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Amazing Grace: Is Rick Santorum the new Sarah Palin?

"I believe in free people and free markets," Rick Santorum told a spirited and well-informed town hall audience last night in Brentwood, a few miles down the road from our hometown, Exeter, New Hampshire. We caught the event in C-SPAN reruns this morning and were struck once again at the disconnect between old-media caricatures of "Soaring Santorum" and the man himself we're coming to know and admire through a full panoply of media, old and new. More on that below. Program Note: We're heading up to Manchester Saturday for "an evening of ruminating, riffing & debate watching" with National Review's Jonah Goldberg and company.

"The interest was palpable in Santorum’s first New Hampshire event since the caucuses," reports the Boston Globe as the former Pennsylvania senator steps up to the "very short but open window" of opportunity [Dana Perino's words on Fox this morning] to grab the nation's attention in this frenetically condensed primary season. First a few facts and then a bit of commentary:

The former senator from Pennsylvania has been a frequent, if under-the-radar, presence on the stump in New Hampshire for the past four months. But after surging to within eight votes of winning Iowa Tuesday, Santorum faced a standing-room only crowd at the Rockingham County nursing home hall …

The room, which had capacity to seat 160 people, was packed with voters and journalists standing in the aisles and lining the walls. It was a sharp contrast to his 100-plus previous town halls in New Hampshire, some of which attracted just a few dozen people … A campaign aide said Santorum plans to stay in New Hampshire through the primary Tuesday.

"This economy is suffering because this administration is crushing it with regulations," Santorum told town hallers last night. "Why are they doing it?" Because they know better than you. They don't trust you to make those decisions … The principle reason I'm in this race is because of Obamacare because I think Obamacare will turn every American into a dependent American … and the more dependent he can make you, the more power he has over you ….Obamacare is the tipping point." If you have the time, be sure to listen to the whole thing. See also James Pethokoukis's "Santorum vs. Romney is a conflict of conservative visions" for an enlightening discussion of two political world views, "traditional conservatism vs modern, free-market conservatism."  

"It's all about media and momentum," says Fox political analyst Larry Sabato, seemingly troubled that "the process is being rushed. One reason why no big themes are being developed is because there isn't time." But there IS time, Dr. Sabato, and there ARE big themes if you know where to look, that "panoply of media, old and new" where fans of the Shining City can disintermediate the lamestream media narrative at will: C-SPAN, blogs, facebook, twitter, not to mention the town halls themselves, under the radar till Tuesday's "unexpected" Iowa caucus results.

Now a larger audience is getting a taste of this authentic, thoughtful, knowledgeable, deliberative, experienced, articulate, principled, humorous and good-hearted man, very much a formidable opponent in any debate with the current Leader of the Free World. And this "flavor of the week" appears to be sticking to the ribs. As Fox anchor Bret Baier just retweeted:

RT @jeffzeleny Santorum not only draws big crowd, he holds their attention in Northfield. Long answers, but classic NH Q&A voters have been craving. #fitn

Like those NH voters, Tea Partiers like us — behind enemy lines here in Taxachusetts — have been craving "long answers." To our surprise, "Darwinian Libertarian" that we are, we haven't been so energized by a candidate's words and manner since that day in late August of 2008 when Sarah Palin burst onto the national stage.

Update: Bruce B. AKA Chickelit in twitter:

Santorum has many of the same archenemies in the media as Palin--so there's that similarity too.

BTW, I think your blogpost took heuvos. I hope you're not attacked.

Update II: Santorum's "Faith, Family & Freedom" tour schedule via our behatted men on the spot, longtime Santorum supporters Stacy McCain and Pete Ingemi. Here's the latest:

Axis of Fedora Update Manchester NH 12:50 p.m.

Greetings From the Granite State!

Crossposted at Riehl World View.

Jeb's lame ultimatum: Are you with the sane Republicans or Not?

