Palin: No Second-Guessing Israel's "Security Efforts"
The financial meltdown, and McCain's campaign "suspension," have resulted in one advantage for McCain: They've reduced the focus on Sarah Palin. But there's plenty of Palin palaver out there today.
Her latest, during her interview with Katie Couric tonight, was to apparently say that the United States can't second guess anything Israel does under the rubric of "security efforts." From CBS' transcript...
COURIC: You recently said three times that you would never, quote, "second guess Israel if that country decided to attack Iran." Why not?PALIN: We shouldn't second guess Israel's security efforts because we cannot ever afford to send a message that we would allow a second Holocaust, for one. Israel has got to have the opportunity and the ability to protect itself. They are our closest ally in the Mideast. We need them. They need us. And we shouldn't second guess their efforts.
COURIC: You don't think the United States is within its rights to express its position to Israel? And if that means second-guessing or discussing an option?
PALIN: No, also ... we need to express our rights and our concerns and...
COURIC: But you said never second guess them.
PALIN: We don't have to second-guess what their efforts would be if they believe ... that it is in their country and their allies, including us, all of our best interests to fight against a regime, especially Iran, who would seek to wipe them off the face of the earth. It is obvious to me who the good guys are in this one and who the bad guys are...
It's very hard to know exactly what Palin said here, as usual. But it seems pretty clear that she said "no" when asked whether the U.S. has the right to second guess anything Israel does.
But again, it's pretty close to impossible to work out exactly what she was saying.
Late Update: Here's the video:
Listening to her talk makes me very sleepy.
September 25, 2008 7:55 PM | Reply | Permalink
Welcome to Closet Land.
September 25, 2008 7:56 PM | Reply | Permalink
Listening to her talk makes me very sleepy.
September 25, 2008 7:55 PM | Reply | Permalink
That's it. I'm suspending commenting on TPM until this server crisis is fixed.
September 25, 2008 7:56 PM | Reply | Permalink
McCain and Obama will be meeting with Josh and Greg to address this crisis as soon as they fix the economy.
September 26, 2008 9:38 AM | Reply | Permalink
I am suspending my job to come save the negotiations. They need me.
September 26, 2008 9:49 AM | Reply | Permalink
Elitist.
September 25, 2008 7:56 PM | Reply | Permalink
I don't think she knows what she's talking about, either.
September 25, 2008 7:58 PM | Reply | Permalink
She knows what she's talking about like an average eighteen-year old knows what they're talking about in a Poli Sci 101 class.
September 25, 2008 8:00 PM | Reply | Permalink
I beg your pardon. I took Poli Sci 101 as a college freshman, and the level of discussion was much higher than this.
September 25, 2008 8:18 PM | Reply | Permalink
You must have gone to a better college than me.
September 25, 2008 8:22 PM | Reply | Permalink
Hey man, Dunyazad went to FIVE better colleges than you did. So there.
September 25, 2008 8:24 PM | Reply | Permalink
I know I can't compete with the U of Idaho.
September 25, 2008 8:27 PM | Reply | Permalink
Please refer to me as WTF-berg.
September 25, 2008 7:58 PM | Reply | Permalink
I watched this interview with my wife. At first, we were laughing. Then, we got very quiet. This isn't really funny anymore. This is fucking terrifying. Our economy is about to go into cardiac arrest, we are fighting two wars, and one of the two potential VPs is an idiot. An idiot. That entire good guy/bad guy riff was like something a 10 year old would say. And it's not funny. It's horrifying. This woman could become President. Do people get that? Are people starting to grasp this? I mean, holy holy holy shit.
September 25, 2008 7:59 PM | Reply | Permalink
It's one thing to use the "bad guy/good guy" as a political ploy and whole another thing when it culminates the depth of one's political insight. This is terrifying.
September 25, 2008 8:03 PM | Reply | Permalink
billy, I completely echo your comments. If it weren't for the fact that it is possible that this woman could be leading the country very soon, this would be hilarious. But it's not, it's DEADLY serious. This woman is a fucking idiot, plain and simple.
