The GOP really loves Sarah Palin, except when it doesn’t. Vanity Fair just published an article by Todd S. Purdum about her that has the pundits all riled up. So, we’re back to where we were just after the election, which means we’re getting all sorts of juicy anonymous info from behind the scenes of the McCain-Palin camp.
Here we go!
Here’s the Vanity Fair piece that got the whole hullabaloo started.
William Kristol, Palin’s number one fan, immediately called out several parts of the article. One thing that Kristol takes issue with is that Purdum wrote that several people had reported Palin as having “extravagant self-regard” without him asking them about her attitude.
“Is there any real chance that ’several’ Alaskans independently told Purdum that they had consulted the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders? I don’t believe it for a moment. I’ve (for better or worse) moved in pretty well-educated circles in my life, and I’ve gone decades without ’several’ people telling me they had consulted the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders.” link
Kristol also took the opportunity to point a finger at Steve Schmidt, a top aide on the McCain-Palin team, as being one of the anonymous sources cited in the article.
Jonathan Martin wrote a great piece for Politico about the tiff and got Schmidt’s response to Kristol’s allegations. They are truly scathing.
“Asked about the accusation, Schmidt fired back in an e-mail: ‘I’m sure John McCain would be president today if only Bill Kristol had been in charge of the campaign.’
‘After all, his management of [former Vice President] Dan Quayle’s public image as his chief of staff is still something that takes your breath away,’ Schmidt continued. “His attack on me is categorically false.’” link
Martin also wrote in the same piece that Randy Scheunemann, an adviser to McCain who also happens to be quite close to Kristol, also accused Schmidt of the leak in an equally inflammatory way.
“Steve Schmidt has a congenital aversion to the truth,” Scheunemann said. “On two separate and distinct occasions, he speculated about about Governor Palin having post-partum depression, and on the second he threatened that if more negative publicity about the handling of Governor Palin emerged that he would leak his speculation [about post-partum depression] to the press.” link
Mark Hemingway at the National Review wrote an exhaustive analysis into who might have leaked the information. It’s definitely an entertaining read. It’s got email transcripts and everything.
This Mother Jones piece calls Sarah Palin “the gift that keeps on giving,” and the last line of the story is snark at it’s lowest common denomenator.
“There’s only one proper response to this: Palin/Sanford 2012! Drill baby drill!” link
And just to make the whole thing even more ridiculous, a blog called RedState has issued a political hit on the staffers that leaked to Vanity Fair. It looks like somebody’s been watching too many mob movies. I knew this one was going to be good when I saw the title, “A friendly suggestion to former McCain campaign staffers: You are not a beautiful and unique snowflake.” LMBO
“If you are a McCain staffer who did not talk to VF, I suggest that you find some way to demonstrate that you aren’t one of the people in the first paragraph. Because until we know who talked, the default assumption is going to be that you may have talked. This will not wreck your career, but it will blight it if the base has anything to say about it. On the bright side, a simple and declarative denial will do; of course, if your denial is a lie and we catch you at it, brush up on your typing skills.” link
Good work everyone.
Aren’t we in the middle of health care reform and cap-and-trade stuff that the GOP claims will hurtle us full-tilt toward socialism/bring the country to its knees?
