The Varmint Kingdom

Lots o’ Sturm und Drang in the blogosphere over this week’s Vanity Fair piece on la Palin, which portrayed her as a tin-pot Kim Jong-il in a leather skirt and the entire population of Alaska as her haunted, shell-shocked victims.

The piece certainly drove its subject into an ear-splitting snit, prompting her to complain to Sean Hannity about “impotent, limp” reporters—a brandishing of metaphorical hedge-clippers rarely seen even in our thoroughly debased political discourse. (I didn’t catch the show, but if the Fox marketing people were on the ball, that segment was surely followed by a Cialis commercial.)

As for other reax, the Palin oompa-loompas over at Conservatards4Palin did the ritual oompa-loompa dance:

I’m almost speechless at how absolutely disgusting this article is. I understand now why a friend warned I would need to be prayed up before reading it and said she had trouble sleeping after she read it.

Of course, that bunch needs to be “prayed up” to contemplate the possibility of lesser outrages, such as the Great Grizzly Mama confronting the horror of a non-bendy straw at a $125K speaking engagement. So their reaction doesn’t much signify.

Anti-Palin blogger Shannyn Moore ripped the piece’s author, Michael Gross, for burning sources:

You just “Sarah Palined” people here.

I’m going through a list doing damage control and telling people I’m so sorry I gave you their contacts and vouched for your professionalism and credibility.

You have neither.

Ouch. But Moore’s reaction lends some credibility to the Republic of Fear portrait Gross painted.

On the other hand, the usual suspects saw the usual sexism. I read the piece, and I didn’t see that. The media love to portray politicians of both sexes as vain, petty, depraved monsters. Just ask Bill Clinton and John Edwards.

The media love that even more when the political figure in question refuses to talk to the non-wingnut press, issuing Facebook edicts and communicating via neo-Confederate sycophants. Michael Gross had this to say about Palin’s political prospects:

I can’t speak to the credibility of what Gross wrote, but what he said there is 100% true.

[H/T: Justlen]

Posted by Betty Cracker on 09/03/10 at 12:18 PM • Permalink

Categories: Politics • Election '10 • Election '08 • Bedwetters • Nutters • Sarah Palin • Teabaggery • Our Stupid Media • YouTubidity •

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Apparently Palin’s “prayer warriors” have been praying to the wrong god or are on vacation. Funny, she didn’t “refudiate” the story, just ridiculed the writer’s penis.

I agree, the national media should ignore her if she is not going to be interviewed and asked questions that are not furnished beforehand.

Comment by laingirl on 09/03/10 at 01:14 PM

What’s even funnier? The writer says that the worst stuff isn’t even in the article

“The author of the blistering Vanity Fair profile on Sarah Palin says he wanted to write a positive piece, but was shocked by what he learned as he researched his story.

“The worst stuff isn’t even in there,” Michael Joseph Gross said on “Morning Joe” Thursday. “I couldn’t believe these stories either when I first heard them, and I started this story with a prejudice in her favor. I have a lot in common with this woman. I’m a small-town person, I’m a Christian, I think that a lot of her criticisms of the media actually have something to them. And I think she got a bum ride, but everybody close to her tells the same story.”

In the profile, Gross paints Palin as an abusive, retaliatory figure with an extreme ability to lie.

“This is a person for whom there is no topic too small to lie about,” he said. “She lies about everything.”

Comment by Patrick McKinnion on 09/03/10 at 03:49 PM

I guess I have to turn in my Real Fighting Feminist Badge—AGAIN!—because I don’t really see the sexism in this piece. And if Sarah Palin can’t stand the heat, well—there’s always the option to go back to the kitchen. She’s the one forcing her way into the klieg lights and now whining. Just like she accused Hillary Clinton of doing.

Comment by Oblomova on 09/03/10 at 04:03 PM

If we all send him a dollar, will he post the stuff he didn’t use? She seems like a mighty trainwreck of small town mean girl and I could use a laugh.

Comment by ruemara on 09/03/10 at 04:23 PM

That was a nice clip. Gross’ analysis and advice would be welcomed by the “Edward R. Murrow Contingent” of the old school news media profession, but that ship done sailed a long time ago. After that outburst of reason and sound advice, Gross will be lucky if he gets any more TV face time on shows like this.

Comment by meepmeep09 on 09/03/10 at 05:47 PM

“She lies about everything.”

And this, right here, is why Sarah Palin is the perfect 24-hour news cycle victim-card playing Republican poster woman.

She is perfect for them.

Comment by Zandar on 09/03/10 at 06:42 PM

I’m a Christian

LIAR! No real Christian would dare criticize St. Sarah of the Sacred Starbursts!

No seriously, how the fuck is one Prayed Up? And are wetsuits involved?

Comment by Hunger Tallest Palin on 09/03/10 at 07:37 PM

Suicide’s first album was the perfect soundtrack to that article.

Comment by Zipperupus on 09/03/10 at 08:40 PM

Since I’d heard most of the LaPalin stories before the best part of the article was someone FINALLY saying out loud that she doesn’t write her own Facebook/Twitter posts.

Comment by Nellcote on 09/03/10 at 08:47 PM

If Gibbs tweeted that lamestream reporters were impotent and limp, I wonder if there would be the same radio silence from the msm.

Comment by Nellcote on 09/03/10 at 09:51 PM

Palin’s tweets and Facebook posts (whether she is really writing them or not and I really doubt that she is) get more and more outrageous, mean and snide. She may still be around in two years but I question whether she’ll be taken seriously by anyone but her most rabid base by then. To the rest of us she’ll just be another reality show personality.

I also disagree with the Shakers that sexism plays a part in the article. To me the overwhelming thing was Palin’s ego and her constant string of lies and two-facedness (if that’s a word but you know what I mean). Calling someone out on that stuff is not being sexist.

Comment by marindenver on 09/04/10 at 12:04 AM

You give good blog, Betty.

Comment by bjkeefe on 09/04/10 at 01:59 AM

Calling someone out on that stuff is not being sexist.

You’re forgetting, Mar, that in Shakescountry, criticising a woman is a capital crime, because obviously you wouldn’t be criticising a man in the same position. Because, you know, the sex class, patriarchy, what about teh menz, [insert internet feminist buzzword], [insert internet feminist buzzword] and [insert internet feminist buzzword].

As an aside, has anyone else noticed how Borg-like online feminists can be? They all use the same expressions and phrases, even the same mannerisms. It creeps me out sometimes.

Comment by Mike on 09/04/10 at 04:23 AM

As an aside, has anyone else noticed how Borg-like online feminists can be?

That’s unfair. What you’re seeing on sites like Shakes is the effect of the constant purging of people found guilty of doubleplusungood crimethink by the humor-impaired, egotistical wanker(s) running the show. It’s the same thing you see on any site run by humorless egotistical wankers, regardless of political bent.

Comment by Hunger Tallest Palin on 09/04/10 at 10:13 AM

I’m with HTP. For Exhibit A, may I suggest CorrenteWhiners?

And really, Poor Ole Shakes did have to go through the ignominy of being martyred during the ‘08 primaries—by John Edwards. Some things just sting more than others, I imagine.