How did she get elected governor in Alaska? She knows NOTHING! This all seems like a strange dream/nightmare but I've pinched myself a lot and realized that it isn't.
Is it possible (and I'm sorry for even asking this), that McDumbass and Plain could actually be WORSE than Bush/Cheney??????
September 26, 2008 1:27 AM | Reply | Permalink
I said similar things about Bush in 2000. Pity is, while I am not always right by a long shot, that time I was dead on.
September 26, 2008 9:00 AM | Reply | Permalink
Some of us believe there are good guys and bad guys out there...and we believe we're the good guys...
September 26, 2008 9:42 AM | Reply | Permalink
Do you believe the "good guys" are always right and there's never any reason to question their motives or choices?
The point was not that there are no bad actors in the world, it's that simply sorting countries out into good guys and bad guys is not sufficient for a leader to make decisions in the best interests of our country.
September 26, 2008 10:33 AM | Reply | Permalink
Why does God hate America?
September 25, 2008 8:02 PM | Reply | Permalink
One word: Hollywood.
Oh, and Manhatten on a Saturday night. And New Orleans, esp during Madi Gras, and Spring Break, and pay-pay-view tv, and...
September 25, 2008 8:05 PM | Reply | Permalink
But why punish us with Sarah Palin? Has He run out of horrible plagues to cast upon us?
September 25, 2008 8:12 PM | Reply | Permalink
Plagues? Borrrrrinnnnggg. People consciously voting against against their own self-interest because the VP kills moose is the type of Absurd Theater that God wants to watch.
September 25, 2008 8:30 PM | Reply | Permalink
You think you've got TiVo?
God has TiVo with frickin' lasers on its head!
~
September 25, 2008 9:43 PM | Reply | Permalink
Forget the books about Hillary's campaign, i cant wait until the election is over and to read the books that will be written by Steve Schmidt and other key McCain campaign staffers about what was the thinking behind some of their strategy moves. I can see the title now for one of the books, "How not to run a campaign."
I cant believe this. We are watching a campaign implode right before our eyes.
September 25, 2008 8:03 PM | Reply | Permalink
Another: "You can't run a successful campaign when the top of the ticket is batshit crazy and the other one is an idiot."
September 25, 2008 8:08 PM | Reply | Permalink
You can put lipstick on a pig...
September 25, 2008 8:20 PM | Reply | Permalink
And then oil it up and try to grab it while it runs around in a pen, while a crowd of liberal media looks on screaming questions about Iran, Iraq, and the economy...
September 25, 2008 8:26 PM | Reply | Permalink
She is the light hearted comedy, meant to be a relief from serious McLame comedy.
September 25, 2008 8:09 PM | Reply | Permalink
But when we pan back we can see that they are comedical play within a large tragic play. We are watching the audience laugh, and all we can do is cry.
September 25, 2008 8:15 PM | Reply | Permalink
She's the hypeman.
She's Flava.
September 25, 2008 8:23 PM | Reply | Permalink
I think her neck would snap under the weight of the Huge Clock Pendant of Flava.
September 25, 2008 8:40 PM | Reply | Permalink
Come on, we all know the power of Christ protects her from witchcraft and allows her to lift inconceivable weights.
For he is Lord, Lord, Lord, Lord
September 25, 2008 9:09 PM | Reply | Permalink
The fundamentals of Palin's neck are strong.
September 25, 2008 9:28 PM | Reply | Permalink
I feel more like she's the absurdist theater. You think you're being entertained and at the end you realize it's been a sociology experiment.
September 26, 2008 4:37 AM | Reply | Permalink
Forget the books about Hillary's campaign, i cant wait until the election is over and to read the books that will be written by Steve Schmidt and other key McCain campaign staffers about what was the thinking behind some of their strategy moves. I can see the title now for one of the books, "How not to run a campaign."
I cant believe this. We are watching a campaign implode right before our eyes.
September 25, 2008 8:13 PM | Reply | Permalink
O Fuck! Now we're involved in practically a shooting war with Pakistan. We exchanged fire with Pakistan today.
