Palin is framing the debate. “my common sense v your bullcrap”

Sara Palin is hated by the left either for her policies or her "stupidity" or, more likely, both. I have been a supported of hers ever since she eviscerated Obama in her nomination acceptance speech. Yet I had strong reservations because she tuned me off when being interviewed. She was too verbose, superficial and repetitive. She was anything but intellectual. How many times have you heard her repeat common sense solutions, put the government back on the side of the people, get out of the way of private enterprise, lower taxes because the people know best how to spent their money and so on.

Tell a lie often enough and people will believe it. So much more so for the truth. When you want to sell anything, you must brand it as "the best". It is immaterial whether it is or not. And while you are at it, brand your competition as "the worst". Selling is not appealing to the intellect but to the emotions. The same goes for winning elections. They are all about imaging and positioning. Is a candidate conservative or liberal, likable or nerdy or smart or stupid? Candidates understand this and campaign on broad stokes and not detailed policies. Being considered an intellectual is often an albatross. It did Adlai Stephenson no good.

Democrats know all about positive and negative branding. Throughout the Bush 43 presidency, they branding him as stupid or a cowboy, or a frat boy. They repetitively flaunted soundbites like "Bush lied, people died". Thus the ground work was laid for "hope and change". The "Messiah" had come.

"If you think I believe Palin is stupid, you need to review my post history. That characterization is both wrong and uninformed."

Please be advised that because I don't know your "post history" does not make me "wrong" OR "uninformed". Knowing your agenda and political leanings is not my mission in life, and frankly I don't feel I need to do background searches on the writer of every post to which I wish to respond. All I did is respond to your one (1) post.

"I’m simply disappointed that when she was asked specifics, she didn’t give any. And Greta prompted her again, giving her another chance and she still didn’t. These are the kinds of moments that make OTHERS assume she is stupid, which I do not believe for one second.

First of all, Greta is a democrat, or at least a democrat supporter; the last time I looked, she had donated campaign funds to the democrat party; secondly, drilling Palin for "specifics" is a Katy Couric tactic intended to trap Sarah and it is cheap, "gotcha journalism". Why else would she do it? I see Greta trying to drive other conservatives she interviews to the center all the time. Never forget that she is a "lawyer", first and foremost.

Sarah Palin is a Fox News CONTRIBUTOR (a job - IMHO - she should never have accepted), she's not just another casual interviewee, which is how everyone, except Hannity (the only true conservative on FOX), has treated her so far. She should receive the courtesy of being their "peer", not serve as their punching bag.

Beck and O'Reilly tried the same tactic when she was on their show. They are all drooling to be the "first" to know whether or not she intends to run for President, and it's running out both sides of their mouths.

"The President’s SOTU speech was available before it was delivered, released online ahead of time. She had ample opportunity to put a substitute response together, with specifics. I’m simply disappointed that she didn’t."

You must watch CNN or something, because I watched that build up closely, and distinctly heard them say that only his "talking points" were released in advance, and the full text of the speech was only released a short time before the speech. Didn't she do her analysis from her home in Alaska? Maybe someone conveniently forgot to fax her the talking points...not that it matters.

I'm sort of a political junkie, retired, all kids grown, and even I didn't have time took look up the kenyan's speech text, or his talking points...nor did I have any interest in it as he was going to give it live very shortly anyway.

No doubt you're still disappointed she didn't rattle off the "Bush Doctrine" to "Kommandant" Charlie Gibson too.

"Well if you don’t care, I suggest you start NOW. Because, believe it or not, I talk to people every day who are willing to ignore the content of what the Idiot in Chief is saying, in order to note how he “sounds.”

Oh...you SUGGEST that I do that huh? (Did you go to the barack obama School of Tact and Decorum?)

Well, if that kind of talk from people influences you, then you're one of them, and I pity all of you. You started off this rebuttle complaining that Sarah didn't have "specifics" and now you end it with she didn't "sound" right? Which is it?

B.S. artists, like obama, can rant for hours on any subject, and make the unknowing believe every word he says, and even nominate him for the Nobel prize. He would be a lot more palatable and believable if once in a while he would just say, "I don't know, but I'll check".

The fact that Sarah does not possess the "B.S. gene" is NOT any reflection on her governing ability or her intelligence. I am certain that if she made any promises to America, she would do what she promised, or get on TV and tell us why not.

There are two kinds of knowledge - knowing a thing, and knowing how and where to find out. I would really rather have the latter as a President. I believe that whatever the subject, Sarah would throughly research it and KNOW what she was talking about before the cameras rolled. The facts would be more current. She wouldn't just walk out there like obama and start smiling at the camera and reeling off phoney baloney facts to impress the ignorant.

She did her job as Governor very well, and whenever the subject comes up and she talks about it, you can tell she knew what she was doing, especially in the areas of energy, and cleaning up corruption.

There's a saying in the martial arts, "There is no defense for a sucker punch.". A sucker punch is exactly what Beck, O'Reilly, and now Greta have delivered to Sarah. She has no more way of knowing what THEY are going to ask than she did Couric and Gibson.

All of those shows are opinion and pundit shows, but Sarah gets a "pop quiz". "OK Alex, I'll take 'knowledge about everything' for a thousand".

Speaking of research, maybe you could look at HER speeches sometime, or even sign up on Facebook to her page. Her ideas, opinons, and subject knowledge are excellent when not in "pop quiz" mode from salivating journalists.

"And unfortunately for the rest of us, they get to vote. "

Yes, you do."

Just for your convenience, I went and copied Sarah Palins response to the SOTU address from her Facebook page...looks pretty SPECIFIC to me.

