumed the information solid because it was passed along in an e-mail from a colleague.

What a poster child for media bias. What a joke. You can see all the glorious details here.

They hated Reagan too

First of all; there can be only one Reagan. Reagan was neither as good or as bad as both sides say he was - but he was right on the big issues. From the Soviet Union, to BMD, to the nature of Socialism and its fellow travelers ---- and so on.

There is one thing that drove the anointed Left nuts about him though; he wasn't one of them and he didn't really care. Make no mistake, Class can make a big difference for both Left and Right. If you come from the right family and go to the right schools - you get cut a little slack as long as you maintain proper social connections and if you are on the right, don't try to get too much power. If you are a beautiful loser that serves as an easy foil - like Minority Leader Bob Michel, you're ok.

But if you come from fly-over country and did something besides be a lawyer or professional politician - then they will tear you apart.

Hey, I know I have been a Palin since earlier this year when almost no one knew who she was - but does she really deserve the attacks from CBS to The View that she is getting? Is she really as bad as all say - the Governor of Alaska? The most popular Governor in the USA? Just because her father was a teacher and she had to put herself through college? Just because she is still married to her High School sweetheart and has five kids? Even though she pulls in the crowds she does?

I read most of the negative stuff about her - but I also watch and read her. I want you to read this speech she gave on 02 AUG 08. Just read it and then come back.

Is this the person you read about in the MSM? At least I know that I am in good company. I am going to quote in full Bill Dyer of BeldarBlog fame - another Palin fan.

I am sorry, he is exactly right.

I'm watching Sarah Palin address a campaign rally in Scranton, Pennsylvania, live on Fox News, and I can't recall ever seeing a GOP rally like this. The crowd is genuinely pumped, which is rare enough. But what's particularly amazing is watching and listening to Gov. Palin. I can't recall ever seeing a politician who so clearly relishes campaigning. She's animated and enthused. I know she's speaking from a teleprompter, and she's probably delivered large chunks of this same speech before many times, but she's tuned in on every line.

She is simply infused with joy. And it flows off the stage, and it's picked up quite powerfully by the TV cameras.

On his best occasions, Reagan had this same quality, but it was more muted, more of a twinkle from behind his carefully maintained stage presence. With Gov. Palin, it's nearly continuous and much more obvious. And I think that's a big part of why she inspires the same harsh counter-reactions from political opponents that Reagan did — the same desperate need to ridicule and belittle, to delegitimize. (You'll see it in the comments to this post within minutes after it goes up, of course.) She has to be shouted down and scorned, because if people are allowed to listen to her, that damned joy might turn out to be ... contagious!

It's a quality that was almost entirely missing from the speeches of, for example, Hillary Clinton, who turned every speech into a siege and whose grim purpose was impressive but slightly scary. Bubba, however, could work himself into joy at the drop of a hat.

Sarah Palin is just haviing a grand old time. If she's afraid of looking foolish, or of her elitist critics, or of her ticket's chances on November 4th, then she's entirely suppressed those fears. I freely admit that with me as a listener, and probably most of the folks at this rally, she's preaching to the choir. But so, too, are lots of politicians, in most of their speeches. And they just don't come across with this same zest.

When the right has someone that doesn't fit the hate-speckled boogie-man that the Left has in their head to justify their own hate - they just become unhinged. That is what Palin does, just like Reagan, unhinges people - even some on the right.

I am convinced that people like Hitchens, Brooks, and Buckley do not care for her because she isn't one of "them." Why do I say that? Because I am one of "them." I grew up with "them." Thank goodness I am a Southeastern and not a Northeastern one of "them." Perhaps that is why "Joe Sixpack" comments don't give me the vapors watching it on my flat screen at my beach house in The Hamptons.

Sure, it got old to me early - but everything isn't about me. I and my "them" usually have a few close cousins who fit the "Joe Sixpack" description - as I think the Southeastern version of "them" cross-breed through Class lines a bit more than the Yankee version. And my "them" actually have Republicans at something close to 50/50 min.

