via Bob Cesca’s Awesome Blog! Go! Produced by Cesca for CollegeHumor.com.

Frank Rich made an interesting observation about Sarah Palin’s crib notes incident at the Tea Party Convention ~

You had to wonder if Palin, who is nothing if not cunning, had sprung a trap. She knows all too well that the more the so-called elites lampoon her, the more she cements her cred with the third of the country that is her base. Her hand hieroglyphics may not have been speaking aids but bait.

If so, mission accomplished. Her sleight of hand gave the anti-Palin chorus another prod to deride her as an empty-headed, subliterate clown, and her fans another cue to rally…

Read More–> Frank Rich, “Palin’s Cunning Sleight of Hand.” NYTimes.com, 13 Feb. 2010

While my take on this matter is nowhere near as well written as Rich’s , I suggested similarly on Feb. 11… and took bunch of crap for it.  (Just sayin’)

via The GOP has a Palin Problem, cross-posted from Care2.com ~ Originally published, 10 January 2010

The National Journal conducted a poll of 109 Republican Party leaders, asking them to “rank 5 candidates in the order of likeliness to capture the GOP nod.”  That former MA Governor Mitt Romney topped the lists of those polled with 81 points, 62 per-cent of which were first place votes, is unsurprising.  Were it not for half-term Alaska Governor Sarah Palin’s poor showing (25 points) it probably wouldn’t be worth talking about.

Not one of the party leaders or pundits polled selected Palin to top their list.  Taking into account the ideological nature of her supporters — distrustful of government, adherents to the myth of a liberal media, and, most importantly, a profound disdain for the GOP elite — this was the best outcome Palin could have hoped for.

Talented FiveThirtyEight.com political prognosticator, Nate Silver, likes Palin’s chances to win 2012 Republican presidential nomination.  Silver posted “10 reasons that Palin Could Win,” last Nov. 18.  In his Jan. 7 reaction to the Insider’s Poll, Silver reiterated his number eight reason from last year:

…If the Establishment, owing to electability concerns or whatever else, tries to put hurdles in her way by re-structuring the primary or delegate allocation process, it may only play into the victimization complex of Palin and her supporters.

Silver’s commentary is apt, and though the poll doesn’t represent any direct effort to “neuter” Palin’s potential candidacy, that doesn’t mean they wont (see video, below).  “Although the Establishment’s concerns about Palin’s viability as a general election candidate are well grounded,” Silver notes, “mostly they’re just terrified of her because she doesn’t need them. “

It might be wiser for establishment Republicans to remain hands-off, and wait for Palin to self destruct.  Her supporters have proven themselves willing to keep their blinders on, content to cling to the dazzling façade rolled out at the 2008 Republican National Convention.  However, Palin’s high visibility — albeit, NEVER in a critical forum — increases the probability of a politically fatal mistake.

Indeed, she may have already made it.  I’m not referring to Palin’s recent doubling down on her “death panel” analysis of health care reform efforts in Washington – a turn of phrase awarded “Lie of the Year” for 2009 byPolitifact.com, Pulitzer winner in that same year.  Palin’s deceit in this matter will go unnoticed by her supporters.

However, Palin’s snubbing of the 2010 Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) has got much attention.  Much more interesting is her commitment to speak at the National Tea Party Convention in Nashville, Feb. 4-6.

Muriel Kane posted an excellent summary about how different factions are reacting to Palin’s curious positioning at RawStory.com, Jan. 8.

Missed opportunity, simple greed, or shrewd calculation? Only time will tell the real meaning of Sarah Palin’s Tea Party gambit.

Another aspect that has, thus far, received little attention from the media pertains to whom Palin will share the stage with at the Tea Party Convention.  Senior Fellow at Media Matters for America, Eric Boehlert, posed the question in a Jan. 9 post:  “Will the press question the ‘Palin – Farah’ ticket?”

The Beltway press still refuses to raise questions about Palin’s decision to attend the first annual Tea Party convention in Nashville next month and share the stage with a fringe radical like Joseph Farah, who is an avowed gay and Muslim-hating extremist, and whose wingnut publication, [World Net Daily], remains obsessed with the loony, and thoroughly debunked, conspiracy claim that Obama was not born in America.