CREDIBILITY GAP
by Sarah Palin

While I don’t wish to speak too harshly about President Obama’s state of the union address, we live in challenging times that call for candor. I call them as I see them, and I hope my frank assessment will be taken as an honest effort to move this conversation forward.

Last night, the president spoke of the “credibility gap” between the public’s expectations of their leaders and what those leaders actually deliver. “Credibility gap” is a good way to describe the chasm between rhetoric and reality in the president’s address. The contradictions seemed endless.

He called for Democrats and Republicans to “work through our differences,” but last year he dismissed any notion of bipartisanship when he smugly told Republicans, “I won.”

He talked like a Washington “outsider,” but he runs Washington! He’s had everything any president could ask for – an overwhelming majority in Congress and a fawning press corps that feels tingles every time he speaks. There was nothing preventing him from pursuing “common sense” solutions all along. He didn’t pursue them because they weren’t his priorities, and he spent his speech blaming Republicans for the problems caused by his own policies.

He dared us to “let him know” if we have a better health care plan, but he refused to allow Republicans in on the negotiations or consider any ideas for real free market and patient-centered reforms. We’ve been “letting him know” our ideas for months from the town halls to the tea parties, but he isn’t interested in listening. Instead he keeps making the nonsensical claim that his massive trillion-dollar health care bill won’t increase the deficit.

Americans are suffering from job losses and lower wages, yet the president practically demanded applause when he mentioned tax cuts, as if allowing people to keep more of their own hard-earned money is an act of noblesse oblige. He claims that he cut taxes, but I must have missed that. I see his policies as paving the way for massive tax increases and inflation, which is the “hidden tax” that most hurts the poor and the elderly living on fixed incomes.

He condemned lobbyists, but his White House is filled with former lobbyists, and this has been a banner year for K Street with his stimulus bill, aka the Lobbyist’s Full Employment Act. He talked about a “deficit of trust” and the need to “do our work in the open,” but he chased away the C-SPAN cameras and cut deals with insurance industry lobbyists behind closed doors.

He spoke of doing what’s best for the next generation and not leaving our children with a “mountain of debt,” but under his watch this year, government spending is up by 22%, and his budget will triple our national debt.

He spoke of a spending freeze, but doesn’t he realize that each new program he’s proposing comes with a new price tag? A spending freeze is a nice idea, but it doesn’t address the root cause of the problem. We need a comprehensive examination of the role of government spending. The president’s deficit commission is little more than a bipartisan tax hike committee, lending political cover to raise taxes without seriously addressing the problem of spending.

He condemned bailouts, but he voted for them and then expanded and extended them. He praised the House’s financial reform bill, but where was Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae in that bill? He still hasn’t told us when we’ll be getting out of the auto and the mortgage industries. He praised small businesses, but he’s spent the past year as a friend to big corporations and their lobbyists, who always find a way to make government regulations work in their favor at the expense of their mom & pop competitors.

He praised the effectiveness of his stimulus bill, but then he called for another one – this time cleverly renamed a “jobs bill.” The first stimulus was sold to us as a jobs bill that would keep unemployment under 8%. We now have double digit unemployment with no end in sight. Why should we trust this new “jobs bill”?

He talked about “making tough decisions about opening new offshore areas for oil and gas development,” but apparently it’s still too tough for his Interior Secretary to move ahead with Virginia’s offshore oil and gas leases. If they’re dragging their feet on leases, how long will it take them to build “safe, clean nuclear power plants”? Meanwhile, he continued to emphasize “green jobs,” which require massive government subsidies for inefficient technologies that can’t survive on their own in the real world of the free market.

He spoke of supporting young girls in Afghanistan who want to go to school and young women in Iran who courageously protest in the streets, but where were his words of encouragement to the young girls of Afghanistan in his West Point speech? And where was his support for the young women of Iran when they were being gunned down in the streets of Tehran?

Despite speaking for over an hour, the president only spent 10% of his speech on foreign policy, and he left us with many unanswered questions. Does he still think trying the 9/11 terrorists in New York is a good idea? Does he still think closing Gitmo is a good idea? Does he still believe in Mirandizing terrorists after the Christmas bomber fiasco? Does he believe we’re in a war against terrorists, or does he think this is just a global crime spree? Does he understand that the first priority of our government is to keep our country safe?

In his address last night, the president once again revealed that there’s a fundamental disconnect between what the American people expect from their government, and what he wants to deliver. He’s still proposing failed top-down big government solutions to our problems. Instead of smaller, smarter government, he’s taken a government that was already too big and supersized it.

Real private sector jobs are created when taxes are low, investment is high, and people are free to go about their business without the heavy hand of government. The president thinks innovation comes from government subsidies. Common sense conservatives know innovation comes from unleashing the creative energy of American entrepreneurs.

Everything seems to be “unexpected” to this administration: unexpected job losses; unexpected housing numbers; unexpected political losses in Massachusetts, Virginia, and New Jersey. True leaders lead best when confronted with the unexpected. But instead of leading us, the president lectured us. He lectured Wall Street; he lectured Main Street; he lectured Congress; he even lectured our Supreme Court Justices.

He criticized politicians who “wage a perpetual campaign,” but he gave a campaign speech instead of a state of the union address. The campaign is over, and President Obama now has something that candidate Obama never had: an actual track record in office. We now can see the failed policies behind the flowery words. If Americans feel as cynical as the president suggests, perhaps it’s because the audacity of his recycled rhetoric no longer inspires hope.

Real leadership requires results. Real hope lies in the ingenuity, generosity, and boundless courage of the American people whose voices are still not being heard in Washington.

- Sarah Palin

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