The next episode of OTB Radio, our BlogTalkRadio program, will record and air live from 5:30-6:30 Eastern.

Dave Schuler and I will talk about Sarah Palin’s comeback tour and ensuing controversies and President Obama’s Asia trip.  Alex Knapp will join us to provide his legal expertise on the Khalid Sheikh Mohammed trial and Steve Verdon will stop by to discuss the latest national debt milestone. Other topics will likely come up as well.

We’ll also be taking calls at (646) 716-7030. Owing to a high trolls to legit callers ratio, however, we’ll be using the BTR chat feature to screen for legit calls.

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Newsweek’s choice of cover art for its Sarah Palin issue has managed to generate controversy for three days now, finally prompting a response from the editors.  The salient passage:

To note that choosing that particular photograph has ruffled a few feathers is perhaps an understatement. Palin denounced it—and us—to her million-strong Facebook following last night. “The choice of photo for the cover of this week’s Newsweek is unfortunate. When it comes to Sarah Palin, this ‘news’ magazine has relished focusing on the irrelevant rather than the relevant,” she wrote on her fan page, adding, “The out-of-context Newsweek approach is sexist and oh-so-expected by now.” She also told ABC’s Barbara Walters that she found the cover “a wee bit degrading.” Others, like CBN’s David Brody, said our cover was a new low: “biased and sexist at the same time.”

Today, Newsweek’s Editor Jon Meacham has responded to critics. “We chose the most interesting image available to us to illustrate the theme of the cover, which is what we always try to do,” Meacham said. “We apply the same test to photographs of any public figure, male or female: does the image convey what we are saying? That is a gender-neutral standard.”

As with June’s controversy over Sarah Palin’s toenails, the issue here isn’t so much sexism as it is contempt for the erstwhile vice presidential nominee as a serious public figure.  Indeed, the “theme of the cover” could not be more clear:  Palin’s a buffoon.  Why, it’s right there in bold text:  “Sarah” (not “Governor Palin” or even “Palin” but “Sarah”) is a “Problem” one must “solve.”  Lest one miss that not-so-subtle message, the subhead goes on to inform us that “She’s bad news for the GOP — and for everybody else, too.”

Now, as regular readers are painfully aware, I’m not a big fan of Palin.  I thought she was a disastrous choice for the nomination from the instant it was announced and hope very much that her brand of silly populism isn’t the future of the Republican Party.

Then again, OTB is a journal of opinion, not a news magazine.  You come here to read the signed analysis of our writers whereas, presumably, you read Newsweek for detached roundups of the week’s most important events.

It’s odd enough for Newsweek to have two opinion pieces on Palin, an out-of-office politician who’s peddling a book she almost certainly didn’t write, in the issue.  Let alone that they’re both negative.  (”Palin’s Base Appeal” by Christopher Hitchens and “Gone Rogue – How Sarah Palin Hurts the GOP and the Country” by Evan Thomas.)  But to add insult to injury by choosing to portray Palin on the cover in a way that they would never use for any other former governor or vice presidential nominee — male or female — is beyond the boundaries of objective journalism.

Yes, Palin posed for those photos.  For Runner’s World.  What she was thinking when she agreed to pose for the cheesy ones with the flags — which have very little to do with running or fitness — I don’t know.  At the time, I wrote that “Palin has crossed the line from politician to pop culture celebrity,”  an assertion of which I’m even more confident today.  But, again, that’s a fair point for political commentary, not for an outlet purporting to be covering the news.

UPDATE:  Until seeing some traffic to it in my referral logs, I’d completely forgotten about the “Newsweek Sarah Palin Cover Outrage!” from October 2008.  That one featured a non-airbrushed close-up of Palin’s face and a Jon Meacham cover story titled “She’s One of the Folks (And that’s the problem).” I sense a trend.

Sarah Palin is kicking off the promotional tour for her book Going Rogue with an appearance today on the “Oprah Winfrey Show” and an interview tomorrow on “Good Morning America.” The book’s already a best seller, so the main benefit of the campaign is a chance for Palin to rebuild her image.