Of course, Kane was correct – only time will tell how this will play out.  There is a long way to go, but the potential for Palin to become the 2012 GOP nominee still exists.  So, too, does another outcome which I suggested the day Palin announced her resignation as Governor of Alaska:

If Palin does still have national aspirations, her only hope of success (in her mind, mind you) would be to position herself at the head of some third-party, the radical right-wing of the GOP finally throwing off its remaining moderate faction.

See Also:

• David Weigel, “Is Palin Getting $100,000 to Speak at the Tea Party National Convention.“ WashintonIndependent.com, 7 January 2010.

• Here’s a teaser for the Jan. 10 ‘60 Minutes‘ segment on Sarah Palin:

Palin Inaccurate says McCain Strategist

Related on Care2:

• Palin Quits – Could GOP split be in the offing?

• The Death Panel Lie – Conservative Dishonesty in the Health Care Reform Debate

Jed Lewison posted this at Daily Kos TV, Jan. 13.  The video displays Sarah Palin associating the 9/11 attacks with Iraq twice during the 2008 presidential campaign.

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Digg This

From Angie Drobnic Holan, published 18 December 2009:

Of all the falsehoods and distortions in the political discourse this year, one stood out from the rest.

“Death panels.”

The claim set political debate afire when it was made in August, raising issues from the role of government in health care to the bounds of acceptable political discussion. In a nod to the way technology has transformed politics, the statement wasn’t made in an interview or a television ad. Sarah Palin posted it on her Facebook page…

Read More ~  PolitiFact | PolitiFact’s Lie of the Year: ‘Death panels’.

Politifact’s treatment gives me occasion to crosspost my own assessment of the “Death Panel” meme, published Aug. 18, 2009, at Care2.com:

The Death Panel Lie ~

Conservative Dishonesty in the Health Care Reform Debate

So the opponents of health care reform are sticking with the “death panel” talking point and the mob tactics it inspires.  Admittedly, the strategy has yielded some results for…  well, it’s unclear what they want aside from railing against President Obama.  Regardless, the anti-reform crowd finally landed a punch.  Good for them, I suppose.  Conservatives have been flailing wildly since Obama took office with little to show for it, save a lot of embarrassing You Tube clips.  Despite this, there is reason to remain optimistic about getting a reform bill ready for Obama’s signature this year.

Among the ethically challenged Republicans maintaining the “Death Panel” myth are Newt Gingrich, Sarah Palin, and Iowa senator, Chuck Grassley.  All three of them are political opportunists, frankly, playing upon the fears of their dwindling, radical constituencies.  At this time and in this debate, it is a losing political strategy.

Grassley’s Folly:

Grassley’s jumping on the crazy train isn’t much of a surprise, but it was unnecessary.  Representing one of the most aged state populations in the U.S., the senator must have felt safer stoking the fear, rather than rebutting it.  However, during his recess town halls, Grassley has failed to mention he — along with many other Republicans — voted in favor of a similar measure in 2003.

From Amy Sullivan at TIME.com’s Swampland Blog, August 13, 2009:

Remember the 2003 Medicare prescription drug bill, the one that passed with the votes of 204 GOP House members and 42 GOP Senators? Anyone want to guess what it provided funding for? Did you say counseling for end-of-life issues and care? Ding ding ding!!

Let’s go to the bill text, shall we? “The covered services are: evaluating the beneficiary’s need for pain and symptom management, including the individual’s need for hospice care; counseling the beneficiary with respect to end-of-life issues and care options, and advising the beneficiary regarding advanced care planning.” The only difference between the 2003 provision and the infamous Section 1233 that threatens the very future and moral sanctity of the Republic is that the first applied only to terminally ill patients. Section 1233 would expand funding so that people could voluntarily receive counseling before they become terminally ill.

Palin’s Density:

As much as I would prefer not to mention Sarah Palin, her peculiar insistence upon furthering the “Death Panel” lie demands it.  It is fitting, though, that her efforts are now publicized via Facebook rather than Governor’s Office press releases.  Her August 7, 2009 post on the subject is the one that really gave the term “Death Panel” its legs within the mainstream media:

The America I know and love is not one in which my parents or my baby with Down Syndrome will have to stand in front of Obama’s “death panel” so his bureaucrats can decide, based on a subjective judgment of their “level of productivity in society,” whether they are worthy of health care. Such a system is downright evil…

Palin followed up this lunacy with a call for civility during the health care reform town halls scheduled by Alaska’s representatives in an August 9 Facebook post.  While it wasn’t a reversal of her previous post, it was a tacit admission that her rhetoric, at least in part, added fuel to the thuggish nonsense displayed by the right-wing at town hall discussions elsewhere.

