I’ve been watching the convention with the sound off, mostly because I’ve been working on other things and don’t need the distraction. But, never fear, I will update this post with live blogging of Sarah Palin’s speech.
Meanwhile, feel free to snark about anything you’ve seen at the convention.
Update: Is it me, or is there something sinister about all those “Country First” signs?
I believe they’ve got the boyfriend sitting next to the pregnant daughter.
Palin: “There’s a time for politics, and a time for leadership.” McCain is stuck in politics mode, dear. He chose you.
She’s pushing the Commander in Chief button. I think of all the things she needs to do tonight, that’s about the last one.
Now she’s pushing the mother button and “special needs children” button.
Introducing her husband. She’s spending a lot of time on her family.
The “opportunity for women” button. Does she have anything to say about, oh, the economy?
They’re praising Harry Truman. Harry Truman was a flaming liberal by their standards.
She’s going on about how ordinary she is. PTA! Hockey mom! Small town!
I might vote for her … for PTA president. Depends on who she was running against, though.
This speech is all about her, with some snark about Obama. She’s not talking about America.
Wow, she eliminated a luxury jet. A bold decision.
Bridge to Nowhere! But she kept the money! What a hypocrite!
She has X-ray vision and can see the oil reserves under the North Slope. Wow.
What’s with the yellow scarves the delegates are swinging?
She said Obama hasn’t authored a single bill as a Senator. I can think of a few he authored off the top of my head.
Is this a speech that will appeal to anyone but wingnuts? I honestly don’t know. She’s dishonest and glib, so it’s not working for me. It will appeal to the stupid, of course.
Is anyone bored yet? I am.
Palin isn’t the reformer she claims to be.
Did you know McCain was a POW? Wow.
Good; she’s done.
This may sound sexist, but there’s something about Palin that reminds me of the woman that used to come to our high school home ec class and do product demonstrations.
They’ve got the bleeping boyfriend on the bleeping stage.
Olbermann is saying she sounded condescending.
The crew at Think Progress is fact checking, but as of now they’re still on Giuliani’s speech. I’m going to bed.
I’ve been following the slow roll of media spectacle for days now. It feels like I just saw a marathon of Jerry Springer shows. I feel so sorry for Palin’s kids, but at the same time this level of implosion in the rep. party is just stunning to watch. I hadn’t expected such spectacle from them.
I’m finding it hard to listen to the stupidity, the lies, the general crap. Giuliani just brought up 9/11. What took him so long?
What embarasses me most is that I may actually be able to stay awake to listen to Palin. The pain.
Well, seeing that we’re encouraged to unleash our emotions…
RUDY GUILIANI IS THE BIGGEST BUTT MUNCHING ASS WEASEL I’VE EVER SEEN.! He’s totally Barf City.
I’m watching La Palin right now. I’ve got to admit there’s something appealing about her, and she paints a pretty picture. However, every word out of her mouth is pure bulls–t.
priscianus jr comment 4. You find her appealing? As a woman I find her exceeding smug and self rightous.
Didn’t listen to much of the early speeches. The little I saw was tedious; and didn’t seem to reflect reality as I know it.
Listening to Sarah now. It is pedantic and disjointed. The lies don’t even flow together well.
Ah, it’s over. And nothing substantive at all on their policies. What a shame!
In spite of the Noonan-Murphy-Todd conversation, LittleGreenFootballs thinks this is the blooper of the day.
Back on topic, Ms Wasilla reminds me of Frances McDormand in Fargo. Oh yeah?
Only I liked Frances McDormand in Fargo.
I didn’t watch, did get the gist via liveblogs. I have some questions:
1) Are the production values as s**t as I’m hearing?
2) What’s the deal with the Rs mentioning Harry Truman all the time? Don’t they know he was a Democrat?
3) How many different people held baby Trig during Mommy’s speech?
4) Is Tina Fey even on SNL anymore? (If not, this is a total waste.)
I think I’ll get to sleep early tonight. Busy day tomorrow, taking back America….
No way…….No how……No McCain…….No Palin
I know this will sound sexist….but Palin is a pig.
Which proves that you can put lipstick on a pig.
But the Republicans are scary. Guilliani and Romney still take the low road. I suspect McCain will do the same.
I’m surprised they didn’t exhume Admiral Stockdale to use as a prop. Oh, that would cut into McCain’s glory..bad idea. Maybe they should have left an empty seat( they had plenty) in the front row to symbolize either Elijah for the Christian vote, or the unknown soldier for the veterans vote.
It’s over; we’ve lost
There’s something really weird about that little smirk-snarl she gives when she delivers a zinger. It’s somewhere between Reese Witherspoon in Election and Glenn Close in Fatal Attraction. To my eyes she shows all the signs of a complete sociopath, and I’m not trying to exaggerate in the slightest. I’m talking clinical. I’d like to see some shrinks examine the tape and get their opinion. She scares me more than McCain. I can see why Rove picked her–it’s like he picked a good-looking version of himself.
Joan Walsh at Salon calls her a pitbull in lipstick.
Good article.
http://www.salon.com/opinion/walsh/?last_story=/opinion/walsh/election_2008/2008/09/04/palin_speech/
I averted my gaze tonight (and every night from the RNC) – if Palin came up to Francis McDormand in Fargo, we’re screwed – but it doesn’t sound like it from the comments upthread.
“Country First” scares me. It reminds me of the far right parties, and the names they choose for themselves – running in Europe. At the least the GOP is coming out and saying what they’re really about, instead of pretending to be something they’re not. I’d want to see Obama (or someone) pick up on this Country First theme and tear it to shreds – explain to the public the real costs of what the GOP really means.
