Sarah Palin Stays in Alaska, out of National Spotlight

February 23, 2009 RSS Feed Print
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By Robert Schlesinger, Thomas Jefferson Street blog

I've written before that Sarah Palin needs to step out of the spotlight and focus both on being governor and boning up on national issues if she wants to be a national figure. Great minds, apparently, think alike.

From The Hill:

Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin (R) is uncharacteristically shunning the spotlight this week in an apparent effort to repair damage to her political stature back home.

...

Pain [sic] took a number of hits back home, some of them from fellow Republicans, during February.

They first criticized her for flying to Washington for the white-tie Alfalfa Club dinner, headlined by President Obama.

...

When Palin returned, lawmakers found her husband, Todd, in contempt for refusing to testify about his role in the firing of a state trooper, and her attorney general resigned amid criticism that he protected government employees from the official Troopergate probe. And last week, state officials ordered Palin to pay $18,000 in back taxes on travel expenses she incurred while commuting between her home in Wasilla and the state capitol, Anchorage.

A good start. According to the article, her approval ratings remain in the 60s, twice her disapproval. "She has a very large and solid loyal base, and it's going to take a volcano eruption to make a severe change," Anchorage pollster Ivan Moore told The Hill.

Now, she needs to stay off stage for a while and learn policy.

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WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Thrust into the spotlight as a Republican rising star, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal has been depicted as an up-and-comer capable of helping reshape the party and jockeying for the 2012 GOP presidential nomination.

Rollins, a veteran of the Reagan White House, called Jindal, a first-generation American born to Punjabi parents, a "young dynamic governor" with "appeal to younger voters."

The governor is a "textbook Republican" who is "scary smart,"

By-by Sarah.

One of mom Sarah Palin's chief support groups -- right-wing evangelicals who promote abstinence -- tore into Bristol over her comments on Fox News that "abstinence is unrealistic." dID MOM SAY LEAVE MY KID ALONE. HELL NO. Why? No back bone?

If Sarah Palin's evangelical base really wants to confront teen pregnancy, they'd be smart to listen to Bristol Palin and others in her shoes and absorb some of their real-life wisdom.

Where's Palin's vituperative comeback at Van Susteren or the NAEA?

Her silence says truck loads.

“Obviously something big took place in the media,” she added. It is “very frightening, I think, what the media was able to get away with, this go around.”

Palin suggested that unbalanced media coverage posed a threat to democracy.

“This is for the sake of our democracy that there is fairness in this other branch of government, if you will, called the media,” she said. “It is foreign to me the way some in the mainstream media are thinking.”

“There have been lies told, there have been reputations trashed, there have been children that have been harmed,” she continued.

See above paragraphs.

Mostly copied and pasted from news media.

So I suppose if the other politicians didn't say something stupid the news media should make things up --- right---wrong.

Stay home until you are defeated in 2010 as governor. Oh, don't forget to take the stimulus aid for your state.

L. W. Ross of KS 10:21PM February 23, 2009

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Thrust into the spotlight as a Republican rising star, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal has been depicted as an up-and-comer capable of helping reshape the party and jockeying for the 2012 GOP presidential nomination.

Rollins, a veteran of the Reagan White House, called Jindal, a first-generation American born to Punjabi parents, a "young dynamic governor" with "appeal to younger voters."

The governor is a "textbook Republican" who is "scary smart,"

By-by Sarah.

One of mom Sarah Palin's chief support groups -- right-wing evangelicals who promote abstinence -- tore into Bristol over her comments on Fox News that "abstinence is unrealistic." dID MOM SAY LEAVE MY KID ALONE. HELL NO. Why? No back bone?

If Sarah Palin's evangelical base really wants to confront teen pregnancy, they'd be smart to listen to Bristol Palin and others in her shoes and absorb some of their real-life wisdom.

Where's Palin's vituperative comeback at Van Susteren or the NAEA?

Her silence says truck loads.

“Obviously something big took place in the media,” she added. It is “very frightening, I think, what the media was able to get away with, this go around.”

Palin suggested that unbalanced media coverage posed a threat to democracy.

“This is for the sake of our democracy that there is fairness in this other branch of government, if you will, called the media,” she said. “It is foreign to me the way some in the mainstream media are thinking.”

“There have been lies told, there have been reputations trashed, there have been children that have been harmed,” she continued.

See above paragraphs.

Mostly copied and pasted from news media.

So I suppose if the other politicians didn't say something stupid the news media should make things up --- right---wrong.

Stay home until you are defeated in 2010 as governor. Oh, don't forget to take the stimulus aid for your state.

L. W. Ross of KS 10:21PM February 23, 2009

You're the idiot..... get your facts straight.

Diane of CA 6:05PM February 23, 2009

Robert Schlesinger

Robert Schlesinger

Robert Schlesinger is managing editor for opinion at U.S. News and World Report, overseeing all opinion editorial content. He is the author of "White House Ghosts: Presidents and Their Speechwriters." E-mail him at rschlesinger@usnews.com. Follow him on Twitter: @rschles.

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