It's time to stand together- UPDATE: Fear in Wasilla

When I was young I lived under a right-wing military dictatorship back in Brazil. We lived in fear, but there were many left-wing groups attempting to restore democratic elections. It took over twenty years to achieve it.

Part of the problem were the deep divisions and rivalry among the various different factions within a movement with the same goals. Each group saw themselves as the owners of the truth. The right-wing presented a united front, there were no divisions or disagreements in their ranks and they were stronger.

The example is a bit extreme, as the dictators had all the resources of the military to silence any dissenters of whatever faction. But it does illustrate how divisions weaken a movement.

Historically, right-wingers have been more united than the left. Their interests were clear and their goals quite simple. The left wingers were a more complex bunch, hell-bent on nuance.

In the US, even though all the right-wing candidates (and one maybe/maybe not candidate) sing from the same hymn book, talking about the constitution, traditional values and small government, they are now divided by a new phenomenon: The cult of celebrity. People who support the undeclared one could be described as hysterical fans who can see no flaws in their muse. They attack everybody, on the left and on the right, whenever there's whiff of a threat to their queen. That puts the real the candidates in a bad light. They don't have such dedicated fan clubs.

It seems to be a great opportunity for the left to present a more united front for a change. These days it doesn't seem to be a case of right vs left anymore. It's right vs wrong, and the left is the new right. It is right to hope for a more equitable society, it is right to put the interests of the people before the interests of the corporations, it is right to protect the environment and to strive for world peace.

But the dreaded liberals are still plagued by divisions. The divisions take many forms and are not necessarily ideological. Let's make the most of the weaknesses of the right and stand united while that fan club tears everybody apart. Let's forget the distractions, the egos and all the irrelevant bickering and focus on the goal.

People who once saw themselves as conservatives have battled with their convictions and changed sides, they watched their party betray their interests and embraced different values. Others are still undecided, but growing frustrated with the present crop of candidates. Let's help them find a new path and let's all walk the same path together. Let's ignore the detours that lead to dead ends.

Regaining the focus and staying on course will take us to the final destination. It's worth trying to get there in one piece rather than wounded by friendly fire...

*****

UPDATE

Joe McGinniss wasn't the only person to feel uncomfortable in Wasilla. From UK's Daily Telegraph:

It may be home sweet home to Sarah Palin and her family but Wasilla, Alaska, is not a city for which Nick Broomfield feels any affection. Or one that he ever wants to visit again. “The place makes Twin Peaks look like a walk in the park,” he says firmly.

“There was a genuine fear in the community about saying anything against Sarah Palin because people were worried about the power of the Palins and worried about losing their jobs,” he says. “In some cases, the children were friends with the Palin kids and didn’t want their parents to talk. She is such a polarising character that, even within a family, the husband or the wife liked her and the other one didn’t. She inspired such strong opinions that people were either passionately for her or against her.”

It seems Sarah Palin's own personal power, the actions by her supporters and the MSM's reluctance to stand their ground and face her lies all conspire to keep this woman in a safe niche, protected and insulated against real criticism.

(H/T to MW)

2012: Are we doing enough?

Joe McGinniss wrote a post about how very little impact the blogs have on Sarah Palin. He suggested we leave our keyboards behind and hit the streets.

As this is a dedicated Palin blog, it's interesting to have a look at the traffic ranking of Palingates and compare it to some other sites and blogs on my blog roll. Palingates is very small and I have always been aware of it.

I also looked at the C4P ranking. None of the anti-Palin dedicated sites ranks high enough to have historic data stored on Alexa, but C4P does...

The really big blogs cover politics in general:

#1. Daily Beast
#2. Crooks & Liars
#3. Politicususa
#4. Firedoglake
#5. Political Carnival

C4P traffic falls between Firedolake and Political Carnival.

The top five smaller blogs that deal with Sarah Palin (some not necessarily exclusively about her) come in the following order:

#1. Immoral Minority (sites linking to it: 403)
#2. The Mudflats (670)
#3. Joe McGinniss (110)
#4. Palingates (288)
#5. Politicalgates (97)

Over a million sites rank higher than the last two.

The reality is: We are small and have niche audiences.

Unless the political scene in the US has become completely unpredictable, Sarah Palin is the least of our concerns. All declared GOP candidates support big breaks for the corporations at the expense of services and entitlements for the majority of the people. They mix religion with politics and have a poor understanding of the Constitution. They don't believe in government but are all itching to be part of it, for some $trange reason...

Do the people who read and comment on the liberal blogs feel that President Obama's heart is in the right place? How important is it to implement some social reforms? Should Americans strive to become a more equitable society? Should everybody have access to healthcare as a right or should it be a privilege?