"In South Carolina this afternoon, TX Gov. Rick Perry held a press conference to detail his economic plans," writes PJ Media's Bryan Preston: "The very first reporter tried distracting him by bringing up the birther nonsense. Perry was having none of it; he cut the reporter off in mid sentence, said the issue is a 'distraction' and put the focus right back on his plan … Every reporter who brings this up from now on should be treated with equal or greater contempt." Good to see a potential POTUS refusing to let the lamestream media control the narrative spin.

"Are you with the sane Republicans or Not? GOP voters need to decide," writes the WaPo's Jennifer Rubin, reporting on the contents of an exclusive and perhaps unwittingly snotty e-mail statement from Jeb Bush regarding the recent Rick Perry "birtherism" flap:

Republican candidates should categorically reject the notion that President Obama was not born in the United States. It is a complete distraction from the failed economic policies of the President.

You need to get out more, Jeb. As we wrote in comments at Commentary's Facebook page in response to Peter Wehner's similar scolding of the Perry campaign for lacking "discipline":

Seems to me the pussyfooting advice of old-school campaign advisers cautioning against saying anything controversial drains the life out of the authentic — if sometimes unpolished — American voices of the Tea Party favorites whose vision has given us hope of regaining the Shining City.

It was Sarah Palin's fierce determination and authentic American voice that had energized us back when we were holding our nose at the prospect of voting for John McCain as the lesser of two evils in the 2008 presidential election. We used to like and admire Jeb as an effective and accomplished former Florida Governor but haven't been able to stomach his condescending brand of "sane" Republicanism since he "gratuitously dissed Sarah and thereby all her fans back in February of 2010" with this little gem:

I mean, I don't know what her deal is. My belief is in 2010 and 2012, public leaders need to have intellectual curiosity.

"What a pompous busybody," we wrote in a twitter exchange with protein wisdom, who caught the conscience of Jeb the would-be kingmaker in 140-or-fewer characters this afternoon:

Next up, he'll tell us how sane people are supposed to speak to the Hispanics. Complete with flow chart.

Update: Perry's poke on Obama's birth certificate has had the desired effect, explains Richard Viguerie:

Obama has ignored it and the blue-nosed gentry of the Republican establishment, such as Jeb Bush and Karl Rove, have all risen like cussed-out Sunday school teachers to chastise Perry. In the mean time, conservative voters in the upcoming primaries have been reminded that there’s only one good ol' boy running who gets the joke, and that’s Rick Perry.

Cross-posted at Riehl World View.

"It was one of those great, only-in-America Judeo-Christian moments"

"You've got to believe you are here for a reason," Senator Joe Lieberman told Sarah Palin back in the fall of 2008 when she was losing her bearings in the tense, over-scripted days leading up to her vice presidential debate with Senator Joe Biden.

"It was one of those great, only-in-America Judeo-Christian moments," Senator Joe Lieberman told a delighted American Enterprise Institute audience yesterday evening, retelling the tale of a fateful meeting between him and Sarah Palin on the eve of her vice-presidential debate with Joe Biden October 2, 2008:

So I'm supporting my dear friend John McCain in 2008, and it's the fall, it's about a week before the vice-presidential debate … Governor Palin was in a hotel in Philadelphia practicing for the debate … The McCain campaign was in a panic. She just wasn't registering, wasn't doing well.

Then Steve Schmidt, who was John's campaign manager, said to me, "Do me a favor. You've got something in common with her that the rest of us don't have … You're both religious. So go in and talk to her. Maybe pray with her" … 

So I went in, and she opened right up: "I'm off today. It's a bad day." Without washing dirty laundry in public, she was not happy with the McCain campaign: "They're not handling me right."

"You've got to believe you're here for a reason," Lieberman told her:

And she laughed and said there must be a reason. It's so unbelievable that I'm here running for vice president.

Lieberman cited the Book of Esther:

…  that part where her uncle [cousin?] Mordechai tells her to go to the king to ask him to save the Jewish people from the evil prime minister, and then this sentence, when she's reluctant, perhaps this is the reason you were brought to the king's palace: If you don't do it, somebody else will come along, and she said "Oh, that's great."

