Sarah Palin Might Not Know What a Platform Is

Yesterday Sarah Palin did a phone interview with James Dobson of Focus on the Family. Most of it went pretty well -- lucky, he's a creep who likes children, that's an important sign; lucky, she's an asshole with children, small world, isn't it? -- but there was one ugly gotcha question:

Dobson:

The Republican Platform is the strongest pro-life, pro-family document to come out of a political party, even more so than the platforms during the campaigns of Ronald Reagan. There are principles there that I've been fighting for for thirty, forty years and you are trying to articulate those same principles, aren't you?

Oh jeez.

See, the problem here, for most Republican politicians, is that the platform is horrifying. A catalogue of revenge dreams and power fantasies, impossible and illegal, most of them involving women and scourging. It's the portrait in the attic of what Republican rule would look like, if the zealot half took over and pushed out the half who are just in it for the money.

It's not what you'd call a moderate document. Bob Dole, famously, claimed he never even read it.

That's what makes it a gotcha question, for most candidates. How to get around it. For Sarah Palin, what makes it a gotcha question is that I'm pretty sure she doesn't know that her party has a platform, or what one is.

He might as well be asking her the atomic weight of unbinilium.

So she goes into Palin bluff mode. What words does she have to work with from the question? "Platform." Good. We know that word. It's like a deck. "Pro-life." We heard about that at church. "Reagan." He was sort of like a young John McCain. Got it. Go.

Palin:

Absolutely, and Dr. Dobson thank you so much for recognizing that. This is a strong platform around the planks in this platform that respect life and respect the entrepreneurial spirit of this great country and those things, back to the social issues that are what Republicans, at least in the past, had articulated and tried to stand on.

Pause. Did that do it? Wait for next question. Darn it, he's not saying anything. That's okay, we can do this. Deep breath.

Palin:

Now, finally, we have very solid planks in the platform that will allow us to build an even stronger foundation for our country. It's all good and it's encouraging. You would maybe have assumed that we would have gotten further away from those strong planks. But no, they're there, they're solid, we stand on them and again I believe that it is the right agenda for the country at this time. Very, very clear and contrasted tickets in this election November 4th. People are going to see the clear contrasts, you just go to the planks in our platforms and that's where you see them.

And... done. Teacher, is that clock slow?

But Dobson isn't finished. He has a follow up. This must be what hell feels like.

Dobson:

In your private conversations with Senator McCain, it is your impression that he also strongly supports those views? I know that he did not oppose that platform when it was written. Do you think he will implement it?

I just remembered, I have an early out for band. Gotta go! No? Okay. Could you repeat the question?

What are the new words? "McCain" and "implement." Implement means "do."

Palin:

I do, from the bottom of my heart. I am such a strong believer that McCain believes in those strong planks and we do have good conversations about some of the details of the different planks and what they represent. I'm very heartened that John McCain ... he doesn't want a Vice President who will check the opinions ... of me at the door and we talk about some of these and they're very important. It's most important though, as you're suggesting, that Americans know that John McCain is solidly there on those solid planks in our platform that build the right agenda for America.

Nailed it! Pencils down.

She's such a desperate doofus. I'm glad she has nice clothes.

I think we might actually miss Sarah Palin. But we won't know until she goes away.

Comments

[SueEll]

She can't blame Katie Couric for this one.

[naviline]

I think it would be rather funny if she tried to spin James Dobson as the "gotcha liberal elite media". LOL

[jacobomorales]

You got it dude!! Her thought process....

[prcleburne]

Apparently, she doesn't know what a preconditon is either.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/ilan-goldenberg/does-palin-know-what-a-pr_b_137049.html

[jessieo]

Thank you. I have been bringing this up on many sites but MSM never got it. Brian Williams didn't even follow up. The problem is that the American Public probably doesn't know this either so it was not a major gaffe.

[dragonlady620]

When the election is over maybe she can have her own reality(?)show.. Or maybe she could be a game show hostess-then she could wear lots of pretty clothes and she wouldn't have to pay for them there either.

[Maisey]

OMG!! Why can't this woman ever just admit when she is clueless? Thanks for the laugh :)

[OneLiberalLady]

What I don't understand is why the Republican Party puts up with James Dobson? Aside from being a real creep, he seems to sabotage them at every turn.

[citizen104]

Are there such things as "planks" in a platform? I know there are in a physical platform, but are there such things in the more ephemeral platform? Just curious of the language used...Could just be me.

