Friday, July 03, 2009

Sarah Palin: Quitter

Sarah Palin has announced that she is going to resign as Governor of Alaska to pursue the presidency in 2012.

Palin was quoted as saying, "Some are going to question the timing of this."

Gee, ya think?


By leaving office early, Ms. Palin, a 45-year-old mother of five, will be able to travel around the country more freely and not be constrained by the duties and responsibilities of being a governor.


Excuse me? She doesn't want to be constrained by duties and responsibilities? And she wants to run for president? I wonder, will she resign the presidency mid-term because the duties and responsibilities of that office make her miss out on all the good shoe sales at Bloomingdales?

Good grief.

18 comments:

Don Geddis said...

This doesn't add up yet. A hastily called news conference, with no questions, deliberately at the start of the 4th of July weekend.

Some people are speculating that she did it to get more time to run for President (or Senator from Alaska?). There's a reasonable argument that she was having a hard time traveling all over the lower 48, while also constantly commuting back to Alaska. And don't forget Trig, a very young special-needs kid.

But all that said, I'm betting on some really bad news that is not yet public. In the next few weeks, or month, I bet some reporter will find out something that has this all make sense.

Notice, in particular, that she did not announce that she was resigning "in order to run for the presidency". That reason is pure speculation, and was not the reason she gave in her own press conference.

Currently non-public bad news about Palin. That's my bet.

Loretta Marie Long said...

Sarah Palin is trying to distract us from the very important health care reform bill being voted on in the Senate.

We all need health care! Please write to these insurance-whipped lollygagging Democrat Seantors to tell them we want a public option or single-payer health care. The information was gathered from www.billpressshow.com/

If you want links to their email pages please go to http://www.portlandlivingweird.blogspot.com

It only takes a few minutes, and you will FEEL SO MUCH BETTER AFTERWARD! Sarah Palin is trying to distract us from getting healthcare!

Here are the culprits who are holding up our root canals and mammograms:-)



Senator Blanche Lincoln (D-AR)

Senator Tom Carper (D-DE)

Senator Maria Cantwell (D-WA)

Senator Ron Wyden (D-OR)

Senator Bill Nelson (D-FL)

Senator Mary Landrieu (D-LA)

Senator Kent Conrad (D-ND)

Senator Max Baucus (D-MT)

Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-CA)

These names are reported by The Hill

thank you,

www.portlandia.etsy.com

andrewljohnson said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
andrewljohnson said...

Obviously, Sarah Palin will never run for president. Give it about 3-7 days and you'll find out why she resigned. It's surely some damaging revelation.

Governors don't resign to become president, they use thier office to become president. That's hardly a way to win election... no one votes for quitters.

Unknown said...

The reasons of Palin resignation are controversial. What could be the real cause of her decision? Vote on the most possible one - http://www.votetheday.com/america/palin-resignation-424/

Miles said...

A lot of strawmen being attacked in this post. She didn't say she was quitting to run for president, nor did she say she wanted to "not be constrained by the duties and responsibilities of being a governor." So attacking her for those things is pretty silly imo.

Don Geddis said...

Miles: the strawmen are coming, because Palin herself didn't offer an explanation that made any sense.

So that naturally causes rampant speculation about what the real reason must be.

Miles said...

It's fine to speculate on what her reasons may be, but to get upset with exasperation directed at her for something she hasn't even said is wrong imo.

Ron said...

Miles: you're right. In my defense I'll just say that the article I was responding to (which was in the NYT, not exactly the Drudge Report) said in the lead paragraph that her quitting was "fueling speculation that she is trying to position herself as a candidate for the Republican presidential nomination in 2012." I just assumed that if the NYT lead with that then there was some substance behind it. It certainly seemed like a reasonable supposition.

Miles said...

Maybe, but before getting angry at Palin, best to let the facts come in imo :)

Plenty of people are jumping too early at this news, and there's been some absolutely disgraceful behaviour on some liberal leaning sites with regards to their coverage of Palin, e.g. at the Huffington Post:

http://blogs.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/timblair/index.php/dailytelegraph/comments/palin_resigns_hatred_remains/

If a conservative website had been so crass, imagine the outcry...

There's so much misinformation going around atm it's better to wait till the dust has settled before making any judgements.

Ron said...

