Snarking On Sarah

I'm always happy to have a reason to snark about Sarah Palin. She's been back in the news recently, although happily not at the "all Sarah, all the time" level we had to endure four years ago, because she told Sean Hannity that she's "considering" running for one of Alaska's U.S. Senate seats next year. Democrats and progressives reacted with joy, all but begging her to run, figuring a candidate as manifestly unqualified as the former half-term governor would ensure a Democratic win. On the other hand, several pundits pointed out that Palin has done nothing in the last four years to indicate that she is serious about running for office, much less actually governing, and that she was probably just jumping back into the spotlight in advance of her next book, which comes out in October.

So is it possible that Sarah would actually run for something? I just can't see it, but I sure understand why Democrats want her to. Not to put too fine a point on it, and forgive my language, Sarah Palin is an opposition researcher's wet dream. The ads just write themselves. Imagine the following, in a deep, doom-and-gloom political announcer voice, with an unflattering picture of Sarah in the background: "Sarah Palin had two of the most important jobs in Alaska, Chairman of the Oil and Gas Conservation Commission, and Governor. She quit them both. Now, she wants to be a Senator. Does she know it's a six-year term?"

And that's just off the top of my head. If someone really wanted to go digging for dirt on Sarah, there is six swimming pools worth of dirt to be dug. She's a very strange woman who has said and done a lot of very strange things, and there are bloggers in Alaska who have devoted their professional lives to tracking every move she makes. They could fill a Democratic campaign operative's head with all manner of things, none of which would make a rational person want to vote for her. If you're interested, check out The Mudflats, Just A Girl From Homer, and The Immoral Minority.

I'm convinced that at this point Sarah Palin is unelectable to anything, which is probably just fine with Sarah Palin because I'm also convinced that she's not really interested in running for anything and she's absolutely not interested in governing. Teasing a senate run, or in 2011, a possible presidential run, just keeps her supporters enthused and happily sending her money, not to mention buying her silly books. By the way, that next book is called "Good Tidings and Great Joy: Protecting The Heart of Christmas," and I won't be reading it.