Thursday, May 26, 2011

Quittin' Ain't Defeat

Why is everyone (example here) pretending that a new straight-to-landfill film about Sharia Plain signals the Alaskan Dumbass' intention to run for President? The trigger for this speculation is a puffer at the right-wing Real Clear Politics site, which pimps the film with book report quality prose such as the following:

If [Palin] does decide to run, "The Undefeated" [sic] will be the key element to her initial coming-out party. The film's impending release -- and the frenzied media attention that it is sure to generate -- will serve as a vivid wake-up call that despite the many obstacles in front of her, Palin's entry into the race would turn the campaign on its head in an instant, just as it did in 2008.

Wait, where's the vivid snooze button? Ah... here it is:

Over the next hour, the crux of the narrative is taken over by Palin's Alaska backers, with former spokesperson Meg Stapleton and attorney Tom Van Flein leading the charge. Other more unfamiliar faces who uphold Palin's Alaska legacy include former Wasilla Deputy Mayor Judy Patrick, former gas pipeline adviser Marty Rutherford, longtime confidantes Kristan Cole and Judy Patrick, and former state Sen. Gene Therriault -- one of the few Alaska legislators who has remained vocal and consistent in his praise of Palin.

What, no spoiler alert?

Nothing generates electoral excitement like headshots and soundbites of and from a candidate's shyster, former mouthpiece and pipeline adviser.

And if that wasn't exciting enough:

As the documentary transitions to Palin's ascent to statewide office, it dramatizes the culture of corruption that permeated Alaska, with images of fat men smoking cigars in dark rooms and the infamous Suite 604 at the Baranof Hotel in Juneau, where the FBI secretly videotaped executives of the oil services company VECO in a corruption scandal that would shake the foundations of Alaska government just as Palin was making a name for herself as an ethics crusader.

I'm not sure why poorly-lit shots of Rush Limbaugh and a hotel room door would encourage anyone to vote for Palin (who didn't work for the FBI), particularly since Palin fled her office to avoid accountability while under investigation for ethics charges against her.

Apart from the crappiness of the film itself, the film isn't a Palin product. So why would it tell us about anything about Palin's plans? Palin didn't even bother to cooperate with the making of this magnum dopus, leaving the filmmaker to recycle audio from Palin's audiobook. (And we all know how riveting audiobook readings can be.)

Whether Palin runs is the guess of anyone who cares to guess about such things, but the fact that some deep-pocketed wingnut nobody decided to make a fanfic film about Palin last year, and is now promoting it, says nothing about Palin's present plans.

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