You left out Siddartha, and that dude who founded the KKK.

Sarah can save our republic and will let us drill for the hundreds of years' worth of oil we have available on our property.

Pelosi went on her vacation/book tour in '08 with gas at $4 when she could have done something.

Punishment is big with the limousine liberals.

Boone Pickens has switched from wind to gas and decries foreign oil without mentioning our technology that will let us get to our oil fast and safely. But what do you expect from someone who threw his children out of his will?

It's such a treat to laugh at some of the (male) wingnuts on here who worship Sarah Palin. We all know the type-male, most likely middle-aged, overweight, underexercised, impotent, totally ineffectual. Hmmmm..can someone say terkoy.

Guys, we all know why you revere Sarah-you want to have sex with her. Ain't gonna happen, ever. Or with anyone, for that matter.

I will quote phrases Fortini, then add my comments, line-by-line. Ready? Here we go...

her bizarre, meandering, apparently self-penned resignation speech -- "bizarre" how? Substantiate. / "self-penned" is a fact you could look into instead of the vague "apparently."

she nearly always had -- use "she often had" to avoid negation of "nearly" and "always"

her manifestly odd desire -- "manifestly" adds nothing to modify "odd"; it's just trendy

she said in her strange, not-quite-clear idiom -- is Palin's idiom almost clear? Why not say "unclear"? / Couldn't you find a more descriptive adjective than "strange"?

But entirely clear to anyone watching -- cut "entirely"; what's the difference between "clear" and "entirely clear"? You're adding verbiage without adding meaning.

her family has been almost unremittingly under siege -- Why "almost"? Was there a gap, and when? You're hedging to cover your lack of confidence in your assertions.

the butt of countless jokes -- This is a cliche; try your own word choice. Even a variation on this would be an improvement.

with her brood gathered once again around her -- "Gathered" and "around her" is either redundant or a split infinitive / You could cut "once" with no loss of meaning.

it seemed implicit that she was leaving -- Turn "seemed" to "was" (by definition anything "implicit" does not merely "seem")

she was leaving, at least in part, to protect them -- Nix "at least" (esp. after already softening statement with "seemed")

One might argue that -- Stilted and distances author from statement. Is this an essay or a report on what others hypothetically think?

From the beginning, she made motherhood -- Why the comma? Subsequent sentence chopped up with commas, making for lumpy reading flow.

Never mind that being a mom didn't actually qualify you to be president -- Didn't? Why past tense? / Cut "actually" as it adds nothing.

the tough mother persona was one we hadn't seen before in a female candidate running at the national level -- There's an awkward passive construction to the entire sentence.

as Todd Purdum put it, rather less charitably -- Why is Purdum's quote uncharitable? Fortini's previous statement was not especially charitable. This phrase adds a sense of erudition but has no meaning.

and for many Americans, it was appealing -- No need for comma here. Fortini has tendency to add commas where she doesn't need them and omit them where she does.

By all counts, someone with her diction -- Cut cliche of "by all counts" (especially as nothing was counted)

someone with her diction and general lack of political knowledge and overweening tendency to get in her own way -- Here you have 3 items separated by "and" instead of the usual form of "x, y, and z." This is grade-school level stuff....WHERE IS THE EDITOR???

and general lack of political knowledge -- Cut "general"; it adds nothing as a modifier.

overweening tendency to get in her own way -- Cut "overweening" ... doesn't add much meaning. Those two words are used together so often, they have become less effective in communicating their concept.

should have been laughed off the national stage a while ago -- Here's another cliche: "laughed off the national stage." You're a WRITER, Forlani! You need to be RUTHLESS about KILLING OFF cliches like this! / Also, you could cut "a while ago" (3 weeks? 3 months? 9 months?) with no loss. It's better to be brief than to be vague.

but Palin has clung on tenaciously -- Another cliche, further compounded by "tenaciously." Just because everybody else matches the same verb with the same adverb doesn't mean you have to.

perhaps because she has tapped into some deep vein of psychodramatic symbolism -- This is a mouthful, which is fine, but you could at least cut "perhaps" (did she tap into it or didn't she? what is author's viewpoint?)

Male candidates, of course, have long emphasized their domestic lives as fathers -- It's unhelpful to say "of course" (if it's so obvious then why are you writing it?) other than to affect a conversational tone.

their domestic lives as fathers -- This approaches redundancy; you could tighten to "their fatherhood" or something

(See numerous staged photos) -- This is a quibble, but staged photos on the campaign trail aren't the same as "their domestic lives," which indicates being at home.

If they weren't pointing to fatherhood as a legitimate qualification for the presidency -- contrary to popular opinion, Palin's appeal to motherhood wasn't this literal-minded, either... -- This sentence is incredibly awkward / What is the "this" in "this literal-minded"? / What "popular opinion" is author referring to? Etc.

they were funneling the image of themselves as a parent -- Metaphor trouble: how do you "funnel" an "image"? / Plural/singular mismatch betwen "themselves" and "a parent"

into a larger, quasi-metaphorical notion of national father figure -- Why "quasi"? A metaphor is a metaphor. / Cut "larger" since reader can figure out that a nation is larger than a family

Our leaders have always been family men. -- Presumptuous and/or vague statement; Check history on this (jefferson? any presidents without children? any presidents who were distant to their children? Wasn't Reagan reported to be?)

For women, however, the model has usually been the competent female executive -- Didn't these women have families too? Role of lesbians?

her femininity obscured by pantsuits and a newscaster 'do -- Refers to modern women; what did Margaret Thatcher wear? Eleanor Roosevelt? / Also this statement carries assumption that a woman's femininity resides in how much of body/hair revealed; seems an anti-feminist notion.

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