Aaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrggggggggghhhhhhhhh

Sarah Palin, was it not enough to foist your goddamn spawn onto Dancing With The Stars? Did you really have to show up tonight and make me hit the mute button and throw the remote to my partner and jam my fingers in my ears yelling lalalalalalala just in case the mute didn't work and contort awkwardly in the recliner to hoop* the laptop up on my knees to block the TV, running the risk of spraining my spine in order to spare my eyes?

Fuck off, Sarah Palin. I need my mindless entertainment once a week, and you're getting the fuck in the way.

*yes, it comes with a sound effect. It sounds like hoop and comes from the diaphragm.

Uh, No.

Not me, Bucko. And I fucking live here.

As calls spread for an economic boycott of Arizona, the state’s governor enlisted the help of former vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin on Saturday to defend a new law cracking down on illegal immigration.

Brewer and Palin blamed President Obama for the state law, saying the measure is Arizona’s attempt to enforce immigration laws because the federal government won’t do it.

“It’s time for Americans across this great country to stand up and say, ‘We’re all Arizonans now,’” Palin said. “And in clear unison we say, ‘Mr. President: Do your job. Secure our border.’”

And with that, the We Are All _______ meme mercifully croaked away its last breath and disappeared forever. What? A girl can dream, can't she?

Offerred Without Comment

Jesus. Fucking. Christ.

I Will Need a Second DVR for This

In honor of former half-governor Palin's upcoming gig:




















I cannot wait.

Why Does Sarah Palin Hate the American Soldier?

The last time I noticed Moosepants Barbie holding forth in public, she was chastising The Media. Sing along; you know the words by now.

So how about in honor of the American soldier, ya quit makin' things up?

Because that is a job that, apparently, is Sarah Palin's and Sarah Palin's alone. Sarah Palin also wants you to leave her kids alone, and the new Alaska governor's kids alone, because no one trots out Sarah Palin's kids as cheap political props except Sarah Palin. Particularly when she's busy makin' things up that are so brazenly untrue and fear-mongering that even our jaded jaw dropped through the floor this morning upon reading her very thoughtful thoughts on healthcare reform:

"The America I know and love is not one in which my parents or my baby with Down Syndrome will have to stand in front of Obama's 'death panel' so his bureaucrats can decide, based on a subjective judgment of their 'level of productivity in society,' whether they are worthy of health care," the former Republican vice presidential candidate wrote.

"Such a system is downright evil," Palin wrote on her page, which has nearly 700,000 supporters.

I am Sarah Palin! And my children are off-limits! By the way! Did you know Obama wants to kill my special-needs baby, Trig? Yeah, that one over there. No, on the right. That's Trig, and he is special-needs! And you media goons need to stop talking about him. Why is the media always talking about him? Trig, I mean, the special-needs one. Oh, and Obama's evil, and you guys in the media like make shit up all the time, and that's why I didn't quit being governor but just decided to not be governor any more in case there might have been a lame duck thing goin' on a couple years down the long long Arctic road with cold and geese and sourdoughs. And quit talkin' about my kids, one of which is special-needs, and is named Trig, that's him over there, and Obama wants to kill him! Socialism! Shut up and leave me alone already! Would you like to be my Facebook friend?

*pant pant* Yeah, anyway, uh, no. No "death panels" or "encouraged euthanasia" are in the offing, unless by "euthanasia" you mean "Medicare coverage for end-of-life counseling when the patient desires it."

The allegation appears to be based on a provision of the House bill that would require Medicare to pay for end-of-life counseling sessions, on a voluntary basis, for beneficiaries who want the service. Medicare already covers hospice care. And legislation passed by Congress in 1990 requires that patients be asked if they have a living will.

Obama addressed the controversy during a July 28 AARP-sponsored town hall.

"Nobody is going to be forcing you to make a set of decisions on end-of-life care based on some bureaucratic law in Washington," he said.

Palin's conflation of providing information to a patient with forcing procedures on them is, of course, a complete reflection of the anti-abortion mindset that would love to prevent doctors from giving pregnant women accurate information about abortion, or from giving teenagers information about contraception. And in this instance that mindset is taken to a maniacal extreme.

A government-funded healthcare plan providing coverage for an hour or two with a counselor going over a living will and explaining all the options falling on the continuum between extreme life-maintaining measures and a DNR order? Sarah Palin has transmogrified that into a horrific scene of old folks and developmentally disabled babies shuffling up to a star chamber tribunal to plead for their lives, probably getting cricks in their necks as a result of peering up at the imposing dais, and being summarily denied and executed on the spot.

