Friday, February 5, 2010

Sarah Palin derangement syndrome in overdrive.....again

The positive daily news feed on Sarah Palin has sent the mainstream media over a cliff in its efforts to destroy her.  First her book Going Rogue has 2.8 million copies in print.  As of today, she has 1,269,266 Facebook fans.  She has a new job at Fox News and in her debut appearance drew almost four times more viewers than the second place cable finisher in the same time slot, CNN's Campbell Brown. And this week we learn that Palin raised $1.4 million for her political action committee, SarahPAC, in the last half of 2009.  So what is the news feed that follows?  Here it is:

1. Investigative msnbc reporter, Bill Dedman pores over thousands of Palin emails and reveals that Todd Palin was a powerful "first dude," going so far as to suggest that he was a "shadow governor."  It's a long article about basically nothing, but read it if you must.

2. The Associated Press has made the shocking discovery that improvements to remote Alaska backcountry property co-owned by the Palins has not been reflected in the Matanuska-Susitna Borough tax digest and therefore had not been added to the Palins tax assessment for the parcels in question.
Dave Dunivan, the assessor for the Matanuska-Susitna Borough, said such a survey had not been done there in five years, before construction started on the cabins.

Palin's attorney, Thomas Van Flein, said it is not the responsibility of property owners to report structures that go up on their land.

"It is the borough's job," he said in an e-mail. "The property taxes on this parcel are fully paid and have never been delinquent."

Dunivan, however, said owners are required by state law to report any omissions or errors in their tax assessments. Often, the borough learns of new structures in remote areas when neighbors report them. Dunivan said no one has called the borough on the Palin lots, among many in the region to add structures, the flyover survey found.

"Typically, if there are errors, we hear from owners," he said. "If there are omissions, we don't. Every once in a while we do have someone call us about omissions, but not often."
3. CBS News wonders if Sarah Palin is at war with Rush Limbaugh.  After Palin called out Rahm Emmanuel on his use of the word "retarded" in an obscenity-laced rant against members of his own party, Rush Limbaugh put his trademark irreverent and humorous interpretation to the controversy:
"Our politically correct society is acting like some giant insult's taken place by calling a bunch of people who are 'retards,' 'retards,' Limbaugh said on this radio show, according to the transcript. "So now there's going to be a meeting, there's going to be a 'Retard' Summit at the White House."

Limbaugh continued: "If you want to look at how this is broken down, Emanuel compares Democrat activists to retarded people, then apologizes to retarded people. Not to the Democrats. Normally if you call somebody a retard, you apologize to them for calling them a retard. But he has apologized to the retarded people for daring to lump them with Democrats. It's hilarious."
And CBS is worried that this little disagreement might drive a wedge between Limbaugh and Palin?  In your dreams.  Rush Limbaugh has been an early and staunch defender of Sarah Palin, and people who follow them know this is a non-story.

4. Last, but not least, ABC broke the story that Palin purchased $63,000 of her own books to sign and give to contributors to her PAC.  This is not only legal, it is a common device for political fundraising.  Ed Morrissey has more here.  Another non-story.

Want some real news? This week the Congress raised the debt ceiling by $1.9 trillion to $14.3 trillion.  A government report issued today included revisions to figures from a year ago showing 8.4 million jobs were lost since the recession started, nearly one million more than earlier estimates.  Moody's is warning the Obama administration that if our government continues on its current path, the U.S. bond rating may be lowered resulting in higher interest costs on an already unsustainable debt. But what is the media focused on?

Sarah Palin.

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