Campbell Brown Defends Sarah Palin Against McCain Advisers' Scapegoating: "You Picked Her"

Campbell Brown used her "Cutting Through The Bull" segment Thursday night to defend Sarah Palin against "scapegoating" on the part of John McCain's advisers.

"I find it so stunning that the very people who introduced us to Sarah Palin, who told us she would make a great Vice President, have now turned on her with a vengeance," Brown said. "They are the top advisers to John McCain's failed campaign and they are desperate right now to find someone to blame for their long list of mistakes."

Brown, who reminded viewers that Sarah Palin was only in the national spotlight for nine short weeks, also reminded McCain's advisers that they are the ones who chose Palin for the #2 spot:

You are the ones who supposedly vetted her, and then told the American people she was qualified for the job. You are the ones who after meeting her a couple of times, told us she was ready to be just one heartbeat away from the Presidency. If even half of what you say NOW is true, then boy, did you try to sell the American people a bill of goods. If Sarah Palin is the reason some voters chose Barack Obama, that is no one's fault but your own. John McCain, as he so graciously said himself the other night, lost this election. He lost it with your help, your advice, your guidance, and yes, your running mate recommendations. And that is crystal clear to everyone, no matter how hard you try to blame Sarah Palin or anyone else.

Watch:

Brown's Full Comments

Tonight the scape-goating of Sarah Palin. Whatever you may have thought about John McCain's running mate... about whether she was qualified, prepared or experienced enough for the job... try if you can to put all of that aside for just a moment. Because Sarah Palin is who she is. She did not become measurably more intelligent or measurably less intelligent during this campaign. Remember, she was only part of the campaign for a matter of nine weeks. Sarah Palin is who she is.

Which is why I find it so stunning that the very people who introduced us to Sarah Palin... who told us she would make a great Vice President... have now turned on her with a vengeance. They are the top advisors to John McCain's failed campaign and they are desperate right now to find someone to blame for their long long list of mistakes. They have been launching grenades at Palin and her supporters... some of their allegations we at CNN have found to be patently false. You will hear people say "this is what always happens with a losing campaign"... and hopefully, this is the last time we will be talking about these people. But what they have done just in the last few days to save their own skins is worth a final comment.

To those top McCain advisors who leaked the little story about seeing Sarah Palin in a towel. To those who called her and her family "Wasilla Hillbillies" while using her to stoke class warfare with redmeat speeches and an anti-elitist message. To those who claim she didn't know Africa was a continent. To those McCain aides who say she is the reason they lost this election... can I please remind you of one thing: you picked her.

You are the ones who supposedly vetted her, and then told the American people she was qualified for the job. You are the ones who after meeting her a couple of times, told us she was ready to be just one heartbeat away from the Presidency. If even half of what you say NOW is true, then boy, did you try to sell the American people a bill of goods. If Sarah Palin is the reason some voters chose Barack Obama, that is no one's fault but your own. John McCain, as he so graciously said himself the other night, lost this election. He lost it with your help, your advice, your guidance, and yes, your running mate recommendations. And that is crystal clear to everyone, no matter how hard you try to blame Sarah Palin or anyone else.

Previously:

Campbell Brown Calls Out Double Standard On Palin Clothes Controversy
Campbell Brown Rips McCain Camp's "Sexist" Treatment Of Palin

Comments

[me again]

McCain should have flip-flopped with Palin and sent her packing. She cost him a massive amount of votes.

[Whinger]

Sarah Palin was a judgment of judges judgment, if you get what I mean!

[violetfire]

I get what you mean; you just need an apostrophe after the s in "judges" (judges' judgment). :)

[kpal711]

I don't think that Campbell Brown was defending Sarah Palin so much as she was calling out the MORONS who chose her as running mate.

These same aides were on every channel spewing lies about how qualified she was and that she was "MORE QUALIFIED THAN BARACK OBAMA." They are absoluely despicable!!

[debb3111]

Campbell Brown should quit flip flopping..­.I beleive she was the first newsperson to bash Palin at the beginning of the election.
She is nothing but a know it all...Way to go Keith for letting her know is really is not a know it all.

[2kids]

debb --
You should go back and read (and watch) this again. She was not flip-flopping. She was placing the blame where it belonged: on the McCain advisors who picked this woman.

As for Palin - I kind of feel bad for her. She was clearly not qualified, and that came through loud and clear over the last couple of months, but she's an ambitious woman who was handed an opportunity that sounded sweet. I don't think she had any clue (regardless of intelligence or lack thereof) about what she was about to face. I agree with Campbell Brown that this was not her doing. At all.

[wallyone]

I don't think Gov. Palin had (or perhaps does not now have) any idea of how uneducated she is. I think the people who vetted her assumed that any governor would have a basic education and interest beyond their state and family. In her married and professional life I do not think there is a lot of time for reading books or newspapers such as the LA or NY Times, Wash Post, etc.

[pixy242a]

Hey there, there are a lot of busy mothers who are much better informed than this lady!

From her Alaska days, Palin has never found it important to burden herself with facts. All she wanted was talking points, even in debates. She even said something to the effect that Joe Biden had 26 years to learn his 'talking points'.

In Alaska, she perforce had to be familiar with issues that impact Alaska politics, but ignored anything that state. A month before being selected, she said she would only accept the VP post if it did something for Alaska.

[lisakaz2]

That's her blind spot in a nutshell: she thinks Biden was giving only "talking pts" rather than answering questions. She doesn't think on her feet because she's allergic to thinking. She's a TV candidate only.

