Directed by Matt Damon?

[Via Sullivan]

Here’s another gem from the already famous Katie Couric interview:

Transcript below:

COURIC: You’ve cited Alaska’s proximity to Russia as part of your foreign policy experience. What did you mean by that?

PALIN: That Alaska has a very narrow maritime border between a foreign country, Russia, and on our other side, the land– boundary that we have with– Canada. It– it’s funny that a comment like that was– kind of made to– cari– I don’t know, you know? Reporters–

COURIC: Mock?

PALIN: Yeah, mocked, I guess that’s the word, yeah.

COURIC: Explain to me why that enhances your foreign policy credentials.

PALIN: Well, it certainly does because our– our next door neighbors are foreign countries. They’re in the state that I am the executive of. And there in Russia–

COURIC: Have you ever been involved with any negotiations, for example, with the Russians?

PALIN: We have trade missions back and forth. We– we do– it’s very important when you consider even national security issues with Russia as Putin rears his head and comes into the air space of the United States of America, where– where do they go? It’s Alaska. It’s just right over the border. It is– from Alaska that we send those out to make sure that an eye is being kept on this very powerful nation, Russia, because they are right there. They are right next to– to our state.

I can’t help but think that after a few more interviews like this, Gov. Palin should do everyone a favor and take the advice of conservative columnist Kathleen Parker.

This is my favorite part:

So health care reform and reducing taxes and reining in spending has got to accompany tax reductions, and tax relief for Americans, and trade — we have got to see trade as opportunity, not as, uh, competitive, um, scary thing, but one in five jobs created in the trade sector today.

This is getting to the point where it’s like watching Michael Scott manage an office.  And the thing about it is, it would be funny if it wasn’t real.  But it is.  And that’s what makes this really, really scary.

[Via Sullivan]

From the St. Petersburg Times:

Five weeks ago, the St. Petersburg Times convened a group of Tampa Bay voters who were undecided about the presidential election. Their strong distrust of Barack Obama suggested it was a group ripe for John McCain to win over.

Not anymore. The group has swung dramatically, if unenthusiastically, toward Democrat Obama. Most of them this week cited the same reason: Sarah Palin.

I feel good about Florida.  I really do.  It doesn’t look good on the surface, but I’ve got a gut feeling that we’ll flip it this year.  Which is good, because I have a real bad feeling about Michigan.  I don’t think they’ve ever shaken the race riots of ’67 from their heads.

You know, looking back on this, Romney may have actually been a solid choice for McCain.  With the Wall St. meltdown, you get his economic chops, and he may have been enough to solidly flip MI into McCain’s column, forcing Obama to play some serious offense in a different state to make up those 17 EVs.

The similarities are downright eerie.  I’m basically going to treat this post as a laundry list of the monstrosity that I like to call the Bushlin.

(more…)

Here, let me write it out for you:

Of course, it’s a fungible commodity and they don’t flag, you know, the molecules, where it’s going and where it’s not. But in the sense of the Congress today, they know that there are very, very hungry domestic markets that need that oil first. So, I believe that what Congress is going to do, also, is not to allow the export bans to such a degree that it’s Americans who get stuck holding the bag without the energy source that is produced here, pumped here. It’s got to flow into our domestic markets first.

That’s your potential VP, who “knows more about energy than probably anyone else in the United States of America.”

Apparently, the anti-Palin rally outnumbered the pro-Palin rally.

[Via Sullivan]

David Frum (of the National Review) on Sarah Palin:

I have been disturbed about the choice from the start, as you know. And I have not seen any reason to feel less disturbed … She really could be president! And here’s where my fellow conservatives really worry me. They are so attracted by the symbolism of the selection that they show no concern — never mind for her executive competence — even for her views.

There’s a photograph circulating on conservative blogs that shows Palin lounging on a motorcycle, paired with another of Obama in a helmet on a bicycle. It’s headed: “All you need to know.” Personally I need to know a little more. That’s not even insufficient information. It’s anti-information — a denial that information matters.

Welcome, my friends, to the modern Republican Party, in all of its glory.  The Party that once prided itself as the intellectually superior “party of ideas” has shrunken to enthusiastically supporting a barely-qualified-to-be-governor-love-to-have-a-beer-with-beauty-queen-who-knows-how-to-field-dress-a-moose-hockey-mom-pitbull-with-lipstick candidate.

My, how far they fall…

[Via Sullivan]

Sullivan says the obvious:

Watching this for the first time, as opposed to reading it, it’s very clear that Palin has never heard of the Bush doctrine on pre-emption, perhaps the most significant element of his disastrous legacy in foreign policy

Btw, doesn’t it seem like Gibson is just aggravated beyond belief?  It’s like he’s getting annoyed at how little she knows or how much dancing she’s doing.  I’m impressed with Gibson’s performance in this interview. I think the McCain campaign expected a lot more softballs than this, and none of us in the netroots thought he would push her quite this hard.

She’s trying real hard to get out of this one:

GIBSON: Let me talk a little bit about environmental policy, because this interfaces with energy policy and you have some significant differences with John McCain. Do you still believe that global warming is not man-made?

PALIN: I believe that man’s activities certainly can be contributing to the issue of global warming, climate change. Here in Alaska, the only arctic state in our union, of course, we see the effects of climate change more so than any other area with ice pack melting. Regardless, though, of the reason for climate change, whether it’s entirely, wholly caused by man’s activities or is part of the cyclical nature of our planet — the warming and the cooling trends — regardless of that, John McCain and I agree that we gotta do something about it and we have to make sure that we’re doing all we can to cut down on pollution.