[Old-Surveyor]

If your aritical represents the way you think about your time on earth then I am truly sorry for you.
When a persons ego blocks out what is good in a another person and all you are left with are words of hate and redicule, it shows how limited your knowledge and views are.

[JiminNC]

ridicule sir

[Mysticalsister]

It's called spell check, Dude, but I gotta say, at least you speak in complete sentences, which is more than we can say about the "Disasta' from Alaska."

[AlmostLiberal]

Sir/Madam:

It is not ego that compels us to call this woman out on her sheer lack of knowledge and substance. (PLANKS??!!) It is the fact that SHE IS RUNNING FOR VICE PRESIDENT!!!

As for you,

When a person's blind faith blocks out what is obviously lacking in a vice presidential candidate and all you are left with is knee-jerk defensiveness, it shows how limited YOUR knowledge and views are.

[egbb]

While it's true Palin can't put two coherent thoughts together in the same sentence, there are planks (or policies) within the platform of both parties. It's okay to discuss the planks in a platform.

[Kenji]

What "artical" do you mean? Just trying to parse your "adverbage" here.

But seriously, it's nice that you can see the good in people filled with ignorance, ambition, and rage.

[Heddie]

I have been mystified in these past weeks when people comment that SP is
"smart". She is "cunning", yes, but let us not confuse that with intelligence.
(prisons are full of cunning people)
In these exchanges, she cannot reach into HERSELF for any fresh commentary
or answers; examine it, and see that she just volleys the same "question" back
(rather than answering) , along with more campaign rhetoric. If one has something
INSIDE- thoughts, opinions, anything, one could reach in there and handle the
discussion in a number of interesting ways.... if they were truly into governance
and representing American people rather than starting a theocracy or personal
kingdom.

[bakunin]

An accurate summation, Heddie. She is a prime example of the narcissistic drive of the, not terribly bright or introspective, pageant girl. Smiling through all her travails, unable to comprehend how these people could possibly wish to thwart her desire to be crowned. She sounds quite like what she is.

[mzwednesday]

Did she really say that?

noooooo...:)

[mzwednesday]

I love you Chris Kelly
You make me laff!!

[ObamaofNazareth]

I admit Palin is overwhelmed. She doesn't come across stupid to me as much as just way out of her depth. Joe Biden says just as many really stupid things though, and he's a lib hero. Not that I'm shocked by the double-standard, but still...pretty hypocritical.

[Paralogos]

The difference is that Biden says more things that make sense than he does stupid things, and that he has a long track record, despite chronic foot-in-mouth disease, of being an effective Senator. I'd be more forgiving of Palin's inchoherent burblings if she could say the same.

[jessieo]

So disagree. Biden has an obvious grasp of major issues and (most of the time) expresses himsellf beautifully. They only play his gaffes in the MSM. Palin is the opposite. She has an obvious lack of understanding. 90% of what is said is communicated nonverbally. She uses this to cover up for the fact that she doesn't get complex issues. This is why some people think she's great and others think she's a disaster. You are either fooled by the package or see right through it.

[nikz]

What else is new? She doesn't know anything! She does not understand: pre-conditions, platform, the role of VP, the constitution, fruit flies...ZERO! The woman is a mannequin. Dress it up but it still has no brain!

[swkidder]

I must admit that it's easier to appreciate the humor in Sarah's truly astonishing performance on the national stage now that trends in the polls are such that one can begin to breathe more comfortably again. There was a short while there in which I had to struggle to see the joke.
Charlie Gibson opened the door to a smile, and Katie Couric spread that to a grin. And then, of course, there's Tina Fey - one of our national treasures.
I'm sure that Sarah will be a bit less embarrassing by 2012 after she's had 4 years worth of time to study foreign policy, economics, and other pillars of governance - presuming that Alaskans don't chuck her out of office when they finish the Troopergate investigation. Perhaps Ted Stevens and Sarah can find something to do together that allows them both to "spend more time with their families." And they can take comfort in the fact that his house is wearing a nice new deck, and she's got a lovely Neiman Marcus/Saks wardrobe to wear on those trips to the grocery store.

[another t palin]

Say it ain't so! There you go again. When she gets to be VP she'll roll those ($150K) sleeves up and start workin workin hard in a mavericky way with the Senate that she's in charge of and get them to write a new platform with lots of good pro-American planks planks for Joe Six Pack and Hockey Moms all over the real America ya know the small towns in it. So get off her back, gosh darn it.