We'd never heard the story before, but a little googling reveals it was used for a bit of proto Palin's-an-idiot spin at the time:

Connecticut Sen. Joe Lieberman thinks that in order for Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin to beat her Democratic rival, Sen. Joe Biden, in tonight’s debate, she needs to keep it from turning into an “IQ test.”

What Lieberman was getting at was not at all that Sarah was dumb:

“What she needs to do tonight is get this public consideration of her back to who she is and her strong points and, frankly, get it away from being a, kind of, IQ test — she's plenty smart — getting it away from being a, sort of, final college exam,” Lieberman said on MSNBC …

“Whether she can answer every detailed question, I don't think that ultimately matters to the American people,” the Connecticut senator added. “She doesn't know every detail, all the questions senators deal with, but, frankly, that's her strength.”

“I think the point is, who is she as a person? I think that's what people are ultimately looking for,” Lieberman said.

Everything happens for a reason? We're hard-wired to see patterns. Palin/Lieberman 2012?

Update from CT4Palin on Twitter:

Lieberman will be Palin's Ambassador to Israel. :)

And John Bolton for Palin's Secretary of State.

Update II: Bill Quick of Daily Pundit links:

Well, she keeps saying it’s going to be an “unconventional” campaign. Of course, Lieberman is an “independent …”

Crossposted at Riehl World View and Cloven Not Crested.

Rick Perry: "Galileo got outvoted for a spell"

 

As a Palinista from day one, we're still  "undecided," but we loved this from Texas Governor Rick Perry (above) at last night's GOP primary debate: "Galileo got outvoted for a spell … Find out what the science truly is before you start putting the American economy in jeapordy." This morning irony-challenged MSNBC talking heads joked about whether Perry saw himself as Galileo, unaware that it is they themselves, our friends on the left side of the aisle, who are the Roman Inquisitors of our day.

"You yourself have said the party is in danger of becoming anti-science. Who on this stage is anti-science?" MSNBC whatshisname taunted flat-earther Jon Huntsman at last night's Republican primary debate. Darwinian libertarian that we are, we've been horrified for some time at the left's conflation of the science of evolution that we embrace with the mumbo-jumbo secular religion of anthropogenic global warming/climate change. We've been on the left's AGW case for two decades, at least, since Andrea Mitchell (God bless her now in her time of genuine sorrow) acknowledged her lack of objectivity way back when:

Clearly the networks have made the decision now, where you'd have to call it advocacy.

Now, when up-till-now AGW proseletizer Nature Journal of Science is finally acknowledging they got it wrong — Can you say cosmic rays and the sun? — our friends on the left side of the aisle continue to bury their heads in the sand. As we've said for a zillion blogyears, it's the importance of being noticed — aka tribalism — stupid.

Crossposted at Riehl World View.

Palin Undefeated: It's the crony capitalism, stupid!

This weekend Steve Bannon's Palin documentary ‘The Undefeated’ will be available On Demand and Pay-Per-View from a major cable or satellite company near you. We wrote about the movie — sight unseen — last June in "Palin Undefeated: 'A story of empowerment for modern women and their daughters.'" Now we can put our money where our mouth was, in the comfort of our own home. Above, sugar-and-spice Sarah (center) with her siblings.

Funny how incurious the "intellectually curious" hive mind of the left can be when it comes to all things Sarah Palin. The latest is a classic blinders-on, Journolist-talking-points-in-hand "review" of Steve Bannon's Palin Documentery "The Undefeated." (h/t Tim Graham of News Busters). Washington Post film critic Ann Hornaday is the mouthpiece of this particular outpouring of Palin envy. A few excerpts and then our take:

Based on her modest demeanor and record of budget, energy and ethics reform in Alaska, it’s easy to see her appeal to McCain, who called Palin while she was at the Alaska State Fair to ask her to run for veep. What "The Undefeated" doesn’t explain — in addition to the title "Undefeated" when Palin was, actually, defeated in 2008 — is how a woman whose early career had been dedicated to transcending partisan politics became such a ferocious political warrior while on the stump. Instead, Bannon sets Palin up as a victim — of liberals, of establishment conservatives and of the "lamestream media" that his subject has become so skilled at manipulating (a talent the filmmaker strangely neglects to mention).