GIBSON: But it’s a critical point as to whether or not this is man-made. He says it is. You have said in the past it’s not.

PALIN: The debate on that even, really has evolved into, OK, here’s where we are now: scientists do show us that there are changes in climate. Things are getting warmer. Now what do we do about it. And John McCain and I are gonna be working on what we do about it.

GIBSON: Yes, but isn’t it critical as to whether or not it’s man-made, because what you do about it depends on whether its man-made.

PALIN: That is why I’m attributing some of man’s activities to potentially causing some of the changes in the climate right now.

GIBSON: But I, color me a cynic, but I hear a little bit of change in your policy there. When you say, yes, now you’re beginning to say it is man-made. It sounds to me like you’re adapting your position to Sen. McCain’s.

PALIN: I think you are a cynic because show me where I have ever said that there’s absolute proof that nothing that man has ever conducted or engaged in has had any affect, or no affect, on climate change.

[my emphasis]

Alright, but don’t twist my arm, Sarah.

In an interview for the September issue of the conservative magazine Newsmax, Gov. Sarah Palin, R-Alaska, said she does not believe climate change is caused by human behavior.

“A changing environment will affect Alaska more than any other state, because of our location. I’m not one though who would attribute it to being man-made,” Palin said in the interview, which was posted online Friday.

That wasn’t so hard; only had to look back about 14 days.  That must be a new World Record in flip-flops.  No word yet on how long ago she thinks dinosaurs walked the earth…

Well, she sure knows how to bullshit:

GIBSON: And under the NATO treaty, wouldn’t we then have to go to war if Russia went into Georgia?

PALIN: Perhaps so. I mean, that is the agreement when you are a NATO ally, is if another country is attacked, you’re going to be expected to be called upon and help.

But NATO, I think, should include Ukraine, definitely, at this point and I think that we need to — especially with new leadership coming in on January 20, being sworn on, on either ticket, we have got to make sure that we strengthen our allies, our ties with each one of those NATO members.

We have got to make sure that that is the group that can be counted upon to defend one another in a very dangerous world today.

GIBSON: And you think it would be worth it to the United States, Georgia is worth it to the United States to go to war if Russia were to invade.

PALIN: What I think is that smaller democratic countries that are invaded by a larger power is something for us to be vigilant against. We have got to be cognizant of what the consequences are if a larger power is able to take over smaller democratic countries.

And we have got to be vigilant. We have got to show the support, in this case, for Georgia. The support that we can show is economic sanctions perhaps against Russia, if this is what it leads to.

It doesn’t have to lead to war and it doesn’t have to lead, as I said, to a Cold War, but economic sanctions, diplomatic pressure, again, counting on our allies to help us do that in this mission of keeping our eye on Russia and Putin and some of his desire to control and to control much more than smaller democratic countries.

His mission, if it is to control energy supplies, also, coming from and through Russia, that’s a dangerous position for our world to be in, if we were to allow that to happen.

[my emphasis]

Doesn’t it just have that “i’m fakin’ it” kind of feel to it?  Especially that part where she repeats what the NATO responsibility is.  It just feels like she just learned that, or something.

Oh, and looks like somebody fell asleep during Joe Lieberman’s Israel class:

GIBSON: What if Israel decided it felt threatened and needed to take out the Iranian nuclear facilities?

PALIN: Well, first, we are friends with Israel and I don’t think that we should second guess the measures that Israel has to take to defend themselves and for their security.

GIBSON: So if we wouldn’t second guess it and they decided they needed to do it because Iran was an existential threat, we would cooperative or agree with that.

PALIN: I don’t think we can second guess what Israel has to do to secure its nation.

GIBSON: So if it felt necessary, if it felt the need to defend itself by taking out Iranian nuclear facilities, that would be all right.

PALIN: We cannot second guess the steps that Israel has to take to defend itself.

At least she remembered one sentence from it…

So, everyone seems to be a little worried lately about the state of the race, and I have a one word answer for y’all.  Breathe.  Something that Obama campaign has known from the very beginning is that national polls mean nothing. (Remember when Hillary was +20 in the national polls in January?)  Fortunately, we’ve all got Nate over at 538 to bring some well-needed perspective here:

McCain’s gain in our popular vote projection has been 2.1 points. Note, however, that his gains have been less than that in essentially all of the most important swing states, including Ohio, Michigan, Florida, Colorado, Pennsylvania and New Hampshire. Only Virginia is on the other side of the line, and then only barely so.

As a result of all this, the Electoral College remains too close to call, even though McCain has a 1-2 point advantage in the popular vote. Obama now has an 8.4 percent chance of winning the Electoral College while losing the popular vote, which is far and away the highest that this number has been all year. And that number may get larger rather than smaller, once polling filters in from other red states like Texas, Nebraska and South Carolina. Palin may have been a brilliant VP selection — I think even Palinophobes like me have to concede that right now McCain’s looking pretty savvy — but some of that sheen is taken off by her somewhat lackluster effect on the Electoral College.

Palin brought home the lackluster Republican base (namely evangelicals), which has boosted McCain’s national numbers, but has had very little effect on swing states.  Now make no mistake, this gives McCain some breathing room, but he still needs to veer left and capture the center in order to pull this thing out.

So, don’t be alarmed.  Ignore the national polls.  Watch the swing states.

(BTW – This whole thing is part of the reason I’m a huge fan of the electoral college, but that’s a post for another day.)

I thought this was a pretty hilarious clip from Matt Damon. Guess we don’t feel alone in the “lack of talking” game. Also, the whole Disney bit is great.