She needs it.  A recent CNN poll showed that, while two-thirds of Americans see her as “a good role model for women” and a strong majority think she’s caring and trustworthy, a mere 23 percent think she’s qualified to be president.  Indeed, 47 percent of Republicans think she’s unqualified.

Politico’s Johanna Blakely thinks Palin’s appearance can be good for both Winfrey, whose ratings have slipped since she inserted herself into the 2008 campaign by stumping for Barack Obama, and the erstwhile Alaska governor.

Palin’s book lays out the trajectory of a self-made woman who rose from humble roots to the national stage, a career description — and cause — that Winfrey has embraced. Palin’s attraction is strongest in the flyover states, where Winfrey’s devoted audience has made her talk show No. 1 in the nation for 23 consecutive seasons. A Lear Center/Zogby survey conducted in August 2008 found that, among 26 celebrities who had publicly endorsed a political candidate, Winfrey was far more likely to be considered “well-informed.”

[...]

[T]he presence of Palin on “Oprah” will most likely produce a ratings blockbuster, which may attract new viewers who stick around to watch future shows.
Will the two women reminisce about beauty pageants past (Winfrey was, after all, Miss Black Tennessee) or bond over their mutual love of Burberry cashmere scarves? Will Palin mention the story about her sister who thought it was awesome that she’d been elected governor of Alaska, because she might get to be on “Oprah”?

The problem, though, is that the book itself could be a problem for Palin.  While it’s getting good reviews in the Wall Street Journal and will likely solidify her support among Republicans unhappy with the moderate direction John McCain was taking the party, it’s rather clear that many parts of the book are self-serving if not outright lies. HuffPo’s Sam Stein has several emails sent during the campaign that directly refute many of Palin’s assertions.

When Palin resigned as governor, she gave away her best chance at rebutting the impression that she was unprepared for the highest office in the land.  Had she worked to enact a bold agenda and then gotten herself re-elected, she could have brought a more impressive resume to the table.  Instead, she decided to double down on her pop culture celebrity.

Right now, people think she’s a lightweight but one who’s likable, charismatic, and decent.  It’s not at all clear how putting out a book that alienates a prominent wing of her own party and calls her integrity into question will help her.

Taegan Goddard links a Public Policy Polling survey [PDF] showing that President Obama would have beaten the most commonly mentioned Republican hopefuls had the election been held from October 16th to 19th and opened to registered voters.  (I hasten to add, it wasn’t.)

In fact, according to the survey, “Obama leads Mike Huckabee 47-43, Mitt Romney 48-40, Sarah Palin 52-40, and Tim Pawlenty 50-30.”

Considering that Huckabee, Romney, and Pawlenty remain virtual unknowns to most Americans and Obama is the sitting president, I’m not sure this is as depressing news for the GOP as PPP’s Tom Jensen seems to think.  Indeed, Huckabee is actually within the poll’s margin of error!

Look, the 2012 election’s a ridiculously long time from now and it’s pretty silly even talk about it.  Still, as Dave Schuler notes, it’s a Thursday.  Obama’s quite popular and, while his approval is plummeting by historical standards, it’s still pretty good all things considered.  Given our propensity for re-electing sitting presidents, the fact that the economy is bound to be better by mid-2012, and that the Republican Party seems to be in disarray, I’d say Obama is an early favorite to win a second term.  But we’ll have a much better idea in, say, two years.

My strong hunch is that neither Huckabee nor Palin will be the Republican nominee.  The party traditionally nominates the person whose “turn” it is, which would seemingly point to Romney.  But given how sick everyone is with the Washington wing of the GOP, I wouldn’t be shocked if some governor who’s never run before emerges out of nowhere.