About that title, "The Undefeated." Ever heard of wordplay, Ms. Hornaday? Sarah Palin may have lost an election, but she fights like a girl! Disintermediating the powers that be, she picked herself up and got back in the race. The words of Sun Tzu come to mind:

To fight and conquer in all your battles is not supreme excellence; supreme excellence consists in breaking the enemy's resistance without fighting.

Then there's Hornaday's fixation with "trascending partisan politics." You see a lot of that from the left, presumably hoping to catch the eye — and poll-tested votes — of the mushy middle. How could a "non-partisan" Palin who rooted out corruption in her OWN PARTY become "such a ferocious political warrior while on the stump"? It's the crony capitalism, stupid. Real Clear Politics has the scoop:

In her speech at the bucolic National Balloon Classic field in Indianola [tomorrow], Palin will lean on loaded phrases like “crony capitalism” and “permanent political class” in laying out her view of the U.S. political system’s deep-rooted ills, according to a source close to Palin and familiar with the content of the speech.

And this from National Review:

“She will also talk, more broadly, about how she is not enamored of the political class, both Republicans and Democrats, who do not deserve to be elected if they only continue the status quo,” the source continues. “She will discuss corporate lobbyists, White House operatives, and others who enable the vested interests.” Many of the themes from her recent Facebook post, “Conquering the Storm,” will be mentioned.

Will she or won't she? Dan Riehl says "yes" on Twitter:

Overseas trip had to be Palin's last check box. She's getting in.

Disintermediate at will:

The former Alaska Governor is scheduled to attend the World Knowledge Forum in Seoul, where she will speak alongside global economic leaders like Larry Summers and former British Prime Minister Gordon Brown. The conference begins Oct. 11, the same day as the GOP primary debate hosted by Bloomberg in Hanover, New Hampshire.

Update: Doug Ross Larwyn's Lynx link.

Crossposted at Riehl World View and Cloven Not Crested.

John Kerry vs Tea Party: It's the Rubber Duckie, stupid

"I have to tell ya. I say this to you politely," John Kerry said impolitely to MSNBC's Morning Joe audience the other day, parroting the Journolist talking-points meme of the day, Tea Party as illegitimate "hostage taker" of the nation's political debate over the debt deal. "Balanced approach" and "compromise" were the plebe-polled words of choice, but a number of the Tea Party freshmen weren't buying. "It doesn't deserve the same credit as a legitimate idea about what you do," pontificated the "seared, seared" Senator Kerry. We guess it depends upon what your definition of "legitimate" is.

So much blog fodder, so little time. Two items. First, this from our reality-challenged friends on the left side of the twittersphere:

The only thing keeping the GOP in charge of this country is the corrupted media. Take that away, and these jerks are done.

Who knew the GOP — with the White House and half the Congress held by the opposition and the MSM in their pocket — was in charge? Must be those terrorist Tea Party types holding John Kerry & Company hostage. 'Course we couldn't agree more about "the corrupted media," but just who are "these jerks" they refer to? In our parallel universe it's always been the media's fellow travelers on the left side of the aisle that weight the scales in favor of the progressive narrative. Which leads us to our second item, an eureka moment of what is wrong with the Gramscian project. See below.

This idea isn’t going to make a big splash with Rubber Duckie," notes Your Daddy's Politics:

An online campaign to pressure the producers of “Sesame Street” into having lovable roommates Bert and Ernie (above) get married is gathering steam. Getting hitched would change things for Ernie, who has long sang about how his bath toy, Rubber Duckie, “was the one.”

