Ed Brayton is a journalist, commentator and speaker. He is the co-founder and president of 
The website Conservatives4Palin (apparently named by Prince) offers a top ten list of reasons why Sarah Palin is qualified to be president. Here's all you need to know about that list: "Ten years volunteer work in the Parent-Teacher-Association" is second.
Makes you wonder what #3 is, doesn't it? "Two years pro-life advocacy." But this is my favorite part. Number five on the list is "Two and a half years governing the largest state in America." Of course, it's the smallest state by population (or very close to it). Apparently, governing empty land is valuable experience. But this is the punchline:
As her state's chief executive, Palin not only oversaw 15,000 state employees and a $12 billion budget, she was immersed in the threats facing our nation as her state is the first line of defense against rogue ballistic and nuclear weapons that might be fired from North Korea or the former Soviet Union.
Now that's using creative language to make the fact that she can see Russia from her breakfast nook sound like serious preparation. She was "immersed in the threats facing our nation"? Seriously? They make it sound like she was manning a Patriot missile battery just waiting for a rogue ICBM to come flying by. But wait, it gets better:
Had Palin served out her natural term, and ran for re-election, the chorus of "is she qualified" would have been mollified by her overwhelming accomplishments and an acceptably completed term in office...Unfortunately, she stepped down 16 months shy of a full term. When you look at that as a percentage, however, Palin actually served two-thirds of her term ... the precise percentage Barack Obama served of his term in the senate.
You have to love what they leave out of this creative prose. Like the fact that she quit and offered a mind-numbingly idiotic and contradictory excuse for doing so. And the fact that Obama didn't finish his term because he was elected president, while she quit to do a reality TV show.
This is what happens when you simply shut off your cognitive processes and become a mindless cheerleader.
Politics
Comments
Sounds like a poe.
Posted by: Disturbingly Openminded | November 24, 2010 11:14 AM
My first thought was "gotta be a joke." But the distance between 'joke' and 'reality' has reeeeeaaally shrunk in the last couple of years. Well, since Palin has been on the scene, now that I think of it.
Posted by: Equisetum | November 24, 2010 11:16 AM
Is it true, or is it a joke? Yes.
Posted by: Herod the Freemason | November 24, 2010 11:21 AM
While this is old cold war stuff, look at the list of locations for Nike Missle bases:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Nike_missile_locations
While there are a few in Alaska, they were there to protect targets *in* Alaska. She has no more experience in this than the governors of California or Florida.
Posted by: KeithB | November 24, 2010 11:30 AM
They have cognitive processes? You're being too kind.
Posted by: Owen | November 24, 2010 11:34 AM
Actually, aside from one little insignificant corner, Canada is your first line of defense, Sarah. And we get to die for it. When the U.S. detects launches, and launch their own counter-measures, guess where they meet? You're welcome.
Posted by: Frac | November 24, 2010 11:37 AM
Well, doing half a job is better than doing no job at all. Amirite?
Posted by: Deepsix | November 24, 2010 11:38 AM
Let me get this straight:
(1) Palin's actual executive experience as governor of Alaska is midway down the list.
(2) The second-place reason is ten years on the PTA.
(3) The people who put up that site actually think she had anything to do with US defence installations in place in Alaska.
(4) They also resort to the weaselly use of "former Soviet Union".
Makes me wonder what the people who wrote up the list decided was the top reason.
Actually, never mind, I don't want to know.
Posted by: Composer99 | November 24, 2010 11:41 AM
not just "empty land", but a state in which a significant portion either still belongs to the federal government (national parks, national forests, national reserves), or native american tribes.
aside from oil (with windfall profits given away to the state residents, though that can't possibly be socialism, can it?), building projects (paid for by federal earmarks, which they then rant against back here in the lower 48), and bitching about the national parks until the tourism dollars start flowing, there really isn't much for ANYBODY to do up there, is there?
Posted by: Joe Shelby | November 24, 2010 11:46 AM
Well, it's relevant experience - if she becomes ever becomes president, the U.S. is likely to turn into a deserted wasteland in no time at all.
