Bizarre but not crazy

By Fester:

The announcement by Sarah Palin that she was a point guard and would not run Alaska's offense as governor yesterday was bizarre.  It was not quite as bizarre as hiking the Appalachian Trail but it was not expected.  I am expecting another shoe to drop in the next couple of weeks on either a political, criminal or personal note.  But it is not crazy.

I have repeatedly argued that the oil patch Republican governors, notably Palin and Jindal, are not significant political threats in 2012.  The recession has removed their politically 'free' money of oil severance taxes that allowed them to make easy decisions of higher services, big rebates and low taxes that fueled their popularity in the middle of this decade.  Louisiana is facing a multi-billion dollar budget hole, and Alaska is in better but not good shape either.  The oil-patch governors are facing the circumstances of every other governor.

And right now, it sucks to be an incumbent governor of either party.  Most governors are dealing with state budgets that are quickly shrinking.  This means pissing off supporters, making enemies and often throwing away priorities and differentiators.  For Democrats, social programs aimed at the median voter's news perspective are at risk, for instance Governor Rendell in Pennsylvania has cut college assistance funds.  For Republicans, tax cuts uber alles must be deferred as even more revenue losses at this stage allows one to Gingrichized. 

So the announcment was not crazy in that being a governor with all the attendent negatives and 'hard work' making fresh enemies is probably not an optimal position to launch a 2012 Presidential run.  It is still bizarre, but I don't think it is crazy to try to avoid these problems. 

Comments

[gz]

You are still making to much of this. I mean even all the anecdotes that suggest she doesn`t know campaign strategy are made up then she still would have lined up a new job before quiting if she was planning a further career in politics.

She took the vanity fair article (and McCain campaign staff career lifeboat) really personally, like she toke the state trooper and Tina Fey thing really personal. While everyone was making fun over what it says about her intellect that she reads very little we ignored practical implications like that she didn`t know this is how people write about politicians on the national level when she accepted the VP nomination. (at least its how people write about vulnerable politicians provided it befriends the permanent inside the beltway campaign strategy and press relations types who will have a future spreading lots of juicy oppo bs now they can blame their loss on McCain, neocons and anyone but themselfs)

Her religios beliefs allow her to convince herself that her feelings are not just human nature, something to deal with the best we can, but they are actually gods way of telling her gods plan.

She doesn`t feel like having things like this written about her, and cant imagine this is what god has in store for her. The vanity fair piece was god closing the door on politics but she doesn`t worry about her career since she just assumes god has already opened a window.

Gods plan is whatever you feel it is just like gods morals are whatever you feel they are. (I mean what does the bible actually say about the punishment for causing someones wife to miscarry compared to killing her? I bet I can name more anti-gay passages than people with god-hates-f@#gs signs)

The early "not seeking another term" announcement was just her people trying not to announce anything irreversible while they keep trying to calm her down and get her to ignore the vanity fair article. IE: "those who demand: "Sit down and shut up", but that's the worthless, easy path; that's a quitter's way out"

And why wouldn`t god help her? She hates all the people god told her to hate.

Immature but not crazy.