It's great to be part of a community of like-minded people, exchange opinions and share information online. Unfortunately, these communities are small and if they remain online, it won't translate into votes for what they believe is right.

Irrelevant as Sarah Palin appears to be, there are people actively organizing things for her. The same goes for the other GOP candidates. They're fuelled by corporate money: Oil, Big Pharma, Healthcare Insurance companies, etc.

GOP candidates are courting the teabaggers. They may have shrunk a bit, but they represent an interesting segment, as they probably never bothered to vote before the 2010 mid-term elections. They've been made to feel important, valued and will very likely vote in 2012. The irony is that they will vote against their own interests.

President Obama is raising big bucks for his campaign, but that won't do any good if people don't go out and vote for him. The GOP has already started the voting registration shenanigans and there are those infernal Diebold machines. They play dirty.

The people who elected Obama may be feeling despondent right now. The GOP has sabotaged all his efforts to address the problems of the economy. Recovery has been slower than expected for that reason, but Obama is being made into the scapegoat.

It's absolutely vital to re-energize Obama voters. They have to get out and cast their ballots in November 2012. Every vote counts.

It's important to share information online, but it's equally important to go out there and do some community organizing. I agree with McGinniss about hitting the streets, but I think it's possible to combine it with the keyboards. Campaign online, by all means, but those who can, please do it in the real world as well.

I'm not a voter, obviously, but I plan to make my small contribution to these efforts from afar. I will continue to write posts on my little blog, urging everybody to do what I can't do physically: To get out there and do some organizing.

If the GOP and the teabaggers can do it, we can do it!

Bloggers, MSM, Sarah Palin's lies...

There is a marked difference between bloggers and the MSM when it comes to Sarah Palin. Progressive bloggers write what they do in order to get to the truth and sometimes take donations to cover their expenses. The MSM, with honourable exceptions, want to make big money.

Bloggers are not ruled by corporate interests. Some have evolved (I use the term "evolve" loosely) into cults and others are committed to exposing the other side of Sarah Palin. An admirable group of Alaskan bloggers have provided objective insight into their governor's actions when Sarah Palin was tapped by John McCain to join his ticket. Their efforts gave other people, far and wide, the impetus to start their own blogs. Palingates wouldn't exist without the inspiration from AKM, Shannyn, Gryphen, Celtic Diva and Phil Munger, among others.

We're all still working hard to unravel Sarah Palin's misdeeds and deceptions. Different styles, different appoaches, but we're all on the same side. Read the blogs. We back up our findings with hard evidence. The opinions are balanced and based on fact. We want to be credible and to that end we dig deep to provide proof to back up our claims.

The MSM, rightly called lamestream media by Sarah Palin, have another agenda. They don't want to kill the goose that lays the golden eggs. Sarah Palin is money. She makes headlines and sells newspapers, generates hits on the internet. The MSM stirs the pot and creates controversy in order to keep her topical and bankable.

Fine. They make their money and we continue to search for the truth.

The good old days of Woodward and Bernstein are long gone. We have the internet, we have instant access to information. No Deep Throat necessary anymore. Now we see the cult of celebrity and an unbridled desire for ratings, hits and money. The MSM chose to pursue profits, the almighty dollar.

We bloggers chose to remain truthful and will continue to do so. From Alaska, from Europe, from Australia or Timbuktu, we're united in not compromising, not selling out.

The MSM can choose to ignore us or try discredit us. That doesn't change the facts, does it?

I prefer our way of doing things. When my head hits the pillow, I'm still poor but I get a good night's sleep.
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Breaking down the walls

Breaking down the walls

Sarah Palin has divided Americans into "real" ones and the rest. I'm sure all real Americans out there feel aggrieved by this division.

It's very sad that now the progressive blogosphere appears to be divided between Alaskan and non-Alaskan.

I consider myself a citizen of the world and started this blog believing that, regardeless of where I was born or where I lived, I could make some small contribution to a certain subject: the truth about Sarah Palin.

I have always been happy about sharing information, but after spending 5, 6, 8 hours researching a topic, trying to make everything watertight, it is a bit upsetting to see it somewhere else without aknowledgement. To have it called undeserved credit is bewildering.

The blog roll on the sidebar reflects a common ground. Some of the links are a bit silly, so readers can take a break from what we call the "gates". But in general, the links point to blogs where people can learn more about the one and only Sarah Palin. It's going to stay as it is.

The only way I, as a real person, living in the real world, can start to comprehend what's going on is to believe that there was a massive misunderstanding that led to an incomprehensible division. Patrick and Kathleen, who have joined me after we spent some time together, are just as confused. We are more than internet buddies. We shared a lot of real things, we shared our families and friends. We have the same world view and would like to make this world a better place for all of us.