[wallyone]

Now the smug, pseudo-intellectual pundits and advisors (see Bill Kristol) are saying that Palin's failure is not their fault because the campaign mismanaged her. What predictable, self serving crap. Nothing is ever their fault because someone else made mistakes in the execution. Like in Iraq. Of course everyone knows that the pitfalls in the execution should be anticipated by really visionary people.

[janeinmia]

I have no sympathy for Sarah Palin and am enjoying each and every leak of outrageous info, BUT it is true that McCain et all foisted her on us, so the lion's share of the blame is for them!

Seriously, Sarah Palin as Vice President of the United States?????? Shame on you, John McCain.

[bored2tears]

Please! No one forced Sarah Palin to accept the offer. And she, more than anyone else, should have known how deeply, deeply unqualified she is.

[Irish55]

To an extent, I agree with Campbell Brown.  Being savaged by these cretins who days ago were telling the American public how qualified she was to be VP is over the top, to say the least.  But not really surprising­.  Most of these people have no loyalty to any one candidate.­  They're mercenarie­s.  They basically work for whoever will hire them and then move on to the next one.  Having said that, Gov Palin should, if she has an ounce of maturity and a conscience, accept at least some of the blame for what happened.  But she has neither and she never will.  Because in the end, she got exactly what she wanted out of this campaign.  National exposure, name recognitio­n.  I think she is an extremely ambitious, not terribly smart, but manipulative and conniving politician­.  She knows how to use people to get what she wants.  And she has no compunction about stepping over the bodies to move on to the next level - John McCain included. ­  She can spin this however she wants - and she will.  All the while probably plotting  how she can shake him loose once and for all and move on.  I wouldn't trust this woman as far as I could throw her.    I can see her now - winking and gosh darning all the way to the Senate.  Get ready for 2012 --- God help us all - here she comes again.

[terri29]

Extremely well articulated Irish55. I couldn't have said it better myself. What an embarrassment she is to America and it's people (John McCain lost so much credibility) especially now, when we have such dire problems on so many levels. Sarah Palin was NOT what America, it's people, and the world needed to see or hear the past nine weeks. What WAS the Republic party thinking? God bless Obama and America!

[postman606]

Excellent points Irish. Some people think talking about this is mean spirited, but the reality is Palin will be back, it is important that someone start asking the questions and seeking answers in a way the McCain campaign failed to do.

[deidrap]

The good news is that the current Republican bashing aimed at Palin will intensify if she runs for Prez in 2012. The other Republican candidates will pummel her with her shortcomings, lack of knowledge, etc....the Dems will hardly have to address the issue.

[IndieChick]

Campbells right. They DID choose her...base­d on her looks. They thought the whole electorate would vote for her for the same reason most of the lowest common denominator GOP redneck, white males liked her....her looks. And then they realized that inside the pretty box was nothing but hot air. The problem is...MS ALASKA was arrogant and narcissistic enough to think that she was actually qualified.­. She should've said "Thanks, but no thanks guys and gals".

[1dogs2]

Palin and McCain campaign leakers deserve each other since they are birds of a feather. Is she really surprised to learn that they are agents of the fine art of politics of personal destruction? Will she learn anything from experiencing first-hand how it feels to be trashed and smeared by anonymous sources? Apparently not, since her latest analysis is that it is the MEDIA, not the leakers, who are responsible for this campaign against her. She will no doubt come away with the same lesson that McCain learned from the Bush campaign's trashing of him in 2000: adopt those tactics yourself (although Palin adopted them before they were ever turned on her).

By the way, why has no one in the MSM picked up on the rather obvious source and reason for the Palin trashing? Who are the McCain campaign leakers? Did they by any chance join the campaign after Romney lost the primary? Are they connected to the Mormons who contributed vast amounts of money to the Prop 8 campaign in California? Do they have any interest in clearing the Republican field for 2012?

[USMC1980]

I love watching one braindead GOP bimbo-con defend another

[sadiehawkins]

Thank You USMC1980 !!

[nick53]

that's a good video.. you should watch it.. and then nonetheless remain mesmerized at the choice of palin http://www.spinwhip.com/palin

[hilary916]

I think they would have lost no matter who they picked.

[QueenOfViolets]

I agree with you. The margins might have been tighter. But the GOP is adrift. Blaming Palin misses the point entirely.

It's no accident that McCain fumbled the financial crisis ball. The Republicans don't know what they stand for any more. The neocon agenda has failed catastrophically in foreign and economic policy. Not only has the War on Drugs not been won, but the younger generation is attacking it at the polls. Abortion and gun control might energize the base, but they're not enough to constitute a conservative ideology.

I think they're entering a period of deep crisis -- far from the permanent majority they envisioned when the Bush Era began.

[Carolab]

This is no one's fault except Sarah Palin's. She had no business accepting the nomination in the first place. And, if you can't take the heat, stay out of the kitchen!

[munki]

Campbell's defense is always "sexist"..­.
Why is she SOOOOOOoooo obsessed with that word?

Some kind of complex? As a woman... I do not see her point...

[Carolab]

It's an B.S. excuse, plain and simple. In fact, by using it as an excuse for Palin's incompetence and downright malice, Campbell Brown is herself being "sexist".

[German Kahuna]

Poor, poor Sarah is picking up so much sympathy right now. She is probably going to run for Office in 2012 and she might even have enough sympathy with the shallow minded, who decide who to vote for based on the neatness of their dress or how cute their friggin dog is, that she might make it. Never underestimate the power of superficialness. Looking at the bath robe discussion and other things being discussed now is like watching a soap opera.

[Carolab]

Anyone with any sympathy for her is deluded.