Sarah Palin

Earlier today, William Kristol was sitting alone by the entrance of Michael's checking his Blackberry. Mr. Kristol was there at the behest of the Independent Film Channel to participate in a panel discussion moderated by Arianna Huffington (and featuring Pete Hamill, Chrisopher Buckley, and Mr. Kristol) to help promote The IFC Media Project, a show which aims to take viewers "behind the news," hosted by former MTV Newsman Gideon Yago.

The room was quickly filling up with eager young journalists, spiral notepads blank and at the ready, digital recorders checked once, twice, and stomachs empty and open. (The invitation called for noon-2:30 p.  read more »

Martin Eisenstadt, principal of the Eisenstadt Group and Senior Fellow at The Harding Institute for Freedom and Democracy is on a the mind of a lot of bloggers and cable news talent bookers lately. Apparently Mr. Eisenstadt, as an adviser to Senator John McCain, leaked the story that former G.O.P. Vice Presidential nominee Sarah Palin didn't know that Africa is a continent and not a single country. That bit of news was picked up by many, many media sources including Fox News, whose Carl Cameron's on-air telling of the anecdote Media Mob saw fit to include in a round-up of post-election bashing of Governor Palin. He also spread the rumor that Joe "The Plumber" Wurzelbacher was spotted "canoodling" with Saturday Night Live's Kristen Wiig and that he might appear on The Bachelor. That little story made it to Politico's Shenanigans blog, written by Anne Schroeder Mullins, and then the New York Post on Nov. 4, in a "Campaign Morsels" sidebar that is not online, but was recounted in New York magazine's Daily Intel blog.

And who can forget back in August when Mr. Eisenstadt revealed that Paris Hilton's family was offended with the McCain campaign for an ad that compared Senator Obama to Ms. Hilton and Britney Spears.

This election year, Mr. Eisenstadt has been full of great scoops. He's also been completely full of it.  read more »

After affixing his signature to the Civil Rights Act of 1964, Lyndon Johnson famously quipped that he’d just signed away the South, a prophecy that was affirmed in that year’s election – when Republican Barry Goldwater won five historically Democratic states in the deep South while suffering blowout losses everywhere else – and in elections for decades to come.

In the post-Civil Rights era, Democrats were told over and over that their path to the presidency was basic: Nominate a candidate who could win back the South, or at least part of it. And sure enough, for 40 years after L.B.J., the only victorious Democrats at the presidential level, Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton, were southerners, while one northern liberal after another was shut out in the region – and locked out of the White House.  read more »

Officially, Valerie Jarrett appeared on this morning’s “Meet the Press” to discuss Barack Obama’s transition effort, which she is helping to lead. But hours later, her turn in the national spotlight took on added significance, with the news that Obama apparently wants Jarrett to succeed him in the United States Senate. In hindsight, she might have been auditioning.

Whether Jarrett, a Chicago lawyer and civic leader who has been closely involved in Obama’s entire political career, ends up being elevated to the Senate isn’t, of course, the president-elect’s call. The power of appointment belongs to Illinois’ Democratic governor, Rod Blagojevich. But, presumably, Obama’s recommendation will go a long way.  read more »

Matt Drudge is reporting that Alaska Governor Sarah Palin is giving her first extensive post-election interview to Greta Van Susteren of Fox News, who back in September scored the first post-convention interview with First Dude Todd Palin. That extensive walk-and-talk interview took place at the couple’s scenic house in Wasilla.

"The sniping at Gov. Palin after the election by 'anonymous' sources is rotten,” Ms. Van Susteren wrote on her blog this morning. "I have said over and over and over again, it is our job in journalism to be aggressive in challenging politicians…but it is not right to gratuitously trash someone."

The New York Times features an exhaustive report today on the feuding between the McCain and Palin camps, but it is best savored while listening to Carl Cameron of Fox News Channel, who finally spills what he has been hearing for months from McCain insiders or "folks" as he calls them. This quote proves that Cameron has an unappreciated talent for understatement:

We are told by folks that she didn’t know what countries were in NAFTA – the North American Free Trade Agreement – that being Canada, the US and Mexico. And we’re told she didn’t understand that Africa is a continent rather than just a country just in itself – a whole host of questions that caused serious problems about her knowledgeability.  read more »

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And now the fun part begins.