I can't understand how it came to pass that our contributors and readers have been reduced to trolls, hijacking threads and other such misdeeds. Our readers are hurt, uncomfortable and confused. That's unsavoury and it makes me very sad.

I don't really understand what's going on, we have nothing to hide and would like to continue to do what we set out to do in the first place, without unnecessary distractions.

Please continue to visit your favourite blogs, continue to keep yourselves informed, don't take sides. We're all on the same side.

If we build walls instead of breaking them down, Sarah Palin scores yet another undeserved point.
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Gryphen's "Eargate"

We have been asked to comment on "Eargate" by several readers.

This is how the whole thing happened: Gryphen broke a major story about Trig's ears and a tale of two babies. Of course the more inquisitive bloggers immediately hit the googles trying to find more photographs in order to corroborate Gryphen's evidence. Bree found some interesting pictures from the book tour and posted them. The thing is, our team came up with exactly the same photos, we were up to our ears in photos! It seemed a bit futile to do a re-run of Gryph's and Bree's posts just to be "in" on the story, even though we spent a lot of time looking for new pictures and taking a closer look at the existing ones.

It is Gryphen's story. He worked on it for ten months, consulted loads of experts, obtained an opinion from a physician and has first hand accounts regarding what therapies Trig receive or didn't receive. If we made any amazing discoveries about the ears, we wouldn't publish it on Palingates. We would send everything to Gryphen, it is HIS big story, not ours.

The progressive bloggers work in tandem on most stories, but when it comes to big scoops, we don't steal each other's thunder.

Gryphen wouldn't do it to us...



So there you have it, we didn't find anything new or interesting to add to Gryphen's findings and if we did, you wouldn't read it here first. You would read it on Immoral Minority!
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Rebecca Mansour: Sarah Palin's secret messenger

Conservatives4Palin have reacted to our discovery (CLICK TO READ OUR POST), and as usual, they try to spin this highly embarassing revelation by telling the public their usual lies.

They write:

"In case you don't know, the two founders of this blog, Rebecca Mansour and Joey Russo, left C4P months ago to work for Governor Palin's PAC after she resigned. They decided to leave quietly because neither of them wanted to draw attention to themselves or be harassed by anti-Palin blogs."

Ok, Palinbots, let's get some things straight here:

1. The only reason Rebecca Mansour and Joseph Russo "left quietly" without an announcement or explanation was that they didn't want to draw attention to the fact that they were supposed to write Sarah Palin's facebook posts.

2. The secrecy was kept up in the meantime in order to create the false impression through the posts on facebook that Sarah Palin has intellectual capabilities or a deeper understanding of political issues, when in fact Sarah Palin doesn't have a clue. The facebook posts were then celebrated on a daily basis on C4P, although everybody at C4P knew that they were actually written by the "great founders" Rebecca Mansour and Joseph Russo.

3. The disclosure of the direct connection between C4P and Sarah Palin is highly embarassing, because it is now more than obvious that the C4P "Webathon" for the Palin's "Alaska Fund Trust" was most likely not a grassroots effort, but a coordinated effort with Sarah Palin - who offically has nothing to do at all with her slush-fund called "Alaska Fund Trust".

Rebecca Mansour is a shameless opportunist, without any conviction. In an article from Politico, we find an interesting fact:

Mansour, who had briefly volunteered for Barack Obama in the earliest parts of the campaign, says she connected with Palin over energy independence. She did not like McCain from the start and became “creeped out” by people’s worshipful attitude toward Obama.

While in the Obama camp Rebecca was a nobody, at C4P she was treated like a queen. Strangely enough, she had no problem with C4Peers' worshipful attitude toward Sarah Palin.

RAM found out that jumping on the Sarah Palin bandwagon satisfied her own vanity and would be a better proposition for furthering her own personal ambitions. To that end, she spared no efforts to help her new found best friend.

Here are some screenshots of the launch of the C4P webathon, by Rebecca A. Mansour:





She was pretty certain that the webathon was absolutely necessary:



Bending the rules didn't present a problem:



Rebecca went on the Eddie Burke show to publicize the webathon:



C4P also started the campaign to fire Letterman and RAM had a chat with Dan Fagan on his radio show. Dan could hardly get a word in, as Rebecca tends to get a bit carried away.





Rebecca Mansour and C4P waged many dirty campaigns on behalf of Sarah Palin while Meg Stapleton claimed that the "governor" had no direct or official links to either of them. They had their own little secrets...

Rebecca, did you really think that all these secrets would never come to light? This reminds me of ordinary criminals. You and Sarah Palin truly belong together.
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Mandation: Sarah Palin’s State of…umm…

It's Sunday, so let's have a brief moment of relaxation and comic relief before getting back to more serious stuff.