That was when the lightbulb went off. Imagine yourself as a child. Bro & sis, mom and dad. Bert and Ernie a couple of goofy guys on one of your favorite shows. They're going to get married? Can you say cognitive dissonance? Mainly, though, it would be terrifying and so wrong, destroying a kid's safe haven of the way the world is. Not unlike the violation visited on the bodies of the innocent by a child molester, these we-know-what's-best-for-you elitists would violate the heart and soul of the innocent:

More than 700 people have signed on to the petition, posted at change.org.  “We are not asking that Sesame Street do anything crude or disrespectful,” reads the petition for the muppet merger. “It can be done in a tasteful way. Let us teach tolerance of those that are different.”

You want tolerance of "those that are different"? Look to the animals, especially the "rare baby Sand Cat" born at Israel's Safari Zoo recently:

Once a common cat in the dunes of Israel, the cat has become basically extinct in the region. The newborn has given hope to conservationalists who hope one day to reintroduce the Sand Cat to the wild.

Update: Snippets from an imail conversation:

She: Am SICK about what they are attempting to do with Bert and Ernie. It would be like if Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis got married. It DESTROYS the concept of true friendship. Goofy Guy/Straight Man are no longer funny, once they become a married couple.

We: The Odd Couple comes to mind.

Update II: "IT'S FLOPPY LIKE A GARDEN HOSE":

Clinching proof that Bert and Ernie are gay.

Crossposted at Riehl World View.

Palin Undefeated: "A story of empowerment for modern women and their daughters"

Stephen K. Bannon, Director of the epic Palin documentary "The Undefeated" — "a story of empowerment for modern women and their daughters" — talked with Stacy McCain about "the gap between the reality of Sarah Palin and the perception created by the media" at the Right Online conference in Minneapolis last weekend, where the film was previewed before what Bannon calls "the vanguard of this revolution, the bloggers."

"Sarah Palin Reportedly Quits Bus Tour Halfway Through," snarked the headline at Talking Points Memo this morning, seamlessly spinning a speculative Real Clear Politics story about "one of the most unpredictable political figures in America" into their Palin's-a-Quitter narrative of choice:

Former half-term Gov. Sarah Palin has reportedly packed in her bus tour… halfway through.

Oh, and lest we forget how stupid she is, a bit of shopworn, gratuitous boilerplate thrown in to keep the natives happy:

The bus tour was launched over Memorial Day weekend, and was particularly scrutinized after one event in Boston where Palin badly flubbed the story behind Paul Revere's ride.

The card-carrying commenters piled on with glee, signalling their membership in the tribe. Our favorite:

"the quitta from wasilla" or the "Iquitarod queen" which discribes [sic] Palin the best?

We couldn't resist and posted a guest comment of our own with links vindicating Palin — The Boston Herald's recent "Old North Church vicar defends Palin on Revere" and John Fund's July 2009 WSJ column "Why Palin Quit: Death by a Thousand FOIAs." It was too much for TPM, who promptly removed our comment without ceremony, but not before a rabid pack of regulars — irregulars? — had had a chance to pile on:

Get lost troll. Go collect your money for posting here at TPM.

Great sources. hahahaha!!!!!! America is such a great country, everyone is free to choose from which direction they take a spin [Oh, the irony!]

Two papers owned by Rupert Murdoch,* who just happens to be Palin's employer?* Is that your idea of objectivity? *I wouldn't be surprised if he was yours as well.

If only. But moving along, as we mentioned in a follow-up comment, had TPM been doing their homework, they would have discovered this bit of inconvenient truth from a June 1 ABC News report:

Palin confirmed that she's going to Boston after New York and that after the northeast, she'll go back to Alaska before re-launching the tour - called the "One Nation Tour," after all - on the West Coast.

"Sigh. Reports of Tour Demise Are Greatly Exaggerated," the deftly disintermediating Palin twittered, not without a bit of snark of her own:

I wouldn’t think it to be such a slow news day that, what with numerous wars and serious economic woes concerning Americans, a bus is driving news stories today. The next leg of the tour continues when the time comes. In the meantime, no one should jump to conclusions – certainly not the media with their long track record of getting things wrong or just making things up.