The New York Times' Elisabeth Bumiller has an A1-promoted story headlined Internal Battles Divided McCain and Palin Camps, in which she reveals all about the Republican candidates' failed bid for the White House. This comes a day after Newsweek broke new ground on the Governor's campaign trail spending spree and Carl Cameron told FOX News (FOX News!) that the woman New York Times columnist Bill Kristol favorably compared to Andrew Jackson didn't know what countries were in NAFTA or that Africa is a continent. (This clip comes via Andrew Sullivan.)  read more »

Facing reporters the day after she and John McCain went down to defeat, Sarah Palin professed not to be thinking much about the next presidential election.

“2012 sounds so far off,” she said.

Of course, that’s exactly the kind of answer that any potential presidential candidate is supposed to give now and for the next two years or so – until the 2010 midterm elections signal the more formal start of the next White House campaign cycle.  read more »

And make no mistake: the race is very much underway, and it has been for some time. In fact, there’s already been

Now that the election is finally (finally!) over, we can rest easy knowing that Sarah Palin will return to the backwoods of Alaska never to be heard from again. Ha! As if! The Alaskan governor has come too far and gained too much notoriety to just simply accept running a non-continental state. As Tina Fey so hilarious stated last weekend, Ms. Palin is never going back. But while we aren't sure if the most polarizing figure in the country will ever become the "White Oprah" (don't you have to be even moderately likeable to accomplish that?), Ms. Palin could easily have a ginormously successful television career if she so wanted.  read more »

A little after 7 p.m. at the Old Town Bar and Restaurant on E. 18th Street, where a casual after-work crowd had gathered for some election-night boozing, one of Old Town’s co-owners, Gerard Meagher, whose family has owned the place for decades, walked towards the back of the bar, ordered a fine Scotch malt whiskey, and started talking politics.

“We’re probably the only place in New York that has Fox News on,” joked the 56-year-old Mr. Meagher, who, on this unseasonably warm evening, was wearing his customary outfit of tan shorts and brown loafers without socks. The three-inch McCain-Palin button affixed to the lapel of his navy blue blazer was an unmissable clue as to which candidate he had voted for earlier in the day at a polling station on 50th Street where, he said, he had to wait in line for more than an hour to cast his ballot.  read more »

Madonna and Alex Rodriguez took seperate helicopters to Jerry and Jessica Seinfeld's house in East Hampton. The two couples stayed for four hours before all returning in the same helicopter. [P6]

Ivana Trump has been spending time with 23-year-old Belgian model Marius Rusovici while her new husband, Rossano Rubicondi, films a reality show in Italy. [P6]

In an effort to save money, Tracy Morgan says he has given up strip clubs. His plan to make up for the loss involves telling his next wife "to get on the bed and put big [underwear] on and throw $400 at her -- then take the money back and go food shopping." [R&M]  read more »

WILLIAMSPORT, Pa. – As Sarah Palin shook hands and blew kisses and signed signs after delivering her stump speech on a baseball field here on the evening of Oct. 30, Diane Taylor stood on the pitcher’s mound and wondered what might have been if John McCain didn’t hold back the Republican ticket.

“I think youth and energy are what sweeps people into the White House,” said Taylor, a 42-year-old mother from Williamsport. “John McCain could have done a lot more with this campaign and she wanted to do more but they never let her loose.”

She pointed at her daughters, who were watching Palin wave goodbye to the crowd before hopping on another flight and starting another day of campaigning in Pennsylvania.  read more »

Last night William Kristol, erstwhile brain to Vice President Dan Quayle, Republican vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin's most ardent admirer, and—when he has some time—editor of The Weekly Standard and once-weekly columnist for The New York Times, appeared on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart last night.

Mr. Kristol mostly just laughed at his own jokes and squeaked, but he did have a semi-serious point to make about this highly contentious campaign: "It's not a psychodrama; it's just an election." (Just an election. Don't we all feel silly now.)

The editor and columnist maintained that on Election Day there will be an "upset" and that Republican nominee John McCain and Governor Palin will "win huge." (The audience loved that.) Mr. Stewart called that outcome "heartbreaking"; Mr. Kristol countered that it would be "inspiring."