This post appeared on a blog called Civilization Rant, written by theworstat. We couldn't find an e-mail address to ask for permission to repost it, but it's so funny that we had to share it with you.

(Theworstat, if you object to your post appearing here without permission, please get in touch. But if you're happy, we're happy, let's laugh together.)


Mandation: Sarah Palin’s State of…umm…

(Following is an excerpt of the State of the Union(?) speech from Teabagger shadow President Sarah Palin. *)
*I made stuff up

"Fellow real Americans in small towns, family values, the Constitution which we hold dear has family values just like you, and thanks for buying my book! This year we defeated Russia because Putin reared his head in my backyard talking to my neighbor and you know, it was like he was in my backyard and I could see him across a lake or he was in my air space or something so I told him to skedaddle home! Just like with healthcare, I would have had to abort Trig because of the death panels. Alaska did not have a death panel it was only to save taxpayer money, just like George Washington signed the Declaration of Independence or the Bill of Rights which is in the Declaration or something. It was a mandation from Washington that did it. I got real mad because Katie Couric has no self-confidence and asked me what I read to make herself feel better! So I told her I read lots of stuff, I like everything. But she’s so elitist I could just tell she has no self-confidence. So I just want her to stop makin’ stuff up or God will get her like he got New Orleans for sinnin’ and stuff.

Real pockets of real pro-Americans live on farms in little towns. That is not a mandation from Washington. You do it because you enjoy freedom and family values and our great history. I have the courage and honor of thanking our veterans who are fighting Iraq in Afghanistan.

That’s why I make all my speeches on Fox News. They hired me because I know all about this stuff. I flew over Canada a few times, you know! Obama was born there or in someplace else where they wear stuff on their heads and are anti-American (editor’s note: see what we wish had been Obama’s real SotU here). We’d be better off being nice to Afghanistan because they’re our neighbor.

I’m a real American and they wouldn’t let me be President so I could be the only real American in Washington and run the Senate, you betcha. I would have gotten in with all those Senators and stuff and made life better for real Americans, like healthcare which is needed for a good economy. No need to change anything! We need smaller government so we can stop interfering with corporations and our freedom which we hold dear and independently and don’t need spending and taxes. We don’t need government in our lives, we need stuff that doesn’t need intervention.

So next year I am going to pray to God that we have America and family values even after that black Muslim guy is in office and the Supreme Court. The Statue of Liberty has 25 windows and I know why cuz I Googled it you betcha. That’s how I went to college and got my journalism degree would have been Miss Alaska except for that black girl and quit my governor job because I have family values and value freedom and work hard every day. No lame ducks around my house! Have you seen my husband?
I like the idea of a Queen of England, just like Queen Ester, since England is a state in New England and everyone knows women are freer if they have less rights to abortion and contraception and stuff. But I haven’t decided yet. Everyone pray real hard and send me money for campaign funds for real Americans. See ya next year you betcha!"

Mrs. Palin is the first recipient of the Lifetime Achievement Stupid of the Day Award.

You can read more funny posts by theworstat at Civilization Rant.

Happy New Year! Open thread - UPDATE 2!

2009 was a good year for the "basement" bloggers. We tackled serious subjects, discussed many interesting topics and had a few laughs together...

Palingates started very modestly in February, with around 13,000 readers in that first month. We're pleased to say that we're going to wave good bye to 2009 with 180,000 readers in December.

Our little community is growing and we're sure there will be more opportunities for people to make new friends in 2010.

Together we'll continue in our quest for the truth. Many eagle eyed sleuths have contributed extra pieces to the ever expanding puzzle that is Sarah Palin.

Patrick, Kathleen and Regina are the names you know, but commenters and others send e-mails, not forgetting the many people behind the scenes, who gather new information and try to make sense of Sarah Palin's convoluted stories. It's sometimes very tiring and disheartening, but we all get a kick when things finally fall into place. A big thank you to all for your patience and dedication!

The big prize for providing invaluable information must go to Sarah Palin herself. "Going Rogue", Twitter and her interviews are a veritable gold mine. We didn't include Facebook because it's not really our Sarah writing any of it...

Here's to an exciting and fruitful 2010!

Please use this shiny new thread to continue the discussions started earlier. Those threads are getting a tad too long.

(I wonder if the person behind Sarah Palin managed to catch the rat before it escaped from the nest...) .

+++

UPDATE (by Patrick):

Here is one of the last laughs of 2009, and it's a particularly good one:

Palin Family New Year Newsletter!

(h/t Mrs TBB!)

Apart from that, in addition to everything that Regina has said and what I couldn't have said better, I would like to thank our brilliant REGINA for letting me become her co-blogger. It's quite a big deal if you have an established blog and then let someone else fiddle around with it. You lose some of the control you had before, but of course we were doing it properly and Kathleen and I met up with Regina at her home in France before we fully started our cooperation.