Newt Gingrich has weighed in with a plan for a Sarah Palin political comeback which Taegan Goddard summarizes as:

1. Write a book.
2. Land a regular commentator slot on television.
3. Consider getting a condominium in New York or Washington.
4. Write and master three types of speeches: to make money, to project her brand, to gain attention.
5. Create some sort of national project or center.
6. Plan on working really, really hard.

There’s an old saying about free advice being worth what you paid for it.  That’s doubly true, I suspect, if it’s a potential rival offering said advice.

Steps 1 and 2 would almost surely reinforce Palin’s existing handicap of being thought rather shallow on the important public policy issues of the day.  She’s not a professional writer and having to make the rounds defending what someone else ghost-wrote for her is what got her into trouble during the 2008 campaign.  And engaging in regular, off-the-cuff analysis is surely not her strong suit.

Step 3 would undermine her chief selling point as being Regular Folk.

She’s already mastered Step 4; it’s her main skill as a politician.  Raising money and, Lord knows, gaining attention are not things she’s had any difficulty with at all.  Her brand is another matter, I suppose, but she appears to be doubling down on securing the loyalty of the hard right.

Step 5 might actually be useful.  Gingrich suggests a “National Energy Project.”  The problem is that actually getting anything worthwhile done with such a thing would take years; starting it up and then running for the 2012 nomination (the race starts next Thursday, I believe, with pancakes in New Hampshire) would make her appear a dilettante.

To have gotten to where she is, she’s already done step 6. So, really, it’s a gratuitious insult disguised as “advice.”  Or maybe it’s not really disguised: “Many ex-politicians confuse being a celebrity with being a serious political player, Gingrich said. “She can be a personality for a long time,” he said. “But that is very different from becoming a national leader.”

Steve Benen heaps praise on ABC News‘ new Fact Check segment for “actually informing the public about a controversy in a fair and accurate way.”

Kate Snow tackled the vile right-wing demagoguery on end-of-life care, and while she refrained from calling Palin and her ilk “liars,” she made it very clear that the accusations about euthanasia are completely wrong. It wasn’t a he-said/she-said report; it was just reality.

But Snow’s “fact check” is idiotic.  She checks an absurd straw man and finds that, sure enough, it’s made of straw.

The business about “death boards” is over-the-top nonsense and is indeed being presented in a dishonest, unhelpful manner.  But nobody* — not even Sarah Palin — is arguing that the Democrats actually put a measure into writing that requires offing granny when she gets too sick to be worth the cost of healing her.  Rather — as Snow finally admits two minutes into the piece — the argument is that a natural consequence of having government involved in these decisions while trying to keep costs low is rationing of care and encouraging people away from expensive, extraordinary measures.  The fact that the law, as written, puts the final decision in the hands of the patient doesn’t dispose of that fear.

A more useful “fact check” would have acknowledged the actual basis of the opposition argument and a look at how systems similar to those proposed, such as those in France and elsewhere, actually operate.  Or even to note that Granny’s healthcare is already provided by the government and has been since the Johnson Administration.

*UPDATE:  John Cole says I should have written “nobody sane.” He points to some lunatic called Mike Sola making this argument on some Fox News show of which I’d never heard.  Fair enough.

Mike Rappaport “hates” David Brooks and finds him “a despicable character.”  Why?  He lets John Hinderaker explain:

Brooks . . . knows where his bread is buttered. He makes his living as a “conservative” who can reliably be counted on to sell out conservatives and Republicans at every opportunity.

In this instance, Hinderaker is reacting to Brooks’ characterization of Sarah Palin’s “death panel” hyperbole as “crazy.”

What’s the evidence that Brooks thinks Palin’s straw man is actually solid argumentation?  He doesn’t say. Presumably, Hinderaker (and apparently Rappaport) think it’s something that all good conservatives believe and that, since Brooks represents himself as a conservative, he must believe it, too, but be lying about it.  (That neither Hinderaker or Rappaport think Brooks is really a conservative, let alone a good one, is immaterial, apparently, in their psychoanalysis.)