And 700,000 people are lapping it up on Facebook and being stirred into a frothy frenzy they're ready to unleash on their representatives and anyone who has the misfortune to show up at the same town hall meeting they do. Stirred up by lies, shrieking about euthanasia, screaming NaziNaziNazi at the tops of their lungs, doing their best to derail a reform process that can only help them and the tens of millions of other people in the country who can't afford healthcare.

Because Sarah Palin won't quit makin' stuff up.

Palin Makes It Official, Appears Unclear on the 'Lame Duck' Concept

Sarah Palin put on a lovely resignation ceremony today, complete with a speech and a reiteration of the original reason she cited for stepping down: she does not want to quack.

Some still don't see why she's quitting, she said.

"It is because I love Alaska so much, sir, that I choose to avoid the typical last year, lame-duck session in office,'' said Palin, who had decided not to seek a second term when she announced on the eve of the Fourth of July that she would step down today.

Um. Did no one remind her that she's only in her first term, and so wouldn't need to worry about the lame duck thing for another four years? Wow, she sure showed us! By pre-emptively creating a very short, two-week lame duck period by announcing her intention to resign on the 3rd, and then circumventing it by plain up and quitting before anyone had time to build a decent blind. It's a deliberate straw-manning of her credibility. I'm sure this logic is impeccable somewhere north of the 48th parallel, hanging a left once you get past Vancouver, but it's a bit much for my addled brain to handle.

Sarah Palin Gobble Gobble Gobbles up More Airtime, Traumatizes Nation's Children

Um. *boggle*

The only possible way this could have been better is if it had been rendered in claymation by Nick Park, a la Chicken Run, with chubby turkey feet kicking in the hopper and the turkey worker giving Palin a giant toothy grin as the odd feather floats down into her hair and worried turkeys mill and mutter in the background. As it is, not bad. And here we were in the desert saying it hadn't felt much like the holidays yet! Who's hungry?

Also noted: yet again, Governor Palin makes specific individual references to her sons while blithely lumping her daughters as "the kids." Track's Stryker brigade is safe, or fairly safe, in Eye-rack, and Trig is happy and healthy. Oh, and school's going fine for the kids--perhaps her own girls, perhaps all of Alaska's children? Does she remember their names, or is she afraid of accidentally calling them Broomstick and Purple? Who knows.

Tweety Scores

I run hot and cold on Chris Matthews. Cold when he calls Hillary Clinton a harpy. Lukewarm with a side of cringe when he talks about Obama-induced thrills running up his leg. Hot hot hawt when he goes on a tear against elected officials and their shills who don't know history (such as here and, epically, here) or the Constitution.

Matthews is an imperfect messenger, to say the least. But when it's a topic that's in his wheelhouse, wham, shade your eyes out in the bleachers and wave as that ball leaves the park in a hurry.

In Other News

Och, there's nae time for cryin', lassie. Not when Sarah Palin keeps on flappin' her yap.

I am, in my own, state, I have voted along with the vast majority of Alaskans who had the opportunity to vote to amend our Constitution defining marriage as between one man and one woman. I wish on a federal level that that's where we would go because I don't support gay marriage. I'm not going to be out there judging individuals, sitting in a seat of judgment telling what they can and can't do, should and should not do...

Except, you know, for when I am.

It was so much fun to be in uber-conservative Mesa over the weekend, which is similarly full of people who would never judge a fellow sinner or tell them what they can and can't do, except for doing "get married," of course, because that doesn't count as judgment or anything, and see giant, jaunty Yes! on 102 signs at every major intersection and smaller signs in people's yards and even smaller bumper stickers on their Escalades. Bracing, really.

The only bright spot in the miasma of despair that trip wrought on my normally sunny disposition is that at least one person out there took the time to do what I only fantasized about:

Pre-debate Fun!