Strangely, Mr. Kristol managed to take a shot at his own paper, telling his host, "You're reading The New York Times too much, Jon." As Mr. Stewart attempted to point out that Mr. Kristol sort of writes for that paper, his guest cut in, "Oh, it's a very fine newspaper." Adding, "On one day of the week."  read more »

Writing in The New York Times' Caucus blog last night (and in print today), Magdelina Sharpe reports on the Governor Sarah Palin costume bubble which appears to be bursting.

According to Ms. Sharpe:

Ms. Palin, the governor of Alaska and Republican vice-presidential nominee, is turning out to be one of the most popular costume figures this Halloween season — and not just for women. And while a $22.99 “Miss Alaska” kit, consisting of a pageant sash (Miss Alaska on one side, Miss Vice-President on the other) and eyeglasses, is a hot item at Ricky’s Halloween Costume Superstore in Manhattan — they say they have sold at least 600 in three weeks — many people are saying they prefer to do it themselves.  read more »

When the news that George W. Bush had been reelected began to pour in around 10:30 p.m. on Nov. 4, 2004, Justin Krebs, a 30-year-old political organizer who lives in Hell’s Kitchen, was driving up the New Jersey Turnpike after a day of last-minute canvassing for John Kerry in Philadelphia. This year, he’s even more anxious about being stuck in transit.

“Everyone who saw Neil Armstrong land on the moon remembers where they were when they were watching the coverage,” said Mr. Krebs, “and now everyone wants to know where they will be the moment this election is decided.”

 read more »

Ana Marie Cox, former Washington Editor of Radar, conducted a long interview with CBS News political analyst-turned-McCain-Palin campaign advisor Nicolle Wallace for Tina Brown and Barry Diller's Web site, The Daily Beast. (The Observer's Felix Gillette spoke with Ms. Wallace earlier this month.)

Early on, Ms. Wallace jokes that she walks her dog, Lily, "in Central Park with a group of wonderful, flaming liberals who I love and I love their dogs," but soon enough, Ms. Cox gets down to some serious questioning:

What are the media lessons people can learn from this election?

I think the networks have re-emerged as the arbiters of what story gets through.  read more »

In early October, The View's Elisabeth Hasselbeck denied rumors that she was considering moving to Fox News. But today on the show, during an interview with Richard Dreyfuss, Ms. Hasselbeck—who recently stumped for Sarah Palin in Florida—quipped that she'd "like" to work for Fox News' Sean Hannity.

In a clip provided by the Huffington Post, Mr. Dreyfuss describes working for W. director Oliver Stone by saying, "Imagine working for Sean Hannity."

As Mr. Dreyfuss pauses to let that image sink in, Ms. Hasselbeck chimes in, "I would like that!"

"Would you?" The actor asks. "Then you'd like working for Oliver... You know, you can be a fascist even when you're on the left."

Fox News' newly-reupped host Bill O'Reilly appeared on Late Show with David Letterman last night.

As you may recall, Mr. O'Reilly and Mr. Letterman didn't get along so well when they met in 2006, but this time, the two got on just fine, making small jokes at each others' expense but smiling the whole time.

Mr. O'Reilly told Mr. Letterman he admired vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin, describing her as a "self-made woman" and offering an impersonation of ABC News' Charlie Gibson interviewing her about The Bush Doctrine.   read more »

Writing a post-mortem for John McCain’s presidential candidacy would be premature. But if and when that moment comes next week, toxic staff infection will be listed as a primary cause of death.

Rarely has any national campaign suffered from the combination of oafish incompetence and transparent malice displayed by the little coterie of operatives who surround the Republican nominee. They continue to damage his reputation and theirs, even as they attempt to escape blame for the campaign’s declining prospects.

Now these geniuses seem to think they can offload the responsibility for their mistakes onto Sarah Palin, which would be like Doctor Frankenstein trying to blame everything on the poor monster.  read more »

Right up until the very end of the 1980 campaign, when polls still showed Jimmy Carter running even with Ronald Reagan despite high unemployment and inflation and fading national confidence, it was taken as an article of faith among Democrats – and more than a few establishment Republicans – that the country would never turn to a candidate as “extreme” as Reagan. Election Day disabused them of this notion: Reagan won 44 states and his party posted a stunning gain of 12 Senate seats.

