The Bishop and the Butterfly: Murder, Politics, and the End of the Jazz Age

    Palin's Speechwriters Display Their Power, Belittle Sarah, and Even Give Shout-out To Palin Staffers' Power

    By azpaull on Fri, 10/17/2008 - 3:41pm |
    I found this morning's WaPo write-up of Palin's Thursday activities to be quite revealing.  And, a bit disturbing.  Unless Palin was actually ad-libbing (or wrote some of her own material), the speechwriters had her say that she was begging them:

    "And I, I begged our speech writers, 'Don't make me say 'Joe the Plumber,' please, in any speeches.' And I was asked, 'Just one time, just at this fund raiser,'" she recounted.

    And, they also had her say (unless she ad-libbed or wrote he own material) earlier yesterday that her staff keeps her away from watching the news so that she doesn't get "discouraged" or "depressed":

    At those times on the campaign trail when sometimes it's easy to get a little bit discouraged, when, you know, when you happen to turn on the news when your campaign staffers will let you turn on the news," she said, prompting laughter from the group. "Usually they're like 'Oh my gosh, don't watch. You're going to, you know, you're going to get depressed.'

    The article in its entirety gives me the definite impression that she is not even close to calling her own shots, is isolated (similar to what we heard about Bush being kept in a protective bubble), doesn't have control over what has to come out of her mouth, is fragile and needs to see a frenzied crowd and hear that they're praying for her, and has a skewed view of some parts of the country being "pro-America" and others apparently being "anti-America" (like Alaska secessionists?).

    Maybe she was throwing in some of her own material and trying to be somewhat self-deprecating, but....

    Is that really the image that she wants to be portrayed to the country (the ENTIRE country, not just the "pro-America" parts)?

    More importantly, after the past 8 years, is this the kind of person Americans would put into the White House?
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    http://voices.washingtonpost.com/the-trail/2008/10/17/to_avoid_being_depressed_palin.html