Need to kill some time? Go here and be sure to click around thoroughly in the President Moosetits Oval Office. (h/t Americablog)

Palinex Means Never Having to Say You're Sorry

Top!Secret G-woman always reads Andrew Sullivan before I do! And now, a morning after pill we can all agree on:

In Which Our Evening Does Not Go As Planned

Huh. As I just now pounded out to Top!Secret G-woman, either Palin pulled off an epic five-week snow job for the ages, or Randy Scheunemann is a debate/presentation/life coach of miraculous abilities. I have not read any analyses yet because I am too sick to my stomach with the anticipation of the right-wing crowing her performance surely set off. Possibly accompanied by brass bands, fireworks, and free ice cream cones as well. She came off as completely capable. She spoke in comprehensible sentences. She was personable. She didn't seem particularly not intelligent or particularly not informed. If she had a presentation weakness, it was falling back on the "John McCain is a maverick" line too many times and saying "nucular" a lot. Beyond that, I got nothing.

Factually, she repeated the tax increase on $42,000 earners lie. She repeatedly credited the surge with gains in Iraqi security without mentioning the other two vital factors there--namely, the Iraq Awakening groups accepting US money to stop killing US troops, and al Sadr's cease-fire--and repeated that "surge principles" will succeed in Afghanistan despite the considerably different political and geographical situation there. She repeated the "Barack Obama voted to cut off funding to the troops" bullshit. She deflected questions on healthcare. Actually, she deflected a lot of questions or just declined to answer the question that was asked, preferring to flog taxes and energy, energy, energy maverick energy.

Biden was exactly as even-keeled as he needed to be, calling her on some of the more egregious mistruths as time allowed. I wish he had hit back on the details of the surge, but he defended Obama's tax and healthcare plans adequately. One point on McCain's $5000 healthcare tax credit I wish he had brought up is that regardless of how big any tax credit ends up being, people who have to buy their own coverage will still need to come up with the money up front, either in a lump or monthly, and if we have to cough up five grand even in monthly installments, well, we're not going to have coverage. Because we don't have an extra $417 a month, whether we get it back at tax time or not.

If you're going just on facts and expertise, Biden won. If you're going on not falling on your face when the world expects you to, Palin did worlds better than I ever would have expected, and a tiny win on principle is going to blow up into a blowout in the minds of people not inclined to think much past the familiar memes, talking points, and lies that have become as comfortable for McCainiacs as a favorite sweatshirt.

Both Biden and Palin oppose gay marriage. Both said they fully support equal civil rights for same sex couples, but both know that will never include key things like Social Security benefits or portability of rights until the federal government pulls same-sex couples under the umbrella of marriage. Most troubling to me was Biden's statement that both he and Obama oppose changing the civil definition of marriage because religious faiths define it as a man and a woman. Seriously, Joe? You're signing on to that conflation of civil law with religous dogma? He and Palin looked so pleased and relieved to agree on that one and be quickly scooted along to the next question that I had to tell them both to fuck off, and their running mates too. I'm too goddamn old and tired for this bullshit. Yes, hospital visitation is necessary. No, saying you're for that doesn't even come close to scratching the surface of showing you have the slightest fucking clue.

So after about an hour we pushed our Palin bingo cards aside and turned on the Cubs game for some relief, and the night promptly nosedived the rest of the way into the shitter. It was only 1-0, but the bases were loaded, and within a couple of batters they'd been cleared. Cubs are now down 6-0 after five. Early during the game last night, the TBS guys said that Wrigley was very quiet, almost as if the fans were nervously anticipating disaster. Kinda like we were about ten minutes into the debate tonight once it became apparent that what we thought was going to be a coast to victory was turning out to be something very different after all. At least the Cubs aren't flipping us off on their way down.

Shite. Shite, shite, shite.

Errrrrrrr

Remember way back when I was posting daily Maddow clips, because they were entertaining, insightful, intelligent, and informative? Yeah, this is the opposite of that:

Remember, this is the person John McCain claims probably knows more about energy than anyone else in the United States.

Well, if she knows more than anyone else that must mean she's an intellectual elite, which I suppose would explain the dense, incomprehensible syntax of her fungible oil and coal rambling above, right? Right??? As we speak, Palin is holed up in Cornville, AZ at one of the McCain estates (Cornville? really?), cramming for tomorrow night's debate with the help of Steve Schmidt and Randy Scheunemann. A nation waits, giddy.

Did You Know Joe Biden's, like, Old?

Did I hear this correctly? Did I hear Sarah Palin mocking Joe Biden for being old?

"I'm looking forward to meeting him. I've never met him," she said at a rally here. "I've been hearing about his Senate speeches since I was in, like, the second grade."

Like, OMG, I did hear that correctly! About 27 seconds into the video, check out McCain leaning in to wife Cindy right after that statement to ask what she said, and then laughing heh-heh-heh afterwards. It's not an insult when Sarah Palin does it!

