Quittin' While the Quittin' Is Good

Sarah Palin quit her Alaska governor's job today. Apparently, half of the country still loves her for her inabilities, flightiness, cowardice, ignorance, and general incompetence. You have to wonder about a country that idolizes someone who has failed every step of the way through her life, but that's the same country that elected "W" who had a similar life record.

The AP report on today's resignation included the information that Palin was leaving under the cloud of "ethics probes, mounting legal bills and dwindling popularity." However, that writer reminded us that "Palin may host a radio or TV show, or launch a lucrative speaking career." Yeah, that's what we need in the midst of a depression; another simple-minded, superstitious, wingnut "author" and talking head.

In quitting 17 months before the end of her first term, Palin finished off most her Alaska support (although there are still 40 percent of that goofy crowd who still "approve" of her performance). It's always worth remembering that Americans are the most short-term memory population in human history and Palin could yet return to her past summer's 60% favorable rating.

One of the idol-worshiping Alaska crowd, Wilson Villanueva, was quoted as having said, "She's not a quitter; she's a fighter. She wants to fight for the Alaskan people and for the greater good nationally."

Hilarious.

Palin burned up her parents' and taxpayers' money taking six years and five colleges to earn a BA in Communications, a degree slightly more demanding than Phys Ed. She didn't like journalism, barely able to cope with the low-level sports crap she wrote about, so she turned herself into a "hockey mom."

She didn't care much for the full-time mom thing, so while cranking out five brats, she ran for the highly demanding job of city council member and, later, Mayor of Wasilla, AK. She ended both jobs prematurely, quitting as it were. Wasilla has a population of 9,000 people and puts so little faith in the job of mayor that the town has a city manager to handle all of the actual tasks of running the city. The mayor has the following job description:

1. Preside at council meetings. The mayor may take part in the discussion of matters before the council, but may not vote, except that the mayor may vote in the case of a tie;
2. Act as ceremonial head of the city;

That's it. All those claims of management experience were about self-management, since the mayor of Wasilla has no authority, no practical function, and nobody wanted a particular mayor, Palin, to have the keys to her own office. I'd say "community organizers" all over the nation have more practical experience than Wasilla's mayor. She couldn't manager to keep her fingers out of the cash drawer in that job, either. She quit that job after unsuccessfully campaigning Lt. Governor from the Mayor's Office and getting caught using city funds for her state campaign. During her VP campaign, she was asked if she had done the same thing that she'd accused Randy Ruedrich of having done. She said, "Yeah, what I did was wrong.'"

From there, Palin moved on to the Alaska governor's office. 18 months from the end of her first term, she quits because, in her own words, because she is "doing what’s best for Alaska." Her biggest whine was that the Alaskan people questioned her ethics, decisions, and sources of income. While she once campaigned telling the people of Alaska to "hold me accountable," when they did that she stonewalled investigations (When she was the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission Chairwoman, she quit because, "I'm forced to withhold information from Alaskans, and that goes against what I believe in as a public servant."), whined often and publicly that she was being picked on (after accusing Hillary Clinton of "whining" about her press coverage.), and now she's running away. Running a state overfloowing with cash from its natural resources and managing a population a fraction of the size of a decent Midwestern city proved too much for Sarah's talents. The poor babe couldn't keep her hands out of the state's till and her cronism got the best of a state known for legendary cronism. Wow, that's sad even by the low standards of Republican candidates!

As one conservative squawking head put it, "Sarah Palin is no quitter. That's why she's quitting."

Advertising age has speculated on her future exit from the media in this article: Inside the Collapse. I vote with them. No matter what Palin does, she'll screw it up, cover herself in "family values," and run away dragging the approval of the low brow wingnuts with her. Everything you need to know about Sarah Palin's fans is properly described in the movie, Stupidity.