Fuck me! On September 12, 2001, I told a friend of mine in exactly these words: I do not want to spend the rest of my life at war.
And I think the chances are good that I will.
Godamn it!
September 25, 2008 8:21 PM | Reply | Permalink
The problem is very obvious: she's exhausted and confused from all the cramming sessions the McCain people have subjected her to. All that information they've tried to cram into her head has her deeply confused. You could really see that in her response to the question about the bailout. Any question of substance, and she tries to remember all the stuff her handlers have taught her, but she's just not up to being able to express it in a coherent way. Her mind doesn't work that way. So now she sounds LESS coherent than she did at the beginning.
If she weren't the Great Hope of the Radical Right, I'd almost fee sorry for her.
September 25, 2008 8:22 PM | Reply | Permalink
O please - that's the third comment today with "O gee, I almost feel sorry for little Miss Sarah."
Give me a giant fucking break - she didn't have to do this. She could have said right at the start - No, I can't. But no, she wants this so don't tell me that there is one thing to feel sorry for her for.
Nobody forced her to run as McLame veep.
September 25, 2008 8:25 PM | Reply | Permalink
She could say no right now. The ole blueman sing,
"It's never too late to be good!" Course the focus of the song wasn't so much on Moose Queens.
September 26, 2008 9:06 AM | Reply | Permalink
Yep.
"Now, remember Sarah, no matter what they ask you, just start blurting all your talking points until they ask the next question,then pick up where you left off and keep blurting."
September 26, 2008 8:29 AM | Reply | Permalink
New CBS/NYT poll BO 50 JM 44
http://graphics8.nytimes.com/packages/pdf/politics/20080926poll-results.pdf
http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/9/25/194036/754/610/610601
September 25, 2008 8:29 PM | Reply | Permalink
Obama fav/unfav +13
McCain fav/unfav +3
Says it all
September 25, 2008 8:39 PM | Reply | Permalink
I like this excerpt:
September 25, 2008 8:43 PM | Reply | Permalink
Who's your populist?
September 25, 2008 8:50 PM | Reply | Permalink
The GOP has to do something about those elitists. Where's Pol Pot when you need him?
September 25, 2008 8:54 PM | Reply | Permalink
Good one, jzap!
September 26, 2008 9:08 AM | Reply | Permalink
She's like a student who has to write a 500 page essay:
"I am writing my 500 page essay on the Rise and Fall of the Roman Empire. Sometimes it is also referred to as the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. This is a subject I have always been interested in and have always wanted to write a 500 page paper about."
"One, two, three, four, five... oh shit, I have another 450 words to go!"
September 25, 2008 8:30 PM | Reply | Permalink
And then schedules a meeting with the professor to personally hand in the paper.
September 25, 2008 8:33 PM | Reply | Permalink
"Webster's Dictionary defines evil as..."
September 25, 2008 8:45 PM | Reply | Permalink
Trying to be with it:
"According to Wikipedia..."
September 25, 2008 8:48 PM | Reply | Permalink
Next comes her visit to Jerusalem, eternal and undivided capital...
Don't you think?
September 25, 2008 8:30 PM | Reply | Permalink
As long as it is coordinated with the "Jews for Jesus 2008 Tour."
September 25, 2008 8:36 PM | Reply | Permalink
Of course, if a real journalist was doing the interview, the follow up question would have been; isn't that what Russia claimed it was doing in Georgia?
September 25, 2008 8:39 PM | Reply | Permalink
Okay, now you're just being to (intellectually) nuanced.
September 25, 2008 8:42 PM | Reply | Permalink
The fun question to ask would be "should we second-guess Israel's decision if they decide to negotiate with regimes like Syria?" because it would create a big soup of "no questioning Israel," "no negotiating with bad guys," along with a likely lack of knowledge that Israel is negotiating with Syria and the McCain campaign's official position is to discourage that.
On second thought, it's hardly worth coming up with "gotcha" questions for Palin when she gives answers like a gotcha to questions that would be an easy opener on a job interview, like "tell me about your foreign policy qualifications."