As Big Hollywood editor John Nolte twittered in awe at this latest Facebook coup:

"Sarah Palin lets the MSM climb way out on a limb before sawing it off. It's called fighting like a girl.

*Update: Twitter buddy irishspy explains:

They invoke the name [Murdoch] to banish the hated facts. :)

Update II: Michelle Malkin Buzzworthy link!

Update III: Victory Film Group links with "Sissy Willis Goes Into The Bowels Of TPM To Defend Palin:

Yes, it's messy there. Go read the whole thing.

Crossposted at Riehl World View, Cloven Not Crested and Liberty Pundits.

Palin for the defense: A judge can look at a kingmaker

"What I would like to see is a little bit more of the GOP contenders' not hesitating to call one another out on their records," Sarah Palin told Judge Napolitano on his Fox Business show "Freedom Watch" yesterday, adding "We condemn the Democrats … for not having vetted their own candidate. Obama wasn't vetted by the press, but he also wasn't vetted by his own party." What a novel idea. Using primary debates to inform the public rather than conceal what the candidates are really up to. See Palin Promotions' "Gov. Palin on Freedom Watch: 'Love to Give White House Fits" for an excellent summary with quotes, and watch the interview here. Props to twitter buddy Brian of The Right Scoop for putting up the vid.

Her fierce determination and authentic American voice won our heart and mind that fateful day in late August of 2008 when she burst into the national consciousness as John McCain's pick for vice presidential running mate. For nearly three years now all things Sarah Palin have been relentlessy savaged by a "lamestream media" hard-wired to reject any member of the fair sex who isn't buying — or selling — the postmodern feminist party line of woman as victim and identity politics as savior. Palin's agile mind and servant's heart eluded not only the usual suspects on the left but — more revealingly — many among America's "Ruling Class," members of the Northeast Corridor Conservative fuddy-duddy community for whom being a member of the tribe trumped any interest in the conservative cause. But now some of those former fuddy-duddies are peeling off, taking a fresh look at Palin and liking what they see. As Dan Morgan, aka danthebarbarian, twittered last night, referencing Fox News personality Judge Napolitano's engaging and informative Palin interview pictured above:

"If @judgenap and @DennisDMZ can change their minds so can a lot of Americans!"

After all, it wasn't that long ago the Judge was just another voice in the Palin-Is-Stupid chorus:

Judge Napolitano Attacks Palin; Calls Her a "Goofball" Without the "Mental Capacity to be President" - Audio 11/17/09

Now he's laughing with her, not at her, and eliciting serious answers to serious questions.

Update: "She has proven that you CAN, in fact, win a fight against the media," writes Haystack at Andrew Breitbart's Big Government:

If you believe everything you read, Sarah Palin is the worst thing that has ever happened to America. She has proven that women aren’t, in fact, victimized by a male-dominated society to the extent that organizations such as N.O.W. and Planned Parenthood would have you believe …

I love this woman, and whether she’s the right person to be our next President or not, she ought to be America’s SoulKeeper™ for what she endures and what she gives back in the abject lessons she’s helping us learn about how evil people really CAN be when someone comes along that doesn’t fit into their tidy little mold of how people should think and act. God bless her for that.

Update II: Joy McCann, aka Little Miss Attila, links!

Crossposted at Riehl World View, Cloven Not Crested and Liberty Pundits.

Rep. Weiner: "You and I have different values"

"I hate that stupid picture of me in the blue. I'm standing in the mirror making a weird face, why would anyone use that?" twittered a sadder-but-wiser Gennette Cordova this morning in a series of 140-or-fewer-character expressions of disgust with media distortions of her image, both physical and psychological, since last Friday, when Andrew Breitbart's Big Journalism broke the Big Story that came to be known as Weinergate. Above, Photoshopped "mirror" images of Cordova based upon her Twitter avatar.