I see much the same venom from the other side of the aisle toward David Broder.  Even though Broder doesn’t even pretend to be a progressive activist, “Broderism” is a slur word to denounce columnists who take the stance that conservatives sometimes have good points.

It’s as if True Believers presume that everyone else is like them.  It’s fine to be a True Believer on the other side but 90 percent friends are heretics who must be burned at the stake.  It’s simply inconceivable that someone who is generally conservative, as Brooks is, might simply have a different cultural background and not share some of the assumptions of the dominant Social Conservative wing of the movement.  Nor, apparently, does it occur to people for whom Inside the Beltway and elite are slurs that there actually is such as thing as Inside the Beltway elite thinking.

Hinderaker’s assessment is particularly bizarre, too, in its misapprehension of the punditry game — particularly coming from one who plays it so well.  Brooks and Broder are at a decided disadvantage precisely because of their moderation.  While “Crossfire” was canceled some time back, the style it pioneered is the predominant one in the industry.  Charlie Rose-style or Jim Lehrer-style conversation is a fringe relegated to public television; the money is in being the next Glenn Beck or Keith Olbermann.

Bill Maher has a piece at HuffPo arguing that Americans are a bunch of idiots who should just shut up and let people who know what they’re talking about make decisions on tough issues like health care reform.

[T]ake the health care debate we’re presently having: members of Congress have recessed now so they can go home and “listen to their constituents.” An urge they should resist because their constituents don’t know anything. At a recent town-hall meeting in South Carolina, a man stood up and told his Congressman to “keep your government hands off my Medicare,” which is kind of like driving cross country to protest highways.

I’m the bad guy for saying it’s a stupid country, yet polls show that a majority of Americans cannot name a single branch of government, or explain what the Bill of Rights is. 24% could not name the country America fought in the Revolutionary War. More than two-thirds of Americans don’t know what’s in Roe v. Wade. Two-thirds don’t know what the Food and Drug Administration does. Some of this stuff you should be able to pick up simply by being alive. You know, like the way the Slumdog kid knew about cricket.

Not here. Nearly half of Americans don’t know that states have two senators and more than half can’t name their congressman. And among Republican governors, only 30% got their wife’s name right on the first try.

Sarah Palin says she would never apologize for America. Even though a Gallup poll says 18% of Americans think the sun revolves around the earth. No, they’re not stupid. They’re interplanetary mavericks. A third of Republicans believe Obama is not a citizen, and a third of Democrats believe that George Bush had prior knowledge of the 9/11 attacks, which is an absurd sentence because it contains the words “Bush” and “knowledge.”

People bitch and moan about taxes and spending, but they have no idea what their government spends money on. The average voter thinks foreign aid consumes 24% of our federal budget. It’s actually less than 1%. And don’t even ask about cabinet members: seven in ten think Napolitano is a kind of three-flavored ice cream. And last election, a full one-third of voters forgot why they were in the booth, handed out their pants, and asked, “Do you have these in a relaxed-fit?”

And I haven’t even brought up America’s religious beliefs. But here’s one fun fact you can take away: did you know only about half of Americans are aware that Judaism is an older religion than Christianity? That’s right, half of America looks at books called the Old Testament and the New Testament and cannot figure out which one came first.

And these are the idiots we want to weigh in on the minutia of health care policy? Please, this country is like a college chick after two Long Island Iced Teas: we can be talked into anything, like wars, and we can be talked out of anything, like health care. We should forget town halls, and replace them with study halls. There’s a lot of populist anger directed towards Washington, but you know who concerned citizens should be most angry at? Their fellow citizens. “Inside the beltway” thinking may be wrong, but at least it’s thinking, which is more than you can say for what’s going on outside the beltway.

And if you want to call me an elitist for this, I say thank you. Yes, I want decisions made by an elite group of people who know what they’re talking about. That means Obama budget director Peter Orszag, not Sarah Palin.

This rant is so powerful it’s united Dennis the Peasant (aka Kenton E. Kelly, CPA) and Roger L. Simon!