The New Deal and Great Society philosophies had become victims of their own success, as the new suburban masses, liberated from the dependence on government that had marked their parents’ lives, revolted against high taxes, big government and the Democratic Party that had come to symbolize them.  read more »

Here's a write-up by Observer intern Lien Hoang of a visit by Republican Senator Chuck Hagel to the Columbia campus on Friday:  read more »

As you probably know by now, Ashley Todd, the Texas woman who claimed she was attacked in Pittsburgh and had a 'B' scratched in her face because of her support of Senator John McCain was lying.

There had been doubts expressed about her story from the moment it broke on the Drudge Report yesterday, including from conservative commentator Michelle Malkin, but the strongest statement came last night from Fox News' executive vice president, John Moody, who wrote on his FOX Forum blog:

If the incident turns out to be a hoax, Senator McCain’s quest for the presidency is over, forever linked to race-baiting.  read more »

Last night, we learned that The View's token conservative hostess, Elisabeth Hasselbeck, will join Sarah Palin on the stump in Florida this weekend. The move promises to be beneficial for everyone involved--Ms. Hasselbeck will have the opportunity to stand alongside her idol in a semi-official capacity, Ms. Palin will pick up a few tips on how to weather liberal attacks, and the sight of the adorable pair frolicking down the campaign trail will surely be enough to inspire any wavering (straight male) Republicans to stick with the ticket come Nov. 4.

But did Ms. Palin have something else in mind when she invited the former Survivor contestant to join her this weekend? It seems she may have been looking for career advice.  read more »

Victoria Beckham has landed the cover of Vogue India's November issue, wearing a pink sari and a fancy headress. [Vogue UK]

Sarah Palin's campaign spokesperson insisted that the entire $150,000 wardrobe the RNC purchased for the vice presidential nominee will be donated to charity after the campaign. [WWD]

Meanwhile, when Ms. Palin appeared on Saturday Night Live, she could not understand why she had to wear the same outfit as Tina Fey rather than one of her own new fancy outfits. [WWD]  read more »

The Los Angeles Times' Matea Gold points us towards this video of The View's Elisabeth Hasselbeck looking absolutely ecstatic to be campaigning in Florida for Republican vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin this weekend.

"I'm more than honored to be there," Ms. Hasselbeck says with palpable excitement in her voice.

Lindsay Lohan's guest appearance on Ugly Betty was cut from six episodes to four because of trouble on the set. Issues included ego clashes with star America Ferrera, the size of Ms. Lohan's entourage, and a de-pantsing incident. People on set were also bothered by Ms. Lohan's tendency to "obsessively cut pictures of herself out of the tabloids like she was creating some sort of scrapbook." [P6]

Among the things Sarah Palin doesn't know: who Oliver Stone is. [R&M, second item]

Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes have been buying up a bunch of separate apartments in a building in the East Village, where Tom is friendly to the neighbors and Katie "keeps her head down." [P6]  read more »

The biggest knock on Joe Biden, back when Barack Obama was still mulling his running-mate options, was his propensity to commit gaffes. And in the two months since he was chosen, Biden has in many ways lived up to his reputation for indiscipline – particularly this week, as his prediction that a President Obama would be tested by a "generated" international crisis has given the G.O.P. an opening to stoke fears about Obama's seasoning.

Obama, who surrounded himself on Wednesday with a collection of reassuring national security graybeards, certainly didn't seem pleased to be answering Republican charges that his own running mate has doubts about his experience and preparation (even though Biden made a point of saying that Obama has "a spine of steel") while media outlets trotted out the "best of" Biden gaffe reels that they reserve for such occasions.  read more »

Team Sarah Palin has reportedly spent $150,000 at Saks Fifth Avenue, Neiman Marcus, and Barneys since early September to dress and accessorize the vice-presidential candidate for her public appearances. [Vogue UK]

Kate Moss often ducks into Topshop stores in disguise to see how her line for the store is selling. [Vogue UK] 

P. Diddy is buying Enyce from from Liz Claiborne, Inc. for $20 million. [The Cut via WWD]  read more »

Did you know that you could've been John McCain's running mate? If this quote from "a friend" of Senator McCain's campaign C.E.O. Rick Davis in Robert Draper's New York Times Magazine article this week is to be believed, "The way you pick a vice president is, you get a frame of Time magazine, and you put the pictures of the people in that frame. You look at who fits that frame best — that’s your V. P."

On December 25, 2006, Time helpfully printed a novelty cover with a mylar mirror when they declared "You" the magazine's coveted "Person of the Year."