"If calling out publications for their inaccurate/shoddy journalism is stirring the pot, so be it," twittered justifiably miffed Seattle journalism student Gennette Cordova this morning, attempting to regain her balance in the aftermath of being mugged by the reality of business-as-usual journalistic spin. It was the left-leaning Politico and the right-leaning New York Post who, she said, had spun her own and her mother's words to sensationalize and distort the facts as she knows them in the Weinergate scandal. Salaciousness sells! In the case of Politico, for example, compare the political journal's headline with Cordova's follow-up tweet:

Politico: "Seattle student: Weiner photo meant for porn star."

Cordova on Twitter: "It wasn't an interview. I spoke candidly with someone posing as a photog assistant. And I never said the picture was meant for a porn star. He [Politico reporter] suggested it and I said maybe. I don't know and don't care."

Update Cordova to Reuven Fenton at New York Post: I clearly remember you suggesting the idea about the porn star, as well as me [sic] being "collateral damage."

Sadder but wiser, indeed. A cautionary tale for young lovelies who "just want to have fun" to be wary of the skeevy allure of little big men like "The Ick-arus of Capitol Hill" prowling the internet. A self-described "progressive," Cordova describes the moment "When Gen met Tony":

Actually I became a fan after I saw him demolish Bachmann on Hannity about 2 months ago. It was great.

"You and I have different values. That's what this fight is about," said Congressman Weiner in a rare moment of truthtelling during a March 16 shouting match debate with Rep Michele Bachmann (MN-6) on Hannity. Oh, the irony.

Can you say eye of the beholder? Here on the Tea Party side of the aisle, of course, we saw Bachmann demolish Weiner.

Note: Hats off to Michelle Malkin for turning us on to SnapBird, an invaluable aid in following Twitter conversations:

As an avid Twitter user myself, I use the SnapBird archive to search old tweets You can search anyone’s public tweets through the service.

Crossposted at Riehl World View, Cloven Not Crested and Liberty Pundits.

Krauthammer's Complaint

"I want to be the one to walk in the sun," Cyndi Lauper explains in "Girls Just Want To Have Fun," a pop cultural artifact that mystically embodies the spirit of Sarah Palin's fierce determination and authentic American voice that captured the hearts and minds of so many of us burgeoning Tea Partiers way back when. Or so we think.

"Krauthammer cannot 'get out more,'" writes blog buddy Gayle Miller of And you thought YOU were Cranky in the comments to our previous post, "Sarah Palin loves New York!" We were going to mention Gayle's observations in an update, but they're so darned insightful and well expressed that we're giving her top billing:

It would shake his complacently settled view of the world! Much as I adore the man — and his brilliant mind — and much as I am of an age with the Northeast Corridor fuddy duddies, what has happened is that mentally I have remained fresh and young! I revel in the uproar and turmoil attendant since Mrs. Palin's arrival on the scene. May it continue long enough to dispose of all of those fusty mental midgets that the "Elite Media" is trying to foist on the right! The so-called frontrunners are nothing more than the people being promoted in the media right now, much as they promoted John McCain in 2008. Once he had the nomination, they crucified him, and that's what they'll do with the new Republican nominee — if they are permitted to do so.

Couldn't have said it better ourselves.

Update: More good thoughts from elaine in the comments:

I usually like Dr. K, too; but when it comes to Palin or the Tea Party, he, like so many of the beltway in-crowd, has a huge blind spot. Remember how he and his fuddy-duddy pals poo-pooed the TPers when the movement got started? And then kept on poo-pooing them even when it became clear they weren't going away any time soon? Dr. K and his pals like to talk about the electorate, as if they know our minds, but they've been behind the curve the whole way. At every step, they've misjudged. And they're the ones ostensibly on OUR side!!! Dr. K can make all the smarty-smart pronouncements that he likes that Palin isn't electable. Just because he said it doesn't make it so. I'm looking forward to the day when I can say, "Told you so!" to fuds like him …

Crossposted at Riehl World View, Cloven Not Crested and Liberty Pundits.