Weekend Palin update

Since I look to be spending the rest of the day on hold with various financial customer service reps as I continue to track down the swath of destruction my identity thief has left across the greater Southwest (motherfucker), it's as good a time as any to fling up the best Palin videos from the weekend. First, Jack Cafferty saying out loud what I honestly didn't think I'd hear a regular news guy say out loud on TV.

The second best part is him smacking down Wolf Blitzer's lame "but she was cramming a lot of information in there" excuse for her. The best best thing is Couric not even trying to hide her contempt. Which was dripping off her face and probably soaking the carpet. Call it what it is. Palin was playing McCain Mad Libs. We are fucked.

The scary thing about this one? Tina Fey's lines are lifted almost verbatim from Palin's actual responses to Katie Couric.

This post not sponsored by T-Mobile or Sprint, since Boltgirl totally anti-endorses them now for the unnerving way in which they apparently shrug and start up accounts for people whose "name" does not match the name on the credit report that comes back on the social security number they give. Which would be mine.

Oh My.

Well, that went... well. in an exchange captured by television cameras, Ms. Palin was greeted by Asif Ali Zardari, the new president of Pakistan, and a delegation of Pakistani officials.

“I am honored to meet you,” Ms. Palin said.

“You are even more gorgeous than you are on the (inaudible),” Mr. Zardari said.

“You are so nice,” Ms. Palin replied. “Thank you.”

“Now I know why the whole of America is crazy about you,” Mr. Zardari continued. At which point an aide told the two to shake hands.

“I’m supposed to pose again,” Ms. Palin said.

“If he’s insisting,” Mr. Zardari said, “I might hug.”

Holy Christ. The Pakistanis think she's a GILF too! And George W. Bush no longer has sole possession of the trophy for World Leader Who Says the Darndest Things All the Goddamn Time! Awesome on two counts! Angela Merkel must be so pleased! And writers at SNL and the Onion are again sobbing into their beer, since nothing they come up with can top the absurdity that follows this woman's wake on a daily basis. As Jon Stewart said, we can't make this stuff up... and, unfortunately, we don't have to.

In Which We Think We Like Campbell Brown

Had noticed her from time to time, not that I can recall why, but yeah. Way to take back the "sexism" charges surrounding Sarah Palin and turn them on their heads! For realz.

Just One More

So I've read a couple of pieces in which people opine that we need to get away from Palin-bashing and back to Obama-promoting. I'll do that in just a second, honest, but before I go back to real newshounding we need to talk about the Sarah Palin Baby Name Generator. Plugging in my first name gives me Buster Taint, and my middle name--which I go by--returns Bomb Locomotive, so I feel completely justified in referring to myself in the future exclusively as Buster Locomotive, which may be the most awesome name ever. Ever! If your name manages to top that--and I wish you luck in that endeavor--leave it in the comments. I still win.

Warmest regards,
Buster Locomotive Boltgirl

The First of a Few

I hope there are more; I fervently hope there are no more after November 4.

Oh My

In a brilliant move calculated to win the heart and vote of every middle-aged former slacker who was ever called on in class unexpectedly after a night of MTV and Atari 2600 instead of the assigned reading for civics class, Palin nails this exchange with ABC's Charles Gibson:

Gibson: Do you agree with the Bush Doctrine?

Palin: *blink*

Palin: In what respect, Charlie?

Gibson: The Bush -- well, what do you interpret it to be?

Palin: His world view?

Srsly?

Oh, absofuckinglutely beautiful! I got that look so many times from Mr. Chandler back in 1985! But! I was not running for Vice President of the US at the time!

I will not jump on Palin for saying we might perhaps have to go to war with Russia if Georgia were admitted to NATO and Russia happened to invade them again, since pledged military assistance is kind of the whole point of NATO in the first place. A better question might have been on her position on Georgia's (and other former Soviet republics') attempts to get into the military BFF club, given our current over-taxed military and substantially diminished standing as the world's primary law enforcement officer. That would be particularly interesting in light of Randy Scheunemann's preeminent position in the McCain campaign. Alas, it will have to wait until the debates.

Oh, and one more thing. I cannot take four more years of anyone in the executive branch pronouncing "nuclear" as "nookyooler." Please. If you cannot take a stand for responsibile foreign policy, environmental protection, renewable energy, women's rights, universal healthcare, and financial recovery, please at least take one for the language.