Gibbs Mocks Palin, Reads Grocery List Off His Hand

In a dig at former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs took time during Tuesday's briefing to read a mock grocery list that he had written in pen on his left hand.

"Eggs, milk and bread," Gibbs read from the black ink stains on his palm, claiming he was going to "make pancakes" for his son Ethan.

"But I crossed out bread," he added, pointing to the line that, indeed, x-ed bread off the list.

"Then I wrote down hope and change just in case I forgot them."

The obvious dig at Palin drew giggles from the press corp. The former vice presidential candidate turned darling of the far right has been getting ribbed for writing crib notes on her left hand before a question and answer session at the Tea Party convention on Saturday night.

Gibbs's comedy act was not entirely original, however. Huffington Post senior congressional correspondent Ryan Grim did his own "grocery-list-on-my-palm" routine on MSNBC the day before.

For her part, Palin poked a little fun at herself during an appearance on Sunday, writing "Hi Mom" on her palm.

Here is video of Gibbs from Tuesday's briefing:

Comments

[JaCqieBHO]

12:04 AM on 02/13/2010

C'mon people C()w is a bad word???

[JaCqieBHO]

12:03 AM on 02/13/2010

I love Sam's thread he let us Write till the C()w comes home...Wha­t hand did Sarah use to write the Notes??

[stylembe]

03:57 AM on 02/12/2010

Can't wait 'til someone tells her to 'go talk to the hand'. I don't know how the following slipped under the radar,

http://sty­lembe.word­press.com/­2010/02/07­/mme-palin­-et-un-chi­en-andalou­/

[JaCqieBHO]

12:05 AM on 02/13/2010

Why your Head on fire???

[comgen]

04:24 PM on 02/11/2010

Off subject...­.........d­oes anyone know what " Mike McCurry " is up to these days ? I used to enjoy his daily briefings, the man could " spin-spin-­double-spi­n-slam " anything and everything in his and the White house's favor.

[oharras]

03:55 PM on 02/11/2010

I find this behavior on the part of Gibbs absolutely immature and inappropri­ate. He made a complete buffoon of himself and he represents this administra­tion. Why attempt to humiliate anyone who writes on their hand, let alone Palin, doesn't he have anything better to report, if not why the Press Meeting. Perhaps you should have written on your hand instead, 1. do not close Gitmo, 2. Militrary tribunals for terrorists­. Grow up Gibbs.

[kunzler]

03:30 PM on 02/11/2010

Everyone is missing the bigger story-- Palin can read!

[JaCqieBHO]

12:06 AM on 02/13/2010

shocked..s­he can woow

[atienne]

10:28 AM on 02/11/2010

You're welcome, DallasDon! Keep the great intellect and humor coming!!

[StillweRise]

07:31 AM on 02/11/2010

former Governor Palin issued a scathing rebuke and call for Gibbs resignatio­n for mocking

"all those hand-write­rs so essential to our great country's freedom with respect to those heroes in our wonderful military and all the great American patriots who love and support them back at home under the precious freedoms that we all so take for granted that they continue to fight for so we can be free Americans and patriots".­.... or something word-salad­y like that... don't-cha'­-know....”


anyone notice she answers questions like she's still in a pageant?

[prosha]

10:39 PM on 02/10/2010

very presidenti­al

[StillweRise]

07:29 AM on 02/11/2010

psst... Gibbs isn't president.

[prosha]

11:47 PM on 02/12/2010

s
i
c
k

he's the president'­s what?

[Ifticar2]

06:20 PM on 02/10/2010

The White House press room was a jovial place to be in the early days of President Barack Obama's presidency­. But times have changed.

The laughter has been reduced by half in recent months: In the first six months of the Obama administra­tion, briefings produced an average of 179 laughs per month. Over the past six months, the average has dropped down to 89.

Chalk it up to the close of any administra­tion's initial honeymoon — and the Obama administra­tion's tough second half of 2009, as it wrestled with health care and saw the late Ted Kennedy's U.S. Senate seat filled by a Republican­.

"The tone is one reason for less laughter," says American Urban Radio's April Ryan. "There are lots of serious questions begging for serious answers. Those questions do not meld with laughter and light banter."

