Sara Palin’s “So What” Paragraph

When I was doing investigative reports for the Philadelphia alternative newspaper “Welcomat”, we had a name for the ubiquitous paragraph that had to appear in newstories to reiterate well-known facts. It was the “So What” paragraph.

For all of Sara Palin’s pains to cast herself as the injured party in recent newstories about her notorious and ill-conceived rants against government, the So-What paragraph appearing in all the stories is haunting her re-inventions of herself.

Up until this morning, that paragraph has been: ”In the midterm elections last year, Ms. Palin used a map with cross hairs over several swing Congressional districts, which Ms. Giffords highlighted in a television interview at the time as an example of overheated political speech.”

But now, as of this morning, a new entry is sure to be added to reports about Palin. And that is: "Referring to the Gabrielle Giffords shooting, Palin said: 'Acts of monstrous criminality stand on their own, especially within hours of a tragedy unfolding, journalists and pundits should not manufacture a blood libel that serves only to incite the very hatred and violence that they purport to condemn. That is reprehensible.'" 

Blood libel yet. 

This morning, the New York Times noted that “blood libel is a phrase fraught with religious symbolism about the false accusation used by anti-Semites of Jews murdering Christian children.” The NYT said it wasn’t clear whether Ms. Palin was aware of the historical meaning of the phrase. 

And that, of course, is the problem with Palin issuing her own responses from her own studio. As the NYT said, Palin’s video "showed her continued determination to tend to her image on her own terms and under her own control, without responding to questions or appearing in a public forum.”

And obviously, her home studio output is not being vetted by anyone who has even a vague knowledge of appropriate verbiage and/or historical facts. Because, as we know, Sarah Palin is absolutely certain she knows what is best for herself, her family, the nation and the world.

I am fervently hoping wiser heads do not prevail on Palin to listen to their counsel. I can’t wait for the next unsuitable, tasteless, wrong-headed, ill-timed, incorrect and out-of-place video to erupt out of Palin’s home studio. The spin generated by frantic Republicans trying to mitigate the political damage Palin’s ignorance causes the GOP, generally has been hilarious.

However, the idea that Palin might listen to an adviser is ridiculous. In Palin’s unstable mental condition, there is no wiser or more informed person in this world or the next than Sarah Palin.