I wished that more of you had a chance to meet Regina, who is a brilliant person with a strong sense of justice and whose heart is always on the side of the oppressed and disadvantaged.

+++

UPDATE (by Regina):

Patrick caught me by surprise with his update.We exchanged e-mails before my husband and I left for a friend's house to eat, drink and be merry. Fine tuning of the Open Thread was discussed and agreed, happy new year and all that, and I didn't think I would see any updates... We stayed at our friend's overnight and have just returned home. I headed straight to the computer and voilà: I'm still blushing!

I can play this game too!

For some months, Patrick had been a voice at the other end of the phone and I knew there was a Kathleen over there as well. Then we invited them to come and spend some time in our beautiful village, not knowing what to expect.

I'll tell you: they are a most charming couple, with a fantastic sense of humour and fun, coupled with an honest desire to discover the truth. We had a great time and it wasn't all about Sarah Palin, I hasten to add. Patrick can only be described as the most enthusiastic walking encyclopedia and Kathleen as a calming influence, with an uncanny gift for finding things on the internet and making sense of confusing stuff.

Patrick was reluctant to blog, so we started slowly, with his wonderful guest posts. Then there was the trip to Australia and Patrick was thrown in at the deep end of the world of blogging. We became equal partners and you have all seen the results: palingates reached new heights, the readership went through the roof, we were mentioned on national television and linked by some major sites.

Well, Patrick, thanks for fiddling with my established blog!

This partnership works because Patrick and Kathleen are brilliant people with a strong sense of justice and whose hearts are always on the side of the oppressed and disadvantaged.

Thank you, from the bottom of my blogging heart...

( I was asked to link to the full gallery of photos of Sarah Palin in Arizona. I think Bree Palin and other bloggers have been having too much fun with the book tour galleries and they are now private and can't be viewed...)
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Sarah Palin's week in pictures

It's been an interesting week for Sarah Palin in Wasilla. She signed books, banned people from her book signing and served Christmas dinner to the less fortunate...

Let the pictures tell the story.

Sarah signing books, helped by Todd and Juanita Fuller

Some people were allowed in and distributed pamphlets, posters, gathered signatures for petitions and had a jolly good time.

(Photos by Bill Hess)

(Photo by Kim Chatman)

Others weren't so lucky. Todd provided a list of people who weren't welcome at the Curtis D. Menard Memorial Sports Center.

There were four names on Todd's list. Gryphen and Dennis showed up, the others didn't.

Gryphen, from Immoral Minority

Dennis Zaki and Shannyn Moore

Andree McLeod was too busy to attend

One person wasn't prevented from entering the sports center, but her signs were confiscated and destroyed. Dawn was threatened with arrest for disturbing the peace. On the plus side, Dawn could display her beautiful t-shirt and got her flu jab!

(photo by Kim Chatman)

...I turned up at 12 in my Sarah Palin LIAR shirt & with 2 signs 1 of which had palingates.blogspot.com & 3 others with slogans. I planted them in the snow at the front door where I stood. After 45 min, bldg security told me to get rid of the signs cuz Palin’s publisher was paying $85/ hr for facility, (can’t remember exact amt )I said no. He said the cops would come. They were parked right there. I said FINE. They can just give me a ticket. Anyway, he took the signs before I could grab them since using a walker slows one down. He crumbled them up after refusing to return them to me. I did make him give me the sticks back.( one was my meter stick) . He asked for my ID. I refused. I told him I could stay out there & sing my slogans & he said I’d be taken for disturbing the peace. I didn’t sing cuz I really don’t & laughter was something I didn’t want to inspire. So, instead, SarahPalin LIAR shirt prominently displayed, I entered what I thought would be the lion’s den only to find an H1N1 flu clinic giving free flu shots. GEEZ. And lucky too cuz I had planned on getting one. The nurse filled out the form for me cuz I didn’t have my reading glasses on the picket line. I pulled my sleeve down for the shot hoping that with my SP LIAR shirt I wasn’t at the mercy of 1 of Sarah’s biggest fans. It didn’t hurt. The next 1/2 hr I spent displaying my shirt to a winding line of people passing by with their books to be signed. I talked with people getting flu shots, ate a few Palin Xmas cookies & let those in line see that yes, even in Wasilla, there was a real live person who considered Palin less than legitimate. Had I known there was a flu clinic going on, I would have been more aggressive about letting brown uniformed security man get my signs. Other than that, mission accomplished, at least on a personal level. (Comment by Dawn on Shannyn Moore's blog.)