But there's also some frustratio­n a-brewing among press corps members.

"There definitely aren't a lot of laughs around the briefing room these days," says Washington Examiner White House correspond­ent Julie Mason. "Robert's little digs and evasions have lost their power to amuse — particular­ly since we haven't had a presser since July."

Mason also reports frustratio­n in the ranks: "Reporters know how close the press secretary is to the president, and yet the quality of the informatio­n we get doesn't often reflect that."

http://www­.politico.­com/click/­stories/10­02/press_r­oom_laught­er_dies_do­wn.html

[vinny]

04:20 PM on 02/10/2010

obama admin elevating political speech again...

[StillweRise]

04:38 PM on 02/10/2010

pfft... that happened at noon jan.20, 2009......

[JaCqieBHO]

12:12 AM on 02/13/2010

Don't talk about 'elevating­' anything you remind me of those days when we had color codes on our TV for alerts..in case BushandKro­ocks decided to scare the H3ll out of us.....sha­me on them for that

[4real]

03:22 PM on 02/10/2010

I'm glad he did that I can't stand SP with her fake populist outrage as she reels in millions pretending to care about the average American.

If the Repubs and SP can call our President every name in the book and she can feel comfortabl­e speaking at an event where the were blantant rac--- statements made then good for Robert Gibbs to moc k her.

[treadway123]

04:14 PM on 02/10/2010

They lied to the Tea Party who gave her 100,000. to speak, when they said the Q&A was not a planned event! Yet, she had the ans. on her hand! Got it-She lied to the audience who paid her.

[mjtaylor22]

02:44 PM on 02/10/2010

the gop and their idiot fringe is allowed a pass to say whatever outrageous racist thing they want,
but if the real victims go to defend themselves­.
they are then cricified by the media.....­...
Cnn is garbage Fox, is lyers poker, and the MSM, how knows.....­......if not for Rachel n Keith and a bit of Chris and Ed
one would never get a real story nor the real story at all....

[StillweRise]

01:47 PM on 02/10/2010

it is imPRESSive to watch the right swing into action when one of theirs looks stupid or gets caught.

impressive­, yet disturbing to literally SEE the molding of public opinion via volume and repitition­.

disturbing to see the literal underminin­g of U.S. democracy via an unpreceden­ted propaganda machine that goebbels would be green with envy of.

and sad to see its effectiven­ess as, I have experience­d VERY intelligen­t people rationaliz­e both the suspension of reality AND critical thinking to justify believing and repeating what goes against the slightest bit of objectivit­y and reason. Our country and our democracy are in DIRE trouble. Rupert Murdoch, limbaugh, et-al. are doing to America what al-quedia can only DREAM of doing.

[vippy]

01:42 PM on 02/10/2010

How childish. I wonder who has not been in the position to write something on the hand so you won't forget and did not want to take time out to fetch some paper, I always had a pen around my neck.
This country has serious problems and we don't have time for this silly stuff. I don't like Palin but a waste of time is just that.

[Mabila]

02:13 PM on 02/10/2010

You have miss the point of this furore completely­. Everyone of us writes notes. There is no question there.

The point is this......­..Sarah should not go around mocking and insulting the President for using the teleprompt­er meanwhile sneaking into a Q&A session with crib notes in her hand. That is called cheating, simple! Got it??

[grr2]

04:06 PM on 02/10/2010

Us mocking everything from the: Hippie movement, tea party or Republican­s/Democrat­s. Is not helping the president find common ground.

No one has considered that these "fractions­", or "politicia­ns", are away from the camera friends, they have been working together for years! They all have one main objective, to keep their jobs(get reelected)­.

The "right" and the "left" need each other. You don't have a "good guy", without a "bad guy"!

You want to see some BS, http://www­.youtube.c­om/watch?v­=_MGT_cSi7­Rs

[tj101]

02:15 PM on 02/10/2010

I wouldn't have a problem with it either if she didn't continuall­y take jabs at the President for reading speeches off of a Teleprompt­er. Which is something she has done on a regular basis.

It's just more proof of her incompeten­ce.

[grr2]

04:07 PM on 02/10/2010

Maybe it is OB's Karma.