Posted by: Phillip IV | November 24, 2010 11:47 AM
Palins' supporters are just tired of having the country run by a small number of out-of-touch, pampered, privileged elites who think they're better than the rest of us. They would prefer that it be run by a small number of out-of-touch, pampered, privileged elites who are plainly seen to be no better than the rest of us in any respect.
Posted by: DaveL | November 24, 2010 11:48 AM
Wait...I thought things like volunteering were bad. Like Obama bad. Community organizer, PTA volunteer, raging anti-colonial Islmao-marxist. I would have thought her volunteerism would have been swept quietly under the rug, never to be heard of again. Becasue, as we all know, empathy is what leads to Hitler.
Posted by: mark boggs | November 24, 2010 11:49 AM
The quality of people who surround Ms. Palin are equivalent to her qualifications. Unfortunately this plays into her argument she's "one of us", we'll at least those of us who are real Americans which includes me because I'm white, live in a small town and hunt (though I gotta keep my mouth shut).
Who would have thought decades ago we'd observe spectacular car crashes by Palin and her peers where 30% of the country and their leaders would claim that no, no car crashes here, just a smooth running highway with everyone on cruise control.
I've been monitoring her new book and it appears Ms. Palin is still reliant on the 2008 campaign rhetoric while comparing the President to a misrepresentation of what he was he first graduated from college. The inability to even acknowledge reality and get millions of people to join you in an alternate one is perhaps an illusion beyond any done by a professional magician.
Posted by: Michael Heath | November 24, 2010 11:53 AM
As her state's chief executive, Palin not only oversaw 15,000 state employees and a $12 billion budget, she was immersed in the threats facing our nation as her state is the first line of defense against rogue ballistic and nuclear weapons that might be fired from North Korea or the former Soviet Union.
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
Soviet Union? Did they not get the memo that a) the Cold War is over b) America won! USA USA USA! and ergo 3) that we don't have to hide under our blankies sucking our thumb worrying about nuclear armageddon from the Commies anymore? I mean, yeah, Russia has nukes and that's worrisome, but it's just not the threat that it used to be. And it hasn't been since at least a decade before this potato with legs became governor. That such an idiot could be elected to dog catcher is far scarier than any ambitions Vladimir Putin has for world domination, IMHO. At least he isn't a fucking moron.
As for North Korea, they wouldn't care fuck all about Alaska. Kim Jong-il is crazy, but he's not stupid. He'd go after Seoul or Tokyo before he'd come after America--he's more likely to hit his targets. Even if he went for America, why the fuck would he care about Alaska? He doesn't have to cross Alaskan air space to get anywhere near San Francisco or Los Angeles, and they're the kind of targets a fanatical power freak would go after, to make the most impact on his enemy.
Are these people really so fucking stupid?
Oh wait.
They're Palin supporters. Of course they are.
Posted by: Aquaria | November 24, 2010 12:02 PM
DaveL:
I'm very confident that if Ms. Palin were Mayor of Wasilla and interviewing to be an administrative assistant* in the groups I managed, she would fail to make it past the initial interview (e.g., lower level managers). I see her as one of the very lucky few who made it in spite of having few discernable talents coupled to a total lack of character.
*In the framing I present here this is the lowest paid clerical job in these groups with secretarial duties which doesn't require a college education but the ability to interface in a professional manner, read, write, and have good MS Office computer skills. All the AA's I worked with were far more capable than Ms. Palin, not even close. That includes their administrative skills.
Posted by: Michael Heath | November 24, 2010 12:06 PM
Sarah Palin has caused me to rethink my lifelong atheism. If she isn't proof that there is a Hell and we're heading straight for it, I don't know what is.
Posted by: Observer | November 24, 2010 12:12 PM
I can't bring myself to visit the web site. Is one of her qualifications that she had a down syndrome baby at age 40?
Observer, we'll know when the apocalypse is coming when Charlie Sheen and Lindsay Lohan have a baby together.
Posted by: Tommkey | November 24, 2010 12:16 PM
Canada is your first line of defense, Sarah. And we get to die for it.
Thank you for that. And thank you also for taking Randy Quaid off our hands.
Posted by: Herod the Freemason | November 24, 2010 12:22 PM
- but you've got Celine Dion now.
MWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!
