"Oh give it up. George W. Bush was the quintessential insider candidate, with the wholehearted approval of Wall Street and the party elite, he had credentials from Yale and Harvard, but he was just as unprepared, uninformed, and lacking in intellectual curiosity as Sarah Palin, and you saw where that got us." Susan Wood

What makes you think elitist progressives are confined to just one party? Are you so ideologically blinded that you whitewash all conservatives and republicans with the same brush? Can you see the difference between the Blue Blood Rockerfeller/Bush Republicans and a regular center right independant american conservative? We are the majority now after all. Can't you see that the Democrats are beholding to the same Wall St. power brokers that the blue blood Republicans are? Don't you see you described Barack Obama as well as Bush? Meet the new boss same as the old boss. Can you see where all that is getting us again? How's that stimulus workin for ya?

The story is not Sarah Palin, she just proves it's still possible for a regular person to gain support and momentum from outside the beltway. She just makes it possible to see a light at the end of the tunnel that the government can once again be held accountable more to americans best interest than to the wants of Wall St. This puts fear into the elite progressives within BOTH parties. That is why they feel they must keep attacking her. Why else would a soon to be ex Alaskan governor even matter?

What a bit@hy whiny article. This is prime example of petty liberal hatred. They just can not get over Sarah Palin! LOL

It is funny to see them working themselves into such a hateful frenzy. Whiny liberal losers just can not control themselves. I am so happy to see even independents have had enough of this petty jealous school girl hateful behavior. How hold is this author? 13? You can't fix stupid, but you can vote it out. Remember that in 2010.

The headline doesn't start with Sarah Palin, but "the losers" who put her in the national spotlight. I don't agree with the tendency of so many Salon readers to advocate ignoring dangerous people.

I'm sure a lot of people ignored Nixon after he lost the California election in 1962. They didn't have Dick Nixon to kick around anymore, so they didn't. How did that work out? Because of Nixon, Reagan, Bush, Cheney, etc., it is advisable to remain alert to the right, no matter how crazy they seem to be. It has been demonstrated that crazy is not necessarily a barrier to power.

In any case, Conason was talking about the people who created Palin as a national player, however temporarily, and points out that they have foisted other undesirable scenarios on us before Palin, and are probably hard at work devising more schemes to screw us up in the future. Those are the folks to keep a watch on.

Also, I read only the first two pages of this letters thread and I have already discovered a delightful blithering idiot calling himself UncleG, apparently another master of ad hominem attacks, false accusations, smart-ass statements and scurrilous charges with no evidence. (Small business taxes have not been raised, for instance.)

I'll have more to say about that after I read the rest of the letters, but it needs to be said that FDR certainly made one big mistake, and that was saving capitalism from itself. Regulated capitalism did bring us prosperity that lasted from about 1950 through 1970 (exploitation of the Third World being a major factor) before the Democrats lost their spines and handed the country back to the elite criminal class. I fear Obama is making the same mistake, giving control to UncleG and his friends, who will show no appreciation for it. Just winning isn't enough for this crowd, and we should become aware of what else they want.

Salon posts have gotten quite adolescent recently. Can't we have some editing please? Get rid of all the name calling ones? I'd like to see higher standards from Salon than we see in other blogs. It's why I read Salon.

My appreciation to Susan Woods for her posts, among the few rational ones here. I've been a mental health professional for 30 years though, and I do think there's an argument to be made that Sarah Palin's narcissism is exceptional, even for politicians.

The "losers" are the operatives that "own" the show horse groomed for the final race to the White House. The parties, beyond functioning as middlemen-bookies during the campaign collecting bets, have lost their significance in the modern media era of celebrity candidates. The real difference between Republicans and Democrats was once defined by the base of power. The Republican party retained rule in a small but powerful "invisible hand" that lost its footing with the underestimated Reagan- who eclipsed their influence with his own expansion into middle-brow constituencies never meant to govern. The Democrats approached things differently, distilling support from a huge tent into an appointed service provider- clearly expecting many favors in return. Obama, neither an appointee, nor beholden by IOU's, is an enigma- the true champion racehorse. The powers that be on the Right- that sobered up GWB, seek only style since they insist on providing the substance. The Left will always look for pre-packaged substance in need of legitimacy. Palin's incompetance fits perfectly the empty vessel role being cast- though what is truly terrifying is the weak hand that feeds it.

I've been a mental health professional for 30 years though, and I do think there's an argument to be made that Sarah Palin's narcissism is exceptional, even for politicians.

-- macb423

Don't you and Nurse Ratched have to give McMurphy his meds about now?

This aint about Palin. This is about setting an example so nobody but nobody that is not Wall St. Mullah approved dare even think about running for any national office. It's about keeping the masses under control and in line. We are just not as openly violent as Iran, well unless it becomes necessary at some point.