UPDATE - Commenter William Henley, at C4P, disputes the photographic evidence shown here and issues a charming threat to detractors of Sarah Palin:

Sandra, you are lying out your a**. I was at the Wasilla book-signing. As a matter of fact I was there at 10 p.m. the night before and was in line at 05:30. I was one of two people who sat out there all night. The second person (Amy) got there at midnight. I was there through-out and not a single protester with signs showed up at anytime. No single person was there handing out oblabla/hitler pictures. You are nothing more than a lying bi**h and need to go to one of the sights that care for what you are lying about. Just as one of the security heads told me, if anyone started trouble they probably would not have survived. I and many others at the signing were carrying our sidearms. Mine happens to be a police special 357 mag. and I know how to use it and rather enjoy using it for the right reasons, i.e. protecting Sarah Palin and family.

(H/T to gunsmoke)


Sarah turned her hand at food serving at the same venue a few days later. She wore gloves, but somehow she never seems able to find a hairnet for these occasions. Maybe hairnets don't come in big enough sizes to contain her generous mane...

Yum..

Todd looks tired...

Sarah signing yet another copy of "Going Rogue"

Yes, all in all, it was a busy week for Sarah Palin. It provided a lot of material for the bloggers, as usual...

We can't wait for the New Year!

Sarah Palin and the bloggers

Some interesting signs I photographed in Australia... (click to enlarge)

November 2009 was some month! Going Rogue was a gift to palingates in so many ways... We have yet another account of the wild ride from Sarah's own pen (so to speak) and that bizarre story of an abortion turned into a miscarriage courtesy of wite-out on a medical bill!

Thanks to a call-to-action by our no longer resident troll, we (and Celtic Diva) were singled out by Harper Collins for copyright infrigement. Our traffic went through the roof as a result. But the whole thing made me wonder why these two blogs were targeted by HC while all others doing the same thing were left alone. Babygate and ethics violations seem to bother our Sarah more than anything else...

Then came the remarkable team effort that led to a mention on msnbc and links from major MSM players when the fake bus tour was exposed. We even got an oblique reference on Sarah's Facebook page. Not bad, eh? Thanks, Snowbilly.

Another gift to palingates is our very own Patrick. Before he came along, I offered fairly well researched posts with my own commentary on various issues. Patrick is great at breaking news and has put palingates on the larger map. It's a good combination and we have more readers than ever, hopefully going through all the gates and finding the darker side of the quitter governor.

Sarah Palin is very entertaining, there's no question about it. But she left a trail of destruction throughout Alaska, not to mention the damage she inflicts on her own family. On a larger scale, she has become the queen of the teabaggers and helps their racist rants appear legitimate.

Sarah Palin is not intelligent enough to do any of it by herself. But just as in Alaska she had very powerful people calling the shots, now she has other powerful groups using her image and celebrity status to further their own agenda.

Our job is to take their beauty queen away from them. Sarah Palin is much more attractive than GWB and draws very emotional reactions from her followers. But if we show them that saint Sarah is not who they think she is, her puppetmasters will have to start again from scratch and find another muse at short notice.

I believe Sarah Palin will eventually bring herself down because she's a loose cannon and doesn't know when to sit down and shut up.

We just like to lend her a helping hand...
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Looking into Sarah Palin's mirror

This landed on my comments box:

Lambie has left a new comment on your post "Sarah Palin's ineptitude":

"Franklin Graham's circus" ?? Look in the mirror, Regina. What did you or your crowd DO about the plight of people caught for six weeks in the energy crisis in western Alaska? You blog while people starve. Some people carp, and some people act. If Franklin Graham taking action to deliver food and supplies was a circus, then I say less blogging and more circuses.

Dear Lambie,

The bloggers collected thousands of dollars and organized food and supplies boxes to be sent to more than one village, the ones actually affected by the energy crisis, not the two villages where people were amused and very surprised to see Sarah Palin arriving with the Evangelical circus, bearing boxes of food, pamphlets and some cookies. They were grateful, but didn't need them. What Sarah Palin achieved with her photo-op trip was to insult a village elder from Emmonak, one of the villages facing hardship.

None of the bloggers involved in the appeal went to the villages for a photo-op, they just helped publicize the villagers plight and made sure they received the help they needed some 6 weeks before Sarah Palin and attending circus made any effort to help at all.

We forged lasting friendships with some Alaska Natives and have started another appeal on behalf of a dear friend who lost her husband recently. She has one little daughter and is due to have another baby in November, facing a very bleak winter without her beloved husband as she's unable to hunt or earn enough money to heat her house or feed her children.

We blog for a reason, a very good reason. We were the first ones to turn the attention of the rest of the world to the crisis in Western Alaska and we haven't stopped after a photo-op. Donations poured in during those 6 weeks from all over the world and we will continue to be vocal about the problems the villagers face each winter, about all the issues that affect their livelihoods, such as the salmon by-catch by industrial trawlers from out of state that ruined the villagers ability to fish and sustain the local fisheries.