Posted by: T. Bruce McNeely | November 24, 2010 12:30 PM
Just fired up Google Earth to confirm that the West Coast is closer to North Korea than about 98% of Alaska. If North Korea fires up a missile, are they really going to aim it at the Aleutians? Maybe C4P thinks that the North Koreans are going to invade the US through Alaska the way that Hitler invaded France through the Ardennes.
Posted by: Alan B. | November 24, 2010 1:10 PM
Simple math. People who agree with me = people who are qualified to be President.
Posted by: Shay | November 24, 2010 1:15 PM
If fluff is important in a president she could easily become a great president.
Posted by: Les Lane | November 24, 2010 1:18 PM
Ed - where on their site is the list? Don't link to it if you don't want to, but I can't find it. Friday on a Wednesday and all, y'know....
Posted by: Coragyps | November 24, 2010 1:19 PM
When I read the title of this post, I expected to find a blank entry when I clicked on it from my reader. Boy oh boy was I surprised to find words underneath it.
Posted by: Dennis N | November 24, 2010 1:32 PM
"Apparently, governing empty land is valuable experience"
This reminds me of, if I remember correctly, W. Bush's first 'election.' I caught Mary Matalin on CNN basking in how many counties in the flyover states went to Bush. If parcels of land voted, she might have had a point, but when one actually looked at the numberfs, they, of course, told a different story.
So yes, empty land is very important to conservatives, only insofar as they can use it as an argument about how great their people are. Conservatism=dirt.
Posted by: derwood | November 24, 2010 1:33 PM
I couldn't find the article and I want to know what they consider #1 to be. Can anyone provide a link?
Posted by: Michael Suttkus, II | November 24, 2010 1:38 PM
@20: You are mistaken. (Google Earth uses a Mercator projection, which exaggerates distances at high latitudes.)
Seoul to Anchorage is 6,000km, Seoul to Seattle is 8,300km, and Seoul to Los Angeles 9,500km.
The great circle route from Seoul to Los Angeles crosses the Aleutians. The great circle route from Seoul to Seattle passes over the base of the Alaska Peninsula. (This is why volcanic eruptions in Alaska disrupt air travel between America and Asia.)
Posted by: Stewart Hinsley | November 24, 2010 1:47 PM
You people are missing the forest for the trees. Palin is eminently qualified to be President, if you follow this logic.
1. America is the land of opportunity.
2. The biggest opportunist is qualified to be President
3. Being named as McCains's VP running mate presented a huge opportunity.
4. In America, everybody gets their 15 minutes of fame
5. Remaining as Governor after losing the election would have sent her back to obscurity, with her 15 minutes expired.
5. Resigning her position as Governor, keeping her face in the limelight with 3 (count-em, 3) books, a Reality TV show and countless appearances endorsing candidates and collecting speaking fees, extended her 15 minutes of fame.
6. Sarah Palin is an opportunist par excellence, and should be rewarded with the plum job of President.
Posted by: Spanish Inquisitor | November 24, 2010 1:53 PM
Coragyps:
http://www.conservatives4palin.com/2010/11/10-qualifications-sarah-palin-has-over.html
First 5 of 10. Can't wait for the next ones. 9 - "Knows her ABCs", 10 - "Can repeatedly get spoon into mouth unassisted."
Posted by: Michael Heath | November 24, 2010 2:00 PM
web address for article (hoping I did the html correctly):
I found it only by searching for "PTA".
http://www.conservatives4palin.com/2010/11/10-qualifications-sarah-palin-has-over.html#comments,
Posted by: Disturbingly Openminded | November 24, 2010 2:03 PM
Our local paper had a letter to the editor today, making the point (!) that Palin's experience matches favorably with Obama's. Their take on her quitting? She had the honesty to quit, rather than (as Obama did), stay on the gummint benefits while campaigning instead of actively being a senator.
You know, like Palin quit during the campaign. Oh, wait.
Posted by: Cuttlefish | November 24, 2010 2:07 PM
"This is what happens when you simply shut off your cognitive processes and become a mindless cheerleader."
The Amurikan Dream(tm)...
Posted by: Seamus Ruah | November 24, 2010 2:07 PM
Those were the days, weren't they? Your basic authoritarian paradise, and with any luck we can have it back again.