Then she did something remarkably dense.  Sarah Palin, following the above mentioned comments from Sen. Grassley, declared victory against the dreaded death panel legislation within her August 13 post:

I join millions of Americans in expressing appreciation for the Senate Finance Committee’s decision to remove the provision in the pending health care bill that authorizes end-of-life consultations (Section 1233 of HR 3200). It’s gratifying that the voice of the people is getting through to Congress; however, that provision was not the only disturbing detail in this legislation; it was just one of the more obvious ones.

Forget for a moment that Sarah Palin had, to put it kindly, a questionable record as Governor of Alaska when it came to elder care.  Her above assertion displays a profound ignorance, not only of the present health care reform debate, but also of the basic mechanisms of the legislative process.

First, the Senate Finance Committee has nothing to do with HR 3200.  The “HR” is for House of Representatives, of course, and HR 3200 is but one of five health care bills being considered by that body.  Second, there is a Senate bill being considered by the Finance Committee, however both Houses of Congress are presently in recess.  They are not presently “removing” provisions, or adding them for that matter.

Finally, Palin’s suggestion that the “provision was not the only disturbing detail in this legislation,” is simply another fear tactic.  One she likely learned from her new mentor:  Newt Gingrich.

Gingrich’s Hypocrisy:

Gingrich is supposed to be the conservative with the most formidable intellectual chops; yet, when he attempted to defend Palin’s comments on ABC’s August 9 broadcast of This Week, he complained about the bill’s length.  “The bill is a thousand pages of setting up mechanisms,” he said. “You are asking us to trust turning power over to the government, when there are clearly people in America who believe in establishing euthanasia, including selective standards.”

Sounds scary, right?  However, consider the former House Speaker’s own words from a July 2, 2009 article at The Washington Post:

More than 20 percent of all Medicare spending occurs in the last two months of life. Gundersen Lutheran Health System in La Crosse, Wisconsin has developed a successful end-of-life, best practice that combines: 1) community-wide advance care planning, where 90 percent of patients have advance directives; 2) hospice and palliative care; and 3) coordination of services through an electronic medical record. The Gundersen approach empowers patients and families to control and direct their care. The Dartmouth Health Atlas has documented that Gundersen delivers care at a 30 percent lower rate than the national average ($18,359 versus $25,860). If Gundersen’s approach was used to care for the approximately 4.5 million Medicare beneficiaries who die every year, Medicare could save more than $33 billion a year.

The emphasis added to the above — again, they are Gingrich’s words — describes, in general terms, what the current health care legislation-in-progress is designed to do.  It is the same idea for reform.  It is the same proposal which Sen. Grassley told his constituents they were right to fear, that Sarah Palin claimed victory for killing, and Newt Gingrich thought was such a good idea just a few short months ago.

Reasons For Optimism:

The “death panel” talking point has absolutely no basis in fact.  It is a false argument, and its success is contingent upon fear:  frightening the oldest among us into thinking their country wants to kill them.  (Wow!  I had to wash my hands after typing the preceding sentence…  Stay classy, conservatives).

The hypocrisy, fear mongering, and intellectual dishonesty described above have been employed by conservatives for years.  They are the same cynical strategies that have been employed in the fight against health care reform since the Truman administration.   They are also the same tactics that were employed against Obama during the 2008 campaign.  Obama’s election, then, is proof positive that this cynicism can be defeated.

Progressive advocates for health care, myself included, and members of the punditocracy have been highly critical of the president for pursuing this reform agenda in an bipartisan fashion.  As Thom Hartmann often says, “We have to hope that Obama is playing chess and not checkers,” with this contentious issue.  Without going into further detail, Obama doesn’t strike me as a checkers man.

In closing, it is important to note that, while optimism for health care reform is warranted, complacency is not.  Tell your representatives you want meaningful reform by signing this petition:  Support Historic Health Care Bill

Crossposted at Care2.com‘s Political Causes Blog – 18 August 2009