Kelly snarks, “Just ask any progressive. They love ‘the people’. They want to help ‘the people’. They want equality, fraternity, mutual respective and constructive dialog.”

And the meme’s spreading. Greg Sargent reports that Obama chief of staff Rahm Emanuel says Democrats attacking other Democrats are “f-king stupid.”  And president Obama wants people who disagree with him to shut up.

What’s interesting here is that Maher’s largely right on the facts.  We’ve known for decades that people are wildly ignorant about basic facts.  Some of it’s explainable by getting caught off guard or not quite understanding the question.  But anyone who has taught college freshmen knows that even fairly bright folks can be astonishingly ignorant.

It doesn’t follow, however, that people are too stupid to make judgments on issues. People may not be able to answer the question “Name the branches of the U.S. Government” but they probably know that we have a president, a Congress, and courts and have some vague sense that there are checks and balances.  They may not know how much of our budget is spent on foreign aid but they know that they’d rather spend their money at home.  They know that abortion is legal and controversial even if they don’t know the name of the case that made it so or even understand that the Supreme Court is responsible.

The nature of representative democracy is that the people make judgments on broad policy directions and elect people to govern them accordingly.  The details are left to the elected representatives and, increasingly, to unelected bureaucrats with actual subject matter expertise.

To the extent that the public’s misunderstanding of the issues makes it difficult to make changes that presidents and congressmen think are necessary, it is incumbent on these leaders to explain themselves better.  Obama is a fine orator and gets more television time that “Seinfeld” reruns.   If he can’t persuade people to buy what he’s selling, he might need a new product.

“I think it would be awesome for Andrew Sullivan if all the documents end up proving that Barack Obama is Trig Palin’s father.” – Jim Henley

If you have no idea what the hell he’s talking about, your life is richer for it.

As if more evidence was needed that Sarah Palin is a pop culture celebrity as much as a political figure, she’s now fending off rumors from tabloids and blogs that she’s getting a divorce and moving to Montana.

I take her at her word that these are completely made up but, as David Adesnik notes, “This is one of those stories where truth will out. Either she’s getting a divorce or she isn’t. ”

Jonathan Martin makes the rather odd argument that, by dignifying the rumor, this is all Palin’s fault:

Sarah Palin’s spokeswoman Saturday took the unusual step of posting a statement on Facebook denying an anonymous blog report that the former Alaska governor was getting a divorce and moving to Montana.

[...]

Actually, no journalists had reported the allegations. They were made on an Alaskan blog called “The Immoral Minority,” and then repeated on other blogs, including Gawker, a well-trafficked New York gossip site.

[...]

By having her spokeswoman repeat the charges to rebut them in a public form, Palin effectively guaranteed coverage from the mainstream media that otherwise would not report claims attributed to unnamed sources on an anonymous blog.

But that’s nonsense.  Mainstream media sources — including Politico and including Martin (remember the way premature “John Edwards is quitting to be with his sick wife” rumors?) — report rumor and rely on anonymous sources all the time.  The fact that people are talking about something is often in and of itself newsworthy.  Especially when it’s about Sarah Palin.

Doug J draws our attention to a new Fox poll suggesting career options for Sarah Palin:

About a third of Americans think the best job for Palin is homemaker (32 percent), while nearly one in five see her as a television talk show host (17 percent). Vice president of the United States comes in third (14 percent), followed closely by college professor (10 percent), with president coming last (6 percent).

Republicans think the best job for Palin is vice president (27 percent), followed by homemaker (18 percent), talk show host (14 percent), president (12 percent) and professor (7 percent).

Jim Henley shares the post via Google Reader and remarks, “College professor?”

Indeed.

Aside from name recognition and the publicity angle, she’s quite literally not qualified to teach at a community  college, let alone have the title “professor” bestowed upon her. The woman has been a mayor and (briefly) governor of a state and presumably has some knowledge to impart to young people.  But she barely cobbled together an undergraduate degree, let alone demonstrated mastery of a scholarly discipline.