Unfortunately, Governor Sarah Palin didn't list Time among the "vast variety of sources" she reads during her interview with CBS News' Katie Couric in September, so we'll never know if she saw herself reflected in Time's plastic mirror.

This has been a bellwether month for Lorne Michaels. Not only has Saturday Night Live seen its ratings rise some 161 percent from a year ago, but Mr. Michaels has been doing more interviews than the political figures his show regularly mocks. Lorne actually has talking points now! Seriously! He must have uttered the sentence "the audience cast Tina [Fey as Sarah Palin]" some thirty times to date. (Mr. Michaels says that more than Sarah Palin has said "I told congress thanks, but no thanks on that Bridge to Nowhere.")

The latest "exclusive" interview with the SNL Grand Poobah over at  read more »

LAKE WORTH, Fla.—At a panel discussion about the economy on Oct. 21, Democratic governors from swing states, a captain of industry and a former Fed chairman flanked Barack Obama behind a desk with a sign that said “Growing American Jobs.”

They shared their ideas on taxes, energy and housing with him, and more than one of the panelists at the event, which was held in an overheated gym, told Mr. Obama they needed a “partner in the White House.”

Mr. Obama and his advisers are already thinking along those lines.

With exactly two weeks left before the election, Mr.  read more »

It was an unseasonably warm evening in a courtyard behind a midtown dive bar called Rudy’s, and a casual after-work crowd of Obamaphiles was bathed in the light of a Florida State football game projected on the wall, talking politics over $9 pitchers of beer. The mood was festive, anticipatory, measured. With just a dash of paranoia.

“I’m cautiously optimistic,” said Josh Bolotsky, 24, a Columbia grad who lives in Astoria and works for Living Liberally, the progressive networking association that had organized the gathering. He was wearing a black T-shirt that advertised the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute. “Anything can happen in the last two weeks.  read more »

Today, Drew Griffin landed CNN's first interview with Alaska Governor Sarah Palin. The fifteen minute interview, which took place in Reno, Nevada, is currently being replayed on each hour of CNN's Situation Room.

Not long ago, we interviewed Mr. Griffin about his trip to Wasilla, Alaska, where he had travelled to work on the CNN documentary Sarah Palin Revealed.

“There was no shortage of color,” Mr. Griffin told us at the time.

The New Republic performed a service for journalists and bloggers the world over by posting Jacob Weisberg's oft-cited March 12th 1990 article "The Veep's Keeper" in which he dubbed then-chief of staff to the vice president William Kristol "Dan Quayle's Brain." (Mr. Weisberg's article comes via a post by Christopher Orr on TNR's blog The Plank.)

The piece is a little dated—references to John Sununu and the invasion of Panama are unlikely to ring bells with younger readers—but it definitely sheds some light on Mr. Kristol, who is now a New York Times columnist who writes spectacularly pro-Sarah Palin columns for the paper and shows his fondness for the Republican vice presidential nominee in his magazine, The Weekly Standard, and during TV appearances.  read more »

In early September when Robert Thomson and Tina Gaudoin revealed The Wall Street Journal's luxury insert WSJ. at a lavish breakfast for reporters at the Morgan Library, Mr. Thomson, the paper's managing editor and editor in chief of Dow Jones & Company boasted:

'The eschatological angst that characterizes much of the newspaper industry does not define Dow Jones. You'll see when the next round of circulation figures are released just how robust, how rosy our sales are.'

Mr. Thomson had good reason to be confident that morning: His new magazine had an article about Alaska Governor Sarah Palin just days after she was tapped to be the Republican vice presidential nominee.  read more »

TAMPA—Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama stood together behind a podium as another enormous crowd for the Democratic nominee chanted “Yes We Can” over and over again at an outdoor rally in Orlando on the afternoon of Oct. 20.

“Not only that,” Clinton interrupted the nearly 50,000 supporters. “Yes we will!”

Her version didn’t catch on, just as it didn’t during the end of the primaries, when she adopted it as a last-ditch riposte to Obama’s. But besides some recycled lines from her protracted battle against Obama, there was little reminder of the strained past between the two Democrats and Clinton enthusiastically made the case for Obama on the stump.  read more »

If you are anything like us—it's O.K. if you're not!—you like to keep abreast of the long-running soap ope