September 26, 2008 10:43 AM | Reply | Permalink
To McCain:
"Take your butt to Mississippi." Rolin Martin
September 25, 2008 8:46 PM | Reply | Permalink
sarah palin is barack obama ace of spade. As simple as that. If I were Barack Obama i would walk around with a t-shirt that says "free sarah palin".
John S. McCain can cure aids, solve all of our problems but he will not be elected president with palin as his v.p.
Prediction: John McCain will drop Sarah Palin by Oct. 15
September 25, 2008 8:47 PM | Reply | Permalink
Now, coming up on CNN, Palin interaction with the media today. This will be interesting to see how this framed.
September 25, 2008 8:54 PM | Reply | Permalink
The look on Roland Martin's face after the Couric interview: Priceless.
September 25, 2008 8:59 PM | Reply | Permalink
I'm watching Keith now - doesn't McCain look like one of those old tortoises out in the desert?
September 25, 2008 8:55 PM | Reply | Permalink
Was Keith interviewing McCain?
September 25, 2008 9:01 PM | Reply | Permalink
No, it was just a clip of McCain talking about suspending his campaign.
September 25, 2008 9:06 PM | Reply | Permalink
Actually, the way his skin toward the bottom of his face is kind of starting to bunch up and get all wrinkly, it reminds me of this:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/cepatri55/2038508030/
September 25, 2008 9:38 PM | Reply | Permalink
You are sooooo bad.
September 25, 2008 9:39 PM | Reply | Permalink
Well, it's true. :)
I'm not trying to be mean. He just looked terrible in the clip where he's announcing the suspension of his campaign.
September 25, 2008 9:50 PM | Reply | Permalink
If I only had a brain...
September 25, 2008 10:00 PM | Reply | Permalink
A concert performance by Jamie Cullum dedicated to the current President of the United States
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w5NzU5Xov9s&feature=related
September 25, 2008 10:04 PM | Reply | Permalink
I focused on the same thing.
September 25, 2008 10:00 PM | Reply | Permalink
she will be back in the bubble soon after this no more press at all she comes off as what she is not ready and does not know a thing
September 25, 2008 9:04 PM | Reply | Permalink
From Larry King:
Paul Begala on CNN: At the WH meeting, Pelosi deferred to Obama who laid out the Dem point, and the to McCain who defferred to seniority and didn't say anything.
The Republican response: Politics in DC? Of course.
During the primary, I came to loathe Begala, but since then he has become one of the best surrogates for Obama.
September 25, 2008 9:12 PM | Reply | Permalink
That's un-fucking-believable. He makes this big national deal about how he HAS to go there and then once he's there he doesn't know enough to say anything????? So he defers to another congressman while Pelosi defers to Obama to give the Dem view?
THIS MAN IS A TOTAL BOZO!
September 25, 2008 9:30 PM | Reply | Permalink
BEDTIME FOR BONZO.
September 25, 2008 9:32 PM | Reply | Permalink
For TheraP:
Larry King played the Letterman episode last night.
September 25, 2008 9:13 PM | Reply | Permalink
In the lull, given the movement toward Obama and the implosion of the McCain campaign, I give you KD Lang singing Hallalujah:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P_NpxTWbovE&feature=related
September 25, 2008 9:24 PM | Reply | Permalink
Ok, she said "eye-ran". That's it no more soup for you!
September 25, 2008 9:48 PM | Reply | Permalink
forget the soup...how can you have any pudding if you don't eat you meat.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m3aIQyL9Mh0&feature=related
September 25, 2008 9:57 PM | Reply | Permalink
And I Ran, I ran so far awaay
or, and iran, iran's so far awaay.
September 25, 2008 11:13 PM | Reply | Permalink
Give me your opinions on this, please.
http://tpmcafe.talkingpointsmemo.com/talk/2008/09/a-modest-proposal-how-to-put-m.php
September 25, 2008 9:55 PM | Reply | Permalink
She's right...So? ... they were there first!
Just blow them up from the face of the earth, just like we do with Moose.
Sheesh where are these people coming from.