At least at my High School reunions I just get pitied for picking such a non-lucrative career field and not admonished for being a baby-killer - well maybe one baby-killer snarl from "her" ... but I think that has to do with the fact I wouldn't date her in '82 and picked her friend instead ..... women can hold a grudge. Debutantes wearing Patchouli oil....you know the type - "tax the rich, but stay away from my trust fund" type...but I digress.

Back to Gov. Palin though; maybe it is just me and my blindness - but I don't think so. Am I wrong? Is she better than Sen. Biden? I think there is no question.

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I am with Laura here - but I have to deal with Heather. Here it is in a nutshell. Of note - Laura is one of "them" even more than I am - by a factor of 10 as she is of the Northeastern variety - and I am with Laura. Oh, BTW - like Laura I was never a McCain guy either - until the other option was Obama.

From NRO, this is the "they" I know:

The truth about Palin

Greg makes it all clear.

VDH on ship jumpers

Wonder what is going on with some Republicans who don't like a fighting McCain - or just seem to dislike Palin because she is "not quite cricket?"

VDH puts it well.

...with Obama now with an 6-8 point lead, some in the DC/NY corridor these last three weeks figure it’s time now to jump on, or at least sort of jump, since the train they think is leaving the station and there might be still be some space at the dinner table on the caboose. They also believe as intellectuals that the similarly astute Obamians may on occasion inspire, or admire them as the like-minded who cultivate the life of the mind–in contrast to the “cancer” Sarah Palin, who, with her husband Todd, could hardly discuss Proust with them or could offer little if any sophisticated table-talk other than the chokes on shotguns or optimum RPMs on snow-machines.

And third, a lot of moderates who would not vote for McCain liked him when he was a sophisticated, ironic maverick loser scoring points against the simplistic Bush and other cardboard-cut-out conservatives. Now he has the onus of winning a campaign and can’t be a noble, tragic loser;so it is easy to say he is no good since he is less than perfect. The sure iconoclastic loser has an attraction that the mainstream conservative possible winner does not.

Obama, as I have said ad nauseam, has brilliantly prepped the battlefield to such a degree that a Farrakhan endorsement or surrogates calling Palin a quasi-Nazi or a bimbo, or smearing McCain as near senile is irrelevant; yet one screamer in a crowd of tens of thousands is proof of McCain’s and Palin’s racism and hatred.

Again, most conservatives know this paradox, but for some, being outraged as the conservative voice of reason, at McCain’s supposed low road ensures a CNN spot, or some future rehabilitation during the expected Obama regnum of the next eight years. I think should I write a column praising Obama’s wit, taste in books, and metrosexuality I would be dubbed principled rather than cynical, ‘even-handed’ rather than self-serving, and a maverick rather than toadish.

Yet for a self-acclaimed conservative to vote Obama would mean that higher taxes, larger government, more entitlements, more of a UN-centered foreign policy, dialogue with an Iran, less coal,oil, and nuclear energy production at home, more “oppression” studies and “reparations”, leftish Supreme Court judges, open borders (I could go on) were the truly conservative positions, or perhaps suddenly truly the ‘right’ positions.

And as far as ethics goes, in fact, a cursory review of the past Obama campaigns would reveal a ruthlessness never seen in any of McCain’s efforts. Obama’s record is far more left than McCain’s is far right. Obama the healer has proven to be the most partisan in the Senate, McCain one of the most bipartisan.

But to believe that truth would be–if we remember that scene in Tolkien’s Two Towers–to trust the grating harsh voice of Gandalf detailing the dangers of Saruman rather than the mellifluous charm of the latter who in soothing tones outlines his own victimhood.

Sump'n like that.

Kipling is spinning

Wow. Just wow.

What happens when Roger Cohen forgets to take his meds, gets an email of a Kipling poem, and is having a very bad episode of Palin derangement syndrome?

BEHOLD!

Palin, Mainstreeter that she is, loves to drop her g’s, so she’d no doubt call the poet Kiplin’. She might have asked, with that wink, to call him “Rud.”

That’s cutesy politics. But pigs still don’t have wings. The world’s still a dangerous place. It’s time for copybook realists in the White House.

In a word; huh?

Read it all - if you must. We may all be dumber for Cohen having written such a disjointed whateveritis - but you will in the end feel much smarter. Just think; this guy gets paid for this stuff.

She killed

What Peggy said.



