Saturday, October 02, 2010

Sarah Palin Invented the Internet Change

Sarah Palin apparently has a beef with new Obama chief of staff Pete Rouse.
Palin appears to have been no fan of Rouse for a long time. In her 2009 memoir, she accuses him of being among those in the Obama presidential campaign who allegedly tried to smear her when she was named McCain's vice presidential nominee.

She also accuses him of lifting Obama's "change" slogan from her own gubernatorial campaign in 2006.

"Every part of our campaign shouted 'Change!'" she wrote. "We were amused a couple of years later when Barack Obama, one of whose senior advisers (come to think of it) had roots in Alaska– adopted the same theme," she wrote in reference to Rouse.

As Kevin Drum put it:
I don't know whether Rouse tried to smear Palin or not. Given Palin's expansive understanding of the word "smear," I wouldn't be surprised. But does she really think that she's the first politician to ever run on the theme of "change"? And that Obama via Rouse stole it from her? Holy cow.

It's unreal, the world that woman inhabits.

13 comments:

joe said...

An unReal America, in point of fact.

sonicfrog said...

And she's probably going to be the front runner for the GOP.... *shudder*

Unknown said...

I'm Alaskan.
How arrogant for someone in Chicago to think they would know anything about this.
I was there and her campaign swag said "change" on it. It's a common theme for reformers.
Only thing is that she was a reformer, Obama is nothing of the sort.

David Schraub said...

Dude(tte): I totally know that Sarah Palin's '06 campaign had change as a theme (thanks to the magic of the internet, even those of us in the lower '48 can follow what's going on in Alaska!). And hey -- good on her: Frank Murkowski was kind of a sleaze (though I note she seems to have a love/hate relationship with the concept: "How's that hope-y, change-y thing working out for ya?").

But to act like she invented the idea of change and that Obama stole it from her -- when, what, it's been done by a thousand campaigns before her? Come on. It's typical Palin narcissism.

PG said...

And Palin stole it from George W. Bush 2004; who stole it from Gore 2000; who stole it from David Dinkins's 1993 mayoral campaign. Sarah Palin owes everything to Dinkins.

N. Friedman said...

In my usual debate choking way - and see how my even, upon request, failing to post chokes off debate (i.e. 8 posts in several days, most of which were 5 or 6 of which were off topic) -, I cannot imagine why we should care what Ms. Palin opines about her dislike of this or that member of the Obama administration. I hope this does not choke off other posters.

David Schraub said...

In my usual debate choking way - and see how my even, upon request, failing to post chokes off debate (i.e. 8 posts in several days, most of which were 5 or 6 of which were off topic)

... much like how a manicured garden is far less interesting than a field overgrown with weeds.

I was just thinking about how pleasant these last few comments sections were, actually.

N. Friedman said...

David,

The question, of course, is why call your blog "The Debate Link" if you want only certain viewpoints represented and, on top of that, you find actual debate problematic. Do you have a bit limit with blogspot?

Life is not about being "pleasant" and choking off facts you do not like (e.g. about JStreet trying to cover up its work for Goldstone and about JStreet, while claiming to represents Americans interested in Israel, taking very, very large donations from a foreign source) allows you to write things which, with all facts considered, are not so simple as you suggest. Well, that is all I have to say about the JStreet fiction you wrote, other than to note that, as you know, what I previously said about Soro and JStreet turned out to be so.

As for Ms. Palin, she is not my cup of tea. However, I see nothing to her blowing her own horn. That is called being a politician.

joe said...

NF, just don't take it so personally. There are lots of ways to skin a blog. For example, David's approach makes sense if he wants more commenters instead of longer comment sections.

N. Friedman said...

joe,

The problem, though, is that he is not getting more people commenting by blocking certain opinions. He is getting what he would otherwise get.

Of course, this is not my problem and, given his comment, his concern appears less to be about choking off others - which is not occurring - than having peace rather than debate.

David Schraub said...

It's about having a pleasant conversation rather than a two person shouting match. I find the former to be both more enjoyable and, ultimately, more illuminating.

And the insight that two or more people yelling at each other uncontrollably does not necessarily optimize the putative benefits of debate is something I knew well even dating back to my debate days. Debate, after all, has rules -- it isn't some wild free-for-all. Managing who can speak, how often, and for how long is an integral part of any debate forum.

N. Friedman said...

Toned down debate is fine by me.

PG said...

Debate, after all, has rules -- it isn't some wild free-for-all. Managing who can speak, how often, and for how long is an integral part of any debate forum.

Also, managing about which topic people will speak. Folks who drift into irrelevancies, who indicate a fairly 101-level of knowledge (of the "have you tried Googling?" type), or who make blatantly false claims detract from the forum. I find fora that discourage such debaters from participation to be far better than those that do not.