Read your Bible...idiot...Palestinians were always there,
September 25, 2008 9:56 PM | Reply | Permalink
It's classic doubletalk. She strings words together, but they don't say anything coherent.
September 25, 2008 10:19 PM | Reply | Permalink
Sorry, no dice. Israel may get a nuclear warhead under Senator Obama. Israeli's in the USA are fairly annoying, especially Rory Zacher and the North Shore of Chicago.
The Republican's campaign is certainly laughable.
This is the end of time and we start at 0. I am something like Jesus Christ.
ps call me to make sure were on the same page. 630 257 9174. I need a date but Israeli's don't crossbreed.
September 25, 2008 10:52 PM | Reply | Permalink
Huh?
Israel has between 100 and 200 nuclear warheads, and has had them for decades.
September 25, 2008 11:52 PM | Reply | Permalink
All this wonderfulness spewing from Palin's mouth and we still haven't seen her tax returns and medical records. I bet they're chock full of goodies too.
I just hope we can all laugh about this later - after they lose. But damn, why aren't the polls way more lopsided? Incredible.
America scares me silly sometimes.
September 25, 2008 10:54 PM | Reply | Permalink
christ...why the fuck is mccain still at 40 something percent?
country first my ass
September 25, 2008 10:58 PM | Reply | Permalink
I almost fell off my chair hearing her talk about good guys and bad guys in her world. She sounded like she was telling a story to a bunch of kids!
September 25, 2008 11:40 PM | Reply | Permalink
Call me elitist but seriously: haven't we had enough of foreign policy premised on who is the 'good' and 'bad' guys???
The world is complex. We have interests all over the place and working to deal with those interests in that complex world is at best simplified to three dimensional chess and it's actually much more complicated than that. Is anyone else scared senseless thinking of the possibility of a very unstable president with a very incompetent vice president?
September 25, 2008 11:54 PM | Reply | Permalink
Shouldn't this be the point where serious Republicans start jumping ship, or demanding that McCain drop this person? I mean, this is embarrassing. What if he pulls it off and wins? There must be more than a handful of old-line Republicans who are just as terrified as we are.
September 26, 2008 2:25 AM | Reply | Permalink
My brilliant wife just noted: this the way beauty pageant contestants answer questions about weighty subjects of the day.
September 26, 2008 6:28 AM | Reply | Permalink
Palin provides way
too much fodder for the rest
of us. You go, girl!
http://thehaikudiaries.wordpress.com/2008/09/26/september-26-2008-2/
September 26, 2008 8:19 AM | Reply | Permalink
I actually liked Sandra Bullock and Miss Detective. The best line was when she had to add ".... and world peace!" to her quiz question.
I am really wondering just how dumb she is.
September 26, 2008 8:59 AM | Reply | Permalink
Sorry if this sounds sexist, but she sounds like a little girl repeating what she heard her daddy say.
September 26, 2008 9:04 AM | Reply | Permalink
Well, the idiotic quote has one virtue. Forever more, xhe can protest that she said to Katie Couric whatever she likes to claim it was. To AIPAC she can say she clearly offered unconditional support. To Palestinians she can she she made clear that U.S. has a role in indicating its rightgs concerns to Israel and our support is thus conditional. She can say it was clearly only about Iran really, or that it clearly was all-encompassing. Clearly, she can now claim she was clear about almost any position she may like.
September 26, 2008 9:23 AM | Reply | Permalink
Just when you think it can't get worse...
Henry Kissinger, James Baker and Colin Powell all favor negotiation with Iran. Sarah Palin thinks that's "naive". And after all, none of those guys have ever lived in a state with a foreign country RIGHT NEXT DOOR.
Good heavens.
September 26, 2008 9:49 AM | Reply | Permalink
You can put lipstick on a python spirit...
September 26, 2008 9:54 AM | Reply | Permalink
Greg Sargent said,
This was no coincidence. In fact, it's straight out of Karl Rove's playbook: When the news is about to get ugly (e.g. Sarah Palin's interview and Rick Davis' ties to Freddie Mac), distract the media.
September 26, 2008 1:44 PM | Reply | Permalink