Trollhammer at Jawa has a correct - if interesting - take on it too.

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UPDATE: In case, like me, you didn't watch it in full; here is the whole debate.

Primary sources; judge for yourself.

About the VP Debate ....

I'm not watching it either. Why?


Actually - I have "schedule" conflicts that won't let me. I'll read/watch the executive summary afterward. I'm still voting for McPalin, and Biden just makes me want to drink more than I need for Friday AM wake-up. As for the whole Gwen Obamaton book; what did you expect? Anyone who expected a level playing field this election is smoking crack. I'm not upset that the model of a neutral moderator for the debate is a PBS reporter who has a Obama worship book due to come out the day of his assumed inarguation - it's expected.

What can you do? Simple - vote.

Temp suspense of the Ralph ban

I know a year or so ago I said I wouldn't comment on Ralph Peters anymore - but this was too good not to pass up.

Speaking of Reagan (Eureka College, Illinois), every chief executive we've had since the Gipper snapped his final salute as president has had the imprimatur of an Ivy League university. And we've gone from bad to worse:

* George Herbert Walker Bush: Yale.

* William Jefferson Clinton: Georgetown, Oxford, Yale Law.

* George W. Bush: Yale and Harvard Business School.

The first lacked the sense to finish the job in Desert Storm; the second lacked the guts to go after al Qaeda when it was just a startup - and the third, well, let's just say he disappointed our low expectations.

Now we have the Ivy League elite's "he's not only like us but he's a minority and we're so wonderful to support him" candidate, Sen. Barack Obama (Columbia and Harvard Law).

Our country can't afford another one of these clowns. Harvard isn't the answer - Harvard's the problem.

So here's the message Palin is sending on behalf of the rest of us (the down-market masses Dems love at election time and ignore once the voting's done): The rule of the snobs is over. It's time to give one of us a chance to lead.

Sen. John McCain's one of us, too. He raised hell at Annapolis (quadruple ugh: military!), and he'll raise the right kind of hell in Washington.

McCain's so dumb he really loves his country.

Sarah Palin's dumb that way, too. How terribly unfashionable.

Ban back in place now, but I am open to change again if needed.

Sunday Funnies

Palin and Clinton

In case you missed it Saturday.



I told Mrs. Salamander Tina would get the gig ...

Oh, and a FLIRJ is...

Why they hate Gov. Palin

...or Sara to you and me. This is just prime, Grad-A goodness ...

She’s only 44 years old. She’s just not seasoned enough - and if you don’t believe me, just ask Gloria Steinem, age 74, or Barbara Walters, age 78, or Sally Quinn, age 67, or Eleanor Clift, age 68, or Andrea Mitchell, age 61, or Gail Collins, age 62.

Why, up on the stage, it has been noted that you can distinguish Sarah’s ankles from her calves. She’s never had a Botox injection. The hags of the Hamptons speak as one on this issue. Snow White Palin must be stopped. Anybody got a poisoned apple?

How can she be qualified when she doesn’t have a single $1.2-million-a-year lobbyist in her family?
...
And finally, we return to the real reason they hate her. She’s younger than they are, and better looking. Good looks is a deal breaker with this crowd, and if you don’t believe me, just ask Diane Feinstein, age 75, and Nancy Pelosi, age 68, and Hillary Clinton, age 61, and Barbara Boxer, age 67, and Barbara Mikulski, age 72. Beautiful People indeed. In this case, the phrase is meant figuratively, not literally.

LOLCUDA

YNSN, if NMCI would let him at sea - would like this.

Hat tip Ragnar at Jawa. and LOL.

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Kind'a unrelated, but the best "Democrats vs. Palin" quote of the week comes via Politico,

"They're like a lion tiptoeing around a turtle — they don't know what to do with it," said Republican strategist Kevin Madden...

Awwwwww ... heart melts

In case you missed it: if you liked what you see, and are thinking about donating, it is too late to give directly to the McCain campaign due to the public funding rules.

Instead, give to the RNC Victory Fund.

As a bonus, if you are still pi55ed about Google - search via this toolbar, and some of the money generated goes to the GOP, rather than going to Google or whatever other search agent you use.

Hat tip Ace.