I won’t judge content, since much of that is in the eye of the beholder, but as someone who has earned his daily bread through public speaking, I will say that it was hands-down one of the worst speeches in construction and delivery that I’ve heard in a long, long time.
Marilyn (5),
You’re right she’s smug and self-righteous, and the speech consisted of one lie after another. But I’ve got to be honest, I am not and never have been a woman, which is no doubt a disadvantage in this case. Anyway, don’t worry, I’m not voting for her.
It was like they all live in an alternate reality. Frightening. Huckabee had a moving story about a teacher who had a powerful way to teach her kids respect for veterans, and all the things they’ve ‘earned’ for us. Respecting veterans is very, very important, apparently
Remind me which party wore the purple-heart band-aids the last time we had a Vietnam vet running for President?
Fact checking tonight will take hours.
I thought Sarah Palin actually did well for herself. Of course, she carried on the snide, even nasty, tone of the evening, being alternately sarcastic and condescending. But that was her job, and she proved she can use misleading claims and lies just like the more established players in the party.
God save us from another term of GOP arrogance, BS, and chip-on-shoulder attitude. I had more than my fill watching tonight.
http://www.lewrockwell.com/calderwood/calderwood23.html
It’s a set-up for the above.Sacrifice your children, shot-gun weddings, deployment to a war zone, God, country, sacrifice.
The illustration at the top of your post says it all, Maha.
Orwellian………
Great article.
It’s very interesting to see what impact her speech and her appearance will have on the polls.
I use a widget to keep track of the progression of polls. The widget shows the election polls by strength of states.
In addition to other different graphical visualizations of data, this one displays the progression of votes over time.
It gives a great overview and it is updated as the polls come in!
http://www.youcalc.com/apps/1218019592041
… and its easy to put on your blog!
Make a difference, keep on voting!
I cannot believe how condescending they were, the woman from Wasilla mocking a community organizer and a US Senator. She’s going to champion the rights of special needs kids, what, that will make her a Democrat? You mean the ones behind the American With Disabilities Act? I thought Palin came off as ready for prime time, that makes it much easier to go after her. If she’s pathetic then it becomes more complicated. But you can see their plan, no attempt at winning the undecideds, secure the base and smear, smear, smear. I don’t think that will work for them. Abnd when you play the downs syndrom card and the family card, get ready for people to ask you questions about them.
My thoughts: Perhaps as someone who has done a fair share of public speaking and struggled mightily with it, I thought the style of speech was fine – I didn’t see the smug and self-righteous characteristics others did. The bigger point is it was a bunch of crap and made me feel nauseated at the end. I’ve actually picked up on something via Republicans in the last year or so: does anyone else feel the paranoia is a bit over the top? For instance, not only are these people worried about the ever present terrorists every time they step out their doors, but the liberals in the media are out to harm them, add to that secularists who are out to ruin their children and they can portray it as a real war. To me this is all nonsense! Isn’t one of their raps about liberals that we whine too much? Just my thoughts.
Fact checking tonight will take hours. (#18)
And therein lies the incredible strength of the Republicans. They lie with impunity, they lie by omission, they lie without any thought about moral bankruptcy. They lie and give an ignorant electorate exactly what it wants to hear.
Unfortunately, refuting lies is not only time consuming, but it actually plays into the Republican narrative of the snotty coastal elites that “speak down” to real people. Telling the truth is so much more complicated than lying and often much less comforting.
Chanting “drill, baby, drill” makes people feel good. Explaining that it will take well over a decade to get any oil out and that in the process, the ecosystem (oh god, we’ve got to explain that too) will be savaged, causing untold damage to our lives (yes, but can you explain why the dwindling polar bear population has an important impact on human survival?) takes much too long. In fact, the sentence I just wrote is way too long for Sarah Palin, who would simply dismiss it outright as intellectual snobbery.
I’m going to have to learn to meditate if I am to get through this electoral campaign. What I saw yesterday makes me despair for the future of humanity.
This morning, my husband reminded me that “it ain’t over ’til it’s over”. Note to self: chill, it ain’t over ’til it’s over.
Not only will I stand by smug and self righteous I will add mean spirited too. Remember she’s been shielded for the last 6 days lets see what happens when they let her out in public. She seems to enjoy being mean and someone in the MSM (maybe Campbell Brown) who seems to have a low threshold for BS will ask he a question and she’ll make a gaff. Also, seems everything is off the table except for her daughter who should be. Families with special needs member should remember there has been no help from the Republicans before this, so now they have an advocate? I’m not a public speaker, but I’ve listened to enough speechs to know this was not a good one. She enjoyed the mean part way too much.
She is also a liar, hasn’t it been pretty well documented that she was for the bridge to nowhere until she was against it? It did play to the base and they love her as they should. I think she opened up a lot of doors that were closed until last night and it’s up the the Dems to take advantage.
Like King George (#22), I thought her delivery was good. I have no idea who actually wrote the speach, but based on the way she delivered the oddly-worded bits on Georgia and other foreign-policy-sounding bits, I suspect she was quite uncomfortable with that part; it may have actually been a last-minute insert by someone else?
Regardless, I was hoping she’d come on stage and make a spectical of herself. And while the speach was crap, she was clearly mostly comfortable reading it. Too bad.
Now, did anybody else notice the protestor being removed by security in the middle of the speach? I’ve been Real Busy today and haven’t been able to search for a reference. Looked like 4-5 burly security guys hauling a woman up the stairs and out of the arena. I wonder what she did – yell “boo” at a scripted “yay!” moment?
Ok, found it on HuffPo. She was removed for holding a “Bush=McCain” sign.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/07/11/mccain-campaign-had-prote_n_112255.html
More “loyalty oaths.” Yet another way McCain=Bush.