Update (Alex Knapp) I beg to differ with my colleague James on this score. As the video clip below demonstrates, Sarah Palin is eminently qualified to be a Creative Writing Professor.

]]> http://www.outsidethebeltway.com/archives/professor_sarah_palin/feed/ 66 http://www.outsidethebeltway.com/archives/sarah_palins_farewell_addresss_--_shatnerized/ http://www.outsidethebeltway.com/archives/sarah_palins_farewell_addresss_--_shatnerized/#comments Tue, 28 Jul 2009 14:34:21 +0000 Alex Knapp http://www.outsidethebeltway.com/?p=39990

I have to say, Sarah Palin’s farewell address as governor makes a little more sense when William Shatner reads it:

Also, speaking of William Shatner, there are a couple of things that are worth mentioning about him. First off, is there anybody who’s as good a sport about himself as he is? I know reports from his colleagues in his younger days paint a picture of a jerkwad egomaniac, but I don’t see any of that now. Second, can you believe that the man’s SEVENTY-EIGHT? He’s got the energy of a twenty-five year old!

(via Below the Beltway)

UPDATE (James Joyner): NBC ordered YouTube to pull the video, so I replaced it with a Hulu version.

In the wake of Sarah Palin’s bizarre and unexpected resignation halfway through her term as Alaska governor, many speculated that a scandal was in the offing. If this is it, it’s pretty thin:

An independent investigator has found evidence that Gov. Sarah Palin may have violated ethics laws by accepting private donations to pay her legal debts, in the latest legal distraction for the former vice presidential candidate as she prepares to leave office this week.

The report obtained by The Associated Press says Palin is securing unwarranted benefits and receiving improper gifts through the Alaska Fund Trust, set up by supporters.

An investigator for the state Personnel Board says in his July 14 report that there is probable cause to believe Palin used or attempted to use her official position for personal gain because she authorized the creation of the trust as the “official” legal defense fund.

The practical effect of the ruling on Palin will be more financial than anything else. The report recommends that Palin refuse to accept payment from the defense fund, and that the complaint be resolved without a formal hearing before the Alaska Personnel Board.

Lots of politicians have “legal defense funds,” which have always struck me as unseemly but apparently not illegal.  Apparently, Alaska law is more strict.

In his report, attorney Thomas Daniel said his interpretation of the ethics act is consistent with common sense.  An ordinary citizen facing legal charges is not likely to be able to generate donations to a legal defense fund, he wrote. “In contrast, Governor Palin is able to generate donations because of the fact that she is a public official and a public figure. Were it not for the fact that she is governor and a national political figure, it is unlikely that many citizens would donate money to her legal defense fund.”

No doubt and I agree with that as an ethical standard. Then again, ordinary citizens typically don’t have frivolous lawsuits filed against them as payback for political disputes.

Former President Jimmy Carter quit the Southern Baptist Convention more than eight years ago because of its refusal to ordain women as pastors (rather odd, since the policy had been in place since the early seventeenth century origins of the Baptist faith based on the example of another follow with the initials J.C.).   To make sure people noticed — since he had long stopped having anything to do with the SBC — he sent out 75,000 letters.

Over the weekend, Carter apparently reckoned people forgot about this (and, I must confess, I had) he up and quit again, this time via op-eds in The Guardian and The Age. (The latter was published a week ago but, owing to the confluence of the International Date Line and a lot of famous celebrities dying, nobody in the United States noticed until yesterday.)

But I digress.  I bring this up not because I much care about Carter’s religion, having neither a dog in the fight nor interest sufficient to warrant exchanging a rodent’s hindquarters for his views on the subject, but rather because of the extraordinarily bizarre explanation given.

At its most repugnant, the belief that women must be subjugated to the wishes of men excuses slavery, violence, forced prostitution, genital mutilation and national laws that omit rape as a crime. But it also costs many millions of girls and women control over their own bodies and lives, and continues to deny them fair access to education, health, employment and influence within their own communities.