Actually, I think quitting without being clear about why is reason enough to get angry at her. No one put a gun to her head and forced her to run for governor. She chose to do that, and having done it, I think she has a duty serve out her term *unless* she thinks she can't do the job any more. But in that case I think she has a duty to say that that's why she's stepping down. It's called public *service* for a reason. It's not just a euphemism for doing whatever the hell you please.

Miles said...

If you check out this Washington Post article, you can see she did explain her reasoning behind quitting.

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/44/2009/07/03/palins_remarks_in_stepping_dow.html?wprss=44

Now, whether they're just excuses or the actual reasons for stepping down, that's another matter. But it's not entirely as if she just said "I'm stepping down because I can't be bothered anymore".

But I agree, she should have made it clearer (given the amount of speculation going on, it's obvious she wasn't clear enough) and when an elected official steps down halfway through a term for no really good discernible reason, that's a reason to be angry. But now we're on a different topic to your original post :)

Miles said...

Maybe Time magazine's last reason is the real reason? It was become too expensive for her to keep defending herself from ethics complaints.

http://www.time.com/time/politics/article/0,8599,1908800-2,00.html

Ron said...

> But it's not entirely as if she just said "I'm stepping down because I can't be bothered anymore".

Actually, that's pretty much exactly what she said.

> It was become too expensive for her to keep defending herself from ethics complaints.

So many aphorisms, so little time:

If you can't stand the heat...

If the shoe fits...

You make your bed...

There is no doubt that being a politician is a shit job. But it's still hard for me to muster much sympathy for Palin because one of the reasons it's a shit job is because the Republicans took character assassination to a whole new level during the Clinton administration, and have been honing it to a fine art on Fox "news" ever since. Furthermore, it's pretty clear that Palin acted inappropriately in the Troopergate thing, so it's not completely unreasonable to think that there might be some substance behind those other complaints. And as long as I've brought up TrooperGATE, let's not forget that it was a Republican who insured that the suffix "-gate" will be forever synonymous with scandal.

Hm... this comment is going to turn into a full-blown post if I'm not careful.

Miles said...

Look at it from this perspective. She's had to pay $600k of her on money on fighting ethics charges, all of which so far have been proven to be erroneous. This is on a salary of $125k a year, and she turned down a $25k raise in December. Meanwhile she's also trying to do her job _and_ raise her family, while fighting these cases. That's a tough position to be put in.

I don't even agree with Sarah Palin's politics, and I'd like to make it clear I'm not a GOP supporter - however there's been a lot of rage wrt Sarah Palin from many of a liberal persuasion that I don't understand. It reminds me very much of how the Republicans would constantly smear Hilary Clinton at every opportunity - it seemed more like character assassination than anything of political merit.

Don Geddis said...

Miles said: "been a lot of rage wrt Sarah Palin from many of a liberal persuasion that I don't understand."

I think it has to do with her being supremely unqualified to be President of the United States, and yet being a single election and a heartbeat (from a 70+ year old man with a long history of health issues) away from assuming that office.

Her national interviews with Gibson and Couric were an embarrassment. She wasn't even aware of many of the national issues, much less had any reasonable opinion about them.

No problem, if she just stays in local Alaska politics. But when she's putting herself out there as a candidate for leader of the free world, I think some harsh questioning is actually appropriate. Once she gets elected and then somehow stumbles into the office, it's too late to fix things if she's naive and unready at that point.

Miles said...

She may have been underqualified, but three things - first, Obama was also lacking in experience, but there's not nearly the same rage directed at him, and second, why is that a reason to get angry at a person? If people want to elect a VP with Palin's experience, then that's their right.

And finally... Joe Biden is a complete joke, and even Obama seems to agree. And yet only Palin deserves our ire? Palin didn't get in to the White House, but the rage and hatred continues.

Perhaps I'm being naive, but she seems no worse than any other politician to me in her views or actions, hence my confusion about the feelings towards her.

Don Geddis said...

For those lacking in experience, you can't judge their past successes -- but you can judge their current abilities. Obama passes, Palin does not.

As for "no worse than any other politician": There are politicans that have views I disagree with; Palin seemed fairly unique in being almost totally ignorant of US or world affairs outside of Alaska.

She's aspiring to higher office based on charisma and the worst kind of pandering to her base. This can, at times, be successful -- so the voters might actually elect her. But it's a mistake that the voters would come to regret. And hence the passion in exposing her lack of qualifications (which is not the same thing as lack of experience).