Unlike Franklin Graham's circus, we didn't flood the villages with Evangelical propaganda, our help had no strings attached. We respect the villagers religion and traditions, they don't have to worship at our altar. We helped people out of human solidarity and don't need temples built or any recognition or grovelling gratitude.

The villagers don't know our faces or our names, we don't need the publicity, we have no hidden agenda. We preserved the dignity of a very proud people because we didn't demand any public show of gratitude, we accepted their friendship instead.

Yes, Lambie, I look in the mirror. What I see is a face that doesn't need to be photographed, a name that doesn't need broadcasting. I am but one of the thousands of people from all over the world who look in the mirror and like what they see and only wish they could do more. We sent what we could to people thousands of miles away from our heated, comfortable homes.

I don't know what Sarah Palin sees when she looks into her mirror... but I guess it's not pretty.

How about you, Lambie? Where did you send YOUR money? SarahPac? The Alaska Fund Trust? The Samaritan Purse?

If you did, go and have a look in the mirror. You will see the face of a sucker.
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Sarah Palin and the truth

First they went after Gryphen (The Immoral Minority), then they turned their attention to Audrey (Palin's Deceptions) and now their target is Patrick (palin_deceives).

Two right wing bloggers appear to have nothing better to do than scour the internet in search of some dirt on Trig Truthers. Let me play the devil's advocate for a moment. Suppose we're all secret perverts and our closets are full of skeletons. Would that alter the fact that Sarah Palin didn't give birth to Trig?

I really fail to see the connection between people's private lives and their ability to question and analize the facts relating to Sarah Palin's pregnancy and delivery of Trig.

They have found flimsy and highly questionable stuff on some of the Trig Truthers, often presented out of context or simply untrue. But they're shouting it from the rooftops, as if any of it proved that Trig emerged from Sarah Palin's own body.

The internet is a very strange place, full of dark alleys, detours and dead ends. I searched myself and came up with a number of people using the handle "palingate", "PalinGate" and other variations. Am I all of them? Some of them? Or none of the above?

Each person they target knows who they are and can easily refute any false information. If they can't, what difference does it make?

Do people need to have Mother Theresa credentials before they're allowed to challenge a public figure who uses her special needs "son" to further her own agenda?

If I were a transvestite, cigar smoker, fond of a bit of bondage and ate cats' brains for breakfast, would that disqualify me from doubting a very fishy account of Sarah Palin's wild ride, dodgy pregnancy and other strange tidbits?

The difference between Trig Truthers and Sarah Palin is that we never had any power to influence people's lives as she did as governor of Alaska. We didn't run for vice president and we don't spout blatant lies on Facebook in a attempt to disrupt public debate on healthcare reform. We are not public figures, we are not polititians and what we are or do has no bearing on the truth.

What these nutters dig up on us doesn't make any difference in the great scheme of things. We remain private citizens who are not accountable to the electorate. But the stuff we dig up on Sarah Palin can make a lot of difference on the political landscape.

The truth about Sarah Palin can change things. Truths or lies about Trig Truthers change nothing.

(I'm not going to link to the right wing blogs, but you can find them among the comments on the last thread)
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Sarah Palin's rainbows

The ugliness going on this past week around some right wing blogs is quite disturbing. $arah Palin talked about the politics of personal destruction. She should know. There are many casualties of personal destruction lining the path of her own political career.

We've seen recent examples of how it works: she raises the bait, then lets her supporters run the show. Letterman, Linda Kellen Biegel, Gryphen... who's next? We saw a late night joke become a major issue involving statutory rape, a silly photoshop turned into the desecration of an iconic image and a mention of a possible split between the quitter governor and her husband is now a hanging offense.

As her fans are the ones asking for people's heads, she can be all innocent, claiming to have no connections to any of these lunatics. She's the victim. Always.

While people are distracted by these hyperbolic witch hunts, not much attention is being paid to the real issues. She who farts rainbows is facing serious charges: failure to disclose gifts, quoting the wrong statute to get away with the Arctic Cat financial disclosure, an unethical "legal fund" and now allegations of bribery in connection with a court case.

Those rainbow farts don't really smell of roses, do they?
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Sarah Palin's smokescreens

ADN on August 4, 2009:

The Alaska Public Offices Commission has refused Palin's request to keep secret the discounts that come from her husband's Arctic Cat sponsorship. APOC also said Palin needs to disclose all the gifts she received last year, rejecting her interpretation that she doesn't need to until after she gets around to actually opening the gifts.

Palin has told APOC "there are boxes of unopened mail at this point, even mail that was delivered in 2008."