Restoring honor! Take back America!
Posted by: D. C. Sessions | November 24, 2010 2:25 PM
Sarah Palin sees elitism behind GOP swipes aimed at her
Elitism - or competence?
Posted by: Herod the Freemason | November 24, 2010 2:41 PM
Thanks, MH and DO. Have you read the comments there? Do you think they filter them much?
Posted by: Coragyps | November 24, 2010 2:59 PM
They should update the site to note that she is also the mother of the "Dancing
with the Stars" runner-up contestant. That should probably be about #4 or #5 on the list.
Posted by: peter | November 24, 2010 3:15 PM
I love that on the left hand side bar of the website, there is a picture of Regan and Palin, with the caption: Past and Future.
It really is appropriate, since he went out of government being so delusional that he couldn't differentiate between reality and the movie roles he played. Palin has the advantage of being delusional right from the start.
Posted by: Tobinius | November 24, 2010 3:19 PM
@KeithB #4: Good research. I had wondered about that as soon as I read it, i.e. whether Alaska really did have an important strategic role in the batshit-crazy-but-what-else-can-you-really-do MAD policy. (Not that it would have mattered, since even if it did have an important role, it would be run by the federal government...but I was curious)
Posted by: James Sweet | November 24, 2010 3:24 PM
Coragyps:
I pretty confident they censor not just comments which are critical of Ms. Palin, but any that don't treat Ms. Palin as a goddess and her blogger as an angel. All the comments in this thread that I skimmed through were incredibly laudatory. We also know that Ms. Palin's Facebook page censors critical comments.
Posted by: Michael Heath | November 24, 2010 3:49 PM
The woman who runs Conservatives4Palin is a paid adviser to the Snowbilly herself. The site, for all intents and purposes, is yet another outlet in Palin's one way media strategy.
So this is a bit more than fans of Palin making up a cute list of her qualifications. It is essentially one of many arguments she would make herself about what qualifies her to be president, were the list not so patently absurd.
Posted by: Fallsroad | November 24, 2010 3:58 PM
It appears they think grammar is elitist, too.
Posted by: Zeno | November 24, 2010 7:09 PM
She has just announced that North Korea is one of our allies... dear dog, help us!
Posted by: Athena | November 24, 2010 8:25 PM
A nuke fired from Russia, targeted on Washington D.C. will pass over Greenland and Canada...nowhere near Alaska.
Unless you are a flat earther...which is something we can't rule out for Palindrones.
Posted by: Ick of the East | November 24, 2010 9:27 PM
I think we are glossing over an important detail. According to her list of qualifications, Alaska would be the first line of defense against "rogue ballistic and nuclear weapons". The way I interpret that, it means that under the leadership of Sarah Palin, Alaska was uniquely qualified to detect if some ill minded terrorist, operating outside of the normal controls of North Korea or the USSR, was launching a missile at one of the North American population centers by way of Alaska. Clearly, she would have seen it coming from her breakfast nook and order the appropriate evasive action - duck and cover.
Posted by: tassilo | November 24, 2010 9:44 PM
She has two qualifications: A pair of 34D's. Just ask John McCain who couldn't keep his eyes off 'em...
Posted by: TomTallis | November 24, 2010 10:31 PM
@#38
Alaska does have an unusually important role in the United States' current missile defense program. While the old Nike line of programs had multitudes of sites in a multitude of states, the Ground-based Midcourse Defense (GMD) program only has two interceptor launch sites. The 49th Missile Defense Battalion mans the primary launch site at Fort Greely in Alaska. They are purely an Alaska Army National Guard unit. The outfit that provides the duty personnel for the other launch site, Vandenberg, is based in Colorada, and is a mix of Guardsmen and full-time troops. I think Vandenberg is intended more as a convenient, fair weather test site with a load of missile expertise already on site. Greely is more of a pure-play operational facility.
For the majority of American targets of a ballistic launch from the Korean peninsula, the flight path will cross over some part of Alaska. North Korea is still unlikely to have the range to deliver a nuclear weapon via ballistic missile to the continental US, but if they make incremental improvements in range, the first targets that become viable will all have flight paths directly over Alaska. The slightly longer range flights to east coast targets would still be coming over the top of the world on the Alaska side of the pole and within kill range of Greely interceptors.