Now, I can’t vouch for Plains, Georgia.  But I’ve lived in plenty of communities where Southern Baptists predominated.  In all of them, prostitution and rape were against the law.  Girls went to school and the doctor.  Women had jobs and influence.  So far as I know, their genitals were intact.

The impact of these religious beliefs touches every aspect of our lives. They help explain why in many countries boys are educated before girls; why girls are told when and whom they must marry; and why many face enormous and unacceptable risks in pregnancy and childbirth because their basic health needs are not met.

But these aren’t countries run by Southern Baptists.  In rural Alabama and Mississippi, girls start and finish school at the same age as boys. Young women now outnumber young men in our colleges and universities.  Arranged marriages have never been part of our culture.  To the extent “their basic health needs are not met,” it’s because of poverty, not religious dogma.

In some Islamic nations, women are restricted in their movements, punished for permitting the exposure of an arm or ankle, deprived of education, prohibited from driving a car or competing with men for a job. If a woman is raped, she is often most severely punished as the guilty party in the crime.

In Southern Baptist towns in the United States, women show a hell of a lot more than their arms and ankles. They’re required to go to school up to age 16 and are strongly encouraged to graduate high school and go on to college.  Women work outside the home at tremendous rate.  Rape is abhorred and the rapist is severely punished, often in extracurricular fashion.

The same discriminatory thinking lies behind the continuing gender gap in pay and why there are still so few women in office in the West. The root of this prejudice lies deep in our histories, but its impact is felt every day. It is not women and girls alone who suffer. It damages all of us. The evidence shows that investing in women and girls delivers major benefits for society. An educated woman has healthier children. She is more likely to send them to school. She earns more and invests what she earns in her family.

A goodly number of Western countries (although, granted, none with large Southern Baptist populations) have women prime ministers and presidents.  In the United States, including the South, women governors, senators, and other high office holders were quite common long before Carter quit the Convention (the first time).  We’ve had three female Secretaries of State, a woman National Security Advisor, a woman Attorney General, a woman Secretary of Homeland Security.  We’ve had two women as vice presidential nominees and one who came close to getting a major party presidential nod.   Sarah Palin, despite rather little experience or demonstrated expertise, seems to be the enthusiastic favorite for the Republican presidential nomination among Southern Baptists.

There are plenty of reasons to pick nits with the Southern Baptists.  But the depredations of radical Islam are not among them.

Baptist photo by Flickr users djking under Creative Commons license.

What The Washington Times calls an “exclusive,” I call a blinding flash of the obvious: “EXCLUSIVE: Palin plans to stay in politics.”

Brushing aside the criticisms of pundits and politicos, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin said she plans to jump immediately back into the national political fray — stumping for conservative issues and even Democrats — after she prematurely vacates her elected post at month’s end.

The former Republican vice-presidential nominee and heroine to much of the GOP’s base said in an interview she views the electorate as embattled and fatigued by nonstop partisanship, and she is eager to campaign for Republicans, independents and even Democrats who share her values on limited government, strong defense and “energy independence.”

“I will go around the country on behalf of candidates who believe in the right things, regardless of their party label or affiliation,” she said over lunch in her downtown office, 40 miles from her now-famous hometown of Wasilla — population 7,000 — where she began her political career.

“People are so tired of the partisan stuff — even my own son is not a Republican,” said Mrs. Palin, who stunned the political world earlier this month with her decision to step down as governor July 26 with 18 months left in her term. Both her son, Track, 20, an enlisted soldier serving in Iraq, and her husband, Todd, are registered as “nonpartisan” in Alaska.

I, for one, am getting mighty tired of people constantly dragging Sarah Palin’s children into the political arena.  They’re not politicians and their privacy should be respected.  It’s especially unseemly when we’re talking about a young soldier in harm’s way.

Otherwise, I wish Sarah Palin good luck in finding conservative Democrats who support limited government, strong defense, and energy independence.