APOC is giving Palin until Aug. 17 to make public "information related to the dollar amount of the discounts from Arctic Cat," as well as any gifts received in 2008 that she has not reported, said Holly Hill, the agency's director. Hill found that the state law Palin cited in arguing for an exemption from the Arctic Cat disclosure "only protects information submitted under the Alaska Gasline Inducement Act, and does not apply in this matter."

Palin's lawyer, Tom Van Flein, did not respond this week to questions about APOC's decision.

There are so many issues regarding $arah Palin clouded by smoke and mirrors... the latest brouhaha about suing Gryphen for mentioning a split between the quitter governor and her husband comes across as a tactic to divert the public's attention from more serious matters.

The hysteria seems to be widespread, with Bill O'Reilly saying Gryphen's post was a vicious attack on $arah Palin. How does a reference to a possible marital split qualify as an attack? What's vicious about it?

$arah Palin's supporters are blowing a trivial matter out of all proportion.

Are they going to report on APOC's deadline? Are they going to point out that $arah Palin is nearly one year late reporting the gifts? APOC have already cut her some slack, asking her to simply amend her financial disclosure even though gifts have to be reported within a certain period. Less than a month, if I remember it correctly.

Thomas Van Flein was very quick off the mark in his threats to Gryphen, but can't be bothered to send a reply to APOC.

While everybody is going nuts over a divorce that Gryphen didn't mention at all, $arah Palin's lack of ethics remains in the background, almost ignored...
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The pitbull and the bloggers

A pitbull was in his backyard, doing his pitbull stuff... until a porcupine invaded his territory. The brave, but stupid pitbull, immediately challenged the porcupine!

Bad decision...the porcupine won this short contest.

A vet sedated the dog, and then removed a total of 1,347 quills. The pitbull survived, and hopefully learned a valuable lesson.

Pitbull=A certain quitter governor
Porcupine=The internet
Quills=Bloggers

Ms Pitbull should learn to ignore the porcupine...
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Sarah Palin attacks!

Martha, a long term mudpuppy, sent me a list of Sarah Palin's attacks on a number of different people. I added a few others I could remember. Feel free to add your own. Attackgate?

• Bloggers (multiple hits)
• Lyda Green - most notably laughing at her being called a bitch on radio show
• Walter Monegan - Troopergate
• Andrew Halcro (multiple hits)
• President Obama (multiple hits)
  
• Andree McLeod - supposedly turned on SP when not granted a job: "falafel lady"
  
• All other ethic's complaint filers
• Katie Couric - the world doesn't revolve around you
• Tina Fey - "job security"
• Ashley Judd on aerial wolf hunting - "extreme fringe group" using AK and her administration to raise funds
  
• Hillary Clinton - called her a whiner
• Media (multiple hits)
• Caroline Kennedy & the media
• Kim Elton - when he took the Interior Dept position
• Beth Kerttula (democratic representative for Juneau) over the Kim Elton Senate post
• Senate Democrats - secret meetings - rejecting Senate picks
• Juneau Democrats - for backing Senate Democrats
• Bob Poe (democratic gubernatorial candidate) - "political grandstanding"
• Whoever and everyone for "bad mouthing" WAR - AG candidate
• Levi Johnston - preemptive strike
• David Letterman - dumb joke
• Celtic Diva - photoshopping an iconic image
• Dennis Zaki - preemptive strike over trip to Emmonak (DZ's Alaska Report posted upcoming ethics complaints and IRS/embezzlement problems)

Most politicians don't react to jokes and certainly don't resort to slanging matches with their constituents on their official websites. But this is Sarah Palin...

Sarah Palin's style is incredibly negative, reactive and divisive.

In addition to attacking all and sundry, other things she's fond of doing are: misquoting the Founding Fathers, misinterpreting the Constitution and borrowing material from other people.

Sarah borrowed a joke from David Letterman (the "perverted pedophile", a major threat to ALL young women) to get back at John Kerry during a speech to the troops in Kosovo.

In 2004, John Kerry made a joke about GW and it backfired. Letterman said this at the time:

"To his credit, John Kerry was very, very upset about the joke and he apologized. ... As a matter of fact, all day long, he's been walking around with a long face."

Oh, the irony...

While photoshopping is a hot topic, check this out.
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The pitbull needs a muzzle...

It looks like Sarah Palin's latest rant (via Meg Stapleton) has backfired. A refresher:

"Recently we learned of a malicious desecration of a photo of the Governor and baby Trig that has become an iconic representation of a mother's love for a special needs child."

Wonkette has a good post about it with lots of links, including one to a forum dedicated to photoshopping the iconic photo. This is going to go on for a while...

Keep digging, Sarah!
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