In short, Fort Greely is the primary launch site for our current ABM program. Palin was high up on the organizational chart for the outfit that mans the launch site. This still does not mean she had any real oversight or insight into that facility -- nor anything connected to launch detection, targeting, or actual launch authority.
Posted by: Sean | November 24, 2010 10:58 PM
All I know is we must take the launch codes away from Todd.
The last thing we need is another little Palinista scooting over the bear fur in the Palin manse.
We already have enough to worry about from the Bush twins and Jeb's evil spawn.*
* Admittedly, one election of a Palin would make all that moot. There would be nothing left -- after she heeded the first half of her first term before hearing the call of the Lower 48 States of Jesusistan -- to argue over.
Posted by: Fifth Dentist | November 24, 2010 11:26 PM
16 months short of a full term.
And about 26 cards shy of a full deck. . .
Posted by: gene | November 24, 2010 11:41 PM
Fixed it for you.
Posted by: Azkyroth | November 25, 2010 12:32 AM
What's #1? "Has b00bs"?
Posted by: MadScientist | November 25, 2010 1:08 AM
@Athena #42: Yes, it was a Freudian slip. She was sent by Kim Jong Il to destabilize the USA with her whackaloonery. Think about it: she's as delusional and loony as Kim, isn't she?
Posted by: MadScientist | November 25, 2010 1:37 AM
I just thank God that there are no US states that North Korea could possibly target (if it ever got the capability and the will) that skip Alaska's defense perimeter completely.
Posted by: Modusoperandi | November 25, 2010 2:39 AM
@Sean #46:
Was she? As I understand it, she had no place in the National Guard org chart at all; as governor, she was entitled to mobilise the guard for civil emergencies, but that is it. For all military purposes, the line of command runs from the President down through the military command. I can't see that ABMs have much purpose in civil emergencies.
Posted by: Robin Levett | November 25, 2010 7:57 AM
That woman isn't smart enough to run a 7/11 let alone the world's most powerful nation.
Posted by: William George | November 25, 2010 9:47 AM
@#53
The relationship between the federal government and state militias is a big long hairy evolved mess. Everything I say here could be nitpicked and argued in court, and often is, from people arguing the relationship is both too close and too loose.
Constitutionally speaking it was pretty lean...
Article 2 Section 2: The President shall be Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States, and of the Militia of the several States, when called into the actual Service of the United States;
Slightly longer Article 1 clauses for Congress about how the purse strings for militias work and the criteria for calling them into federal service.
In the beginning the state militias were very independent and quite separate from federal troops -- excepting when the country was invaded and militia members became federal troopers for the duration of the crisis. In the past one hundred years laws have brought the Guard into an ever tightening relationship with the standing national army and provided more routes for a member of the Guard to find themselves in the regular army. "Congratulations, there is no crisis to call up the Guard as a whole under any existing law, but Corporal Jones, you are on detached duty with the regular army for the next twelve months. Also Corporals Smith, Rodriguez, Redshirt..." Kinda funny how an entire Guard detachment will find themselves bumped up into the big leagues.
Toss in the National Guard Bureau acting as the umbrella organization. Adjunctant Generals. Random bits of Congressional insanity from annual Defense Authorization Acts. The permanent strings between the regular military and the Guard are numerous and thick.
But, the simplest version is that the governor of a state is to their Guardsman what the President is to a member of the regular armed forces so long as that particular Guardsman has not been called up to federal service.
Posted by: Sean | November 25, 2010 12:07 PM
And during my logorrhea, I got distracted and forgot to say that Robin is correct in this case. The 49th is an Alaskan Guard outfit but are called up to federal service.
Not that that is why Palin didn't get insight into national defense policy. No governor becomes neck deep into American military theory and practice just because they have Guardsman with a particular specialty.
Posted by: Sean | November 25, 2010 12:37 PM
Erm, Vandenberg is in COLORADO?? Egads, since when? I mean, I spent my whole life as a Californian and a year at the Ofutt AFB AFSATCOM MCC believing Vandenberg was in California...
Posted by: twincats | November 25, 2010 8:44 PM
Quick, some one updatw Wiki!
Dingo
Posted by: DingoJack | November 25, 2010 9:40 PM
Ed, you faked me out. When I first saw the title of this blog entry, "Palin's Qualifications for President," I assumed that this was going to be one of those posts about The World's Shortest Books.
~David D.G.
Posted by: David D.G. | November 25, 2010 11:18 PM
Palin's quals for being the Prez (using a Republican strategist's 'mindset'):
a) authoritarian (v. much so)
b) Christian (nominally)
c) Republican (v. nominally)
d) lacks brain function
e) large breasts
f) has a pulse
Yep, the perfect candidate for the Party of God. Vote Palin, or she'll send you to the 'naughty step'.
Dingo.
Posted by: DingoJack | November 26, 2010 2:55 AM
@ 59
Everybody knows the world's shortest book is "Great Italian Military Campaigns of the 21st Century."
Posted by: Fifth Dentist | November 26, 2010 4:13 AM
The first five entries appear to be ordered by length of service. Her partial term as governor is out of sequence because it is partial.
BTW: The byline is Nicole Coulter. Oh, noes — there's two of 'em!
The 94 comments are uniformly laudatory (with one or two possible exceptions that might be sarcastic). Michael Heath is probably correct that outright criticism is deleted.
My favorite: "Nicole -- Teriffic (sic) essay! If more people would read this from the MSM, the less ridiculous questions would be asked. It was a pleasure to spend a bit of time with you at the meetup. You are a talented writer."
Shouldn't that be "LSM", as in lamestream media? And that second sentence can be interpreted in two ways.
One recommends voting in this WSJ poll, and someone else laments the fact that you can only vote once.
http://online.wsj.com/community/groups/election-day-684/topics/palin-obama-would-win-2012
Posted by: Chris Winter | November 26, 2010 10:55 AM
twincats:
Is that Ofutt AFB anything like Offutt AFB just outside Omaha, NE? I amember as a child going out to Offutt for Armed Forces Day and seeing lotsa cool killing machines. I actually got sorta stationed there for a month or so before getting discharged (I was home from Germany on Emergency Leave due to my father's terminal illness). I liked the old Martin assembly building, some big ass beams in that sucker.
Posted by: democommie | November 29, 2010 3:18 AM
Fifth Dentist (#61) - "Everybody knows the world's shortest book is "Great
ItalianAmerican Military Campaigns of the 21st Century."Fixed that for ya. (Welcome to the wonderful world of post-colonialism).
;) - Dingo
Posted by: DingoJack | November 29, 2010 6:11 AM
The site is a an echo chamber of self-congratulatory stupidity. Who knew that working in municipaL government was SOOOO much more important than "state legislatures, governorships, and the hallowed halls of Harvard, Yale and the Naval Academy". Mind those darned elites, now!
As for the question "What would she have done in the last 16 months had she remained in office?", heigh-ho for fantasy land, I thought. I mean, simply put, we will never know, correct? However, the questioner supplies the perfect answer, which is; "We can be assured that she wouldn't have been productive".
This will be the hallmark of a Palin administration, if you allow one to happen(you betcha, wink, grin)
Posted by: MacTurk | November 29, 2010 7:43 AM
so lets see, obama's more 2/3 in office as senater only made him qualified because he happened to become elected president, and the fact that he has never displayed his birth certificate makes you wonder if he should even be in office, and beyond that Sarah Palin is more than qualified to become president based solely on the requirements of the office itself, which simply states that the person be at least 35 years old, a natural born citizen of the USA and be a US resident for at least 14 years, hate on her all you want, but she has more sense than the current fool in chief
Posted by: bigalvah123 | November 30, 2010 8:44 AM
You're forgetting the Harvard Law degree and his stint teaching constitutional law at the University of Chicago.
He did, in fact, do just that.
Posted by: DaveL | November 30, 2010 9:08 AM
Re: #57 and #58
Resurrecting a moldy corpse of a thread just to clarify.
The outfit, the 100th Missile Defense Brigade, that mans the missile defense component at Vandenberg in California is based in Colorado. The Colorado brigade sends a small detachment of guardsmen to California.
Posted by: Sean | December 1, 2010 10:27 PM