In a move that vindicates my view that when it comes to policy positions Sarah Palin is substantively little more than a McCain clone she declared today that we need to reduce green house gases. Sure her attitude and focus are certainly different but when you boil it down they have always been twins on policy… well at least since the election started.

You see back before she was picked to be McCain’s running mate Palin was wishy washy on the global warming hysteria at one point she fought against the Bush administration’s idiotic plan to put polar bears on the endangered species list, despite the fact that the polar bear population is way up over the past several decades, yet still forming a “sub-cabinet” position on global warming. But, once she was picked she went completely soft. She started saying that, while global warming may not be man made, it was a problem that needed government intervention to solve.

Apparently and unfortunately she still thinks that’s true:

Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin acknowledged Tuesday that global warming was harming her state, but said stepped-up natural-gas production could mitigate its effects.

Speaking at a hearing before Interior Secretary Ken Salazar — the third of several he is holding across the country to consider renewed oil and gas leasing on the outer continental shelf — Palin said that relatively clean-burning natural gas could supplant dirtier fuels and slow the discharge of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere.

“We Alaskans are living with the changes that you are observing in Washington,” she said. “The dramatic decreases in the extent of summer sea ice, increased coastal erosion, melting of permafrost, decrease in alpine glaciers and overall ecosystem changes are very real to us.”

Yup. She’s buying into the so called science behind the alarmism (at least publicly). Yes, I know, to her pseudo-credit she doesn’t buy into the nut job economy wrecking policies that the alarmists push:

Palin acknowledged that “many believe” a global effort to reduce greenhouse gases is needed.

“Simply waiting for low-carbon-emitting renewable capacity to be large enough will mean that it will be too late to meet the mitigation goals for reducing [carbon dioxide] that will be required under most credible climate-change models,” she warned.

“Meeting these goals will require a dramatic increase . . . to preferred available fuels, including natural gas, that have a very low carbon footprint . . .,” she said. “These available fuels are required to supply the nation’s energy needs during the transition to green energy alternatives.”

But that’s not much of a positive to me. I mean if you really buy into the argument that CO2 is causing the earth to warm, despite the fact that actual science based on observations and not crack pot theory says other wise, then you really ought to be calling for the complete shut down everything that produces CO2 and pray real real hard that your theories are as hair brained as sane people think they are. Because if they aren’t, if global warming is what the alarmists say it is, then we are all screwed and a couple of solar panels and wind turbines won’t do a thing to save us.

Luckily though, the alarmists are nothing more than just that… alarmists. Using the politics of fear, if I may borrow a phrase from the lefties, to achieve both riches and power. Sadly, as much as I might like Palin’s unique attitude and focus I mentioned earlier, I feel she is yet another politician using global warming to push her agenda. In this case it’s something I agree with, more drilling for our national resources, but I still find the strategy reprehensible.

Or in other words, my opinion of this can be summed up in one word: vomit

Come on… will the merchandising ever end?

I mean how can I be expected to take this “monumental achievement” when its being cheapened to the level of the snuggie.

I mean sure this time Obama’s people weren’t the ones behind the cornyness, it was a minor league baseball team from Brooklyn or “Baraklyn“, but they’ve sponsored their own crap fests as well.

I swear the genius who came up with this promotion is a political satire savant. Just check out the full package:

Special red-white-and-blue jerseys will be worn by players and auctioned during the game, with proceeds going to the Jackie Robinson Foundation. The team, a Class A affiliate of the New York Mets, will have an “Economic Stimulus Package” from Jan. 20 — Inauguration Day — until Jan. 23, selling tickets at $5-$10, matching the levels of its inaugural season in 2001. Regular prices are $8-15.

In addition, the first 1,000 fans get free Band-Aids as part of “Universal Health Care,” all fans named Barack get in for free, fans named McCain or Palin get free bleacher seats (“a bipartisan consolation prize”) and any plumber named Joe gets two free tickets.

“One for himself, and one to ‘spread the wealth’ with a friend,” the Cyclones said,

Fans will receive American flags when they leave, what the Cyclones called “a clear-cut exit strategy.” The Cyclones are reserving four seats behind the plate for the first family, in case it can attend.

And the commercial:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=2lAZ82OaYt4

Ugh… this is just pathetic

Despite the whiny insinuations of Oprah an aid of Alaska Governor Sarah Palin has denied that she is purposely snubbing the crybaby day time host.

From CNN:

Sarah Palin’s camp is denying claims she’s is snubbing talk show host Oprah Winfrey, telling CNN Monday the decision was “nothing personal” — the Alaska governor has just been flooded with so many media requests she simply hasn’t had the time to sit down with the daytime talk show icon.

“The governor was invited to appear. She was also invited to appear on Letterman, Leno, Stephanopoulos, The Daily Show. She passed on a vast majority of these requests,” Bill McAllister, Palin’s communications director and press secretary.

“We’re up to about 250 requests for interviews and appearances and so on. It’s worldwide, there’s still a tremendous amount of interest. It’s nothing personal about Oprah, it’s just that she turned down the vast majority of these requests.”

A Palin appearance at a later date is still possible, said McAllister: “I’m not aware that it’s been ruled out.”

How much does that suck? I can understand Palin wanting to keep all media outlets open for her use but I still would’ve loved to have seen Palin lay a verbal smack down on Oprah for her disrespectful banning of Palin during the campaign because she didn’t want to make her show political (what a joke of an excuse on Oprah’s part by the way). Oh well… you can’t always get what you want I suppose.

“I said I would be happy to talk to Sarah Palin when the election was over… I went and tried to talk to Sarah Palin and instead she talked to Greta [Van Susteren]. She talked to Matt [Lauer]. She talked to Larry [King]. But she didn’t talk to me.”

Gosh I hope Oprah’s little whinny insinuation is true. I really really hope that Sarah Palin did purposely snub her.

I guess the golden rule still rings true huh Oprah? Do unto others as you would have done unto you.

Sarah’s massive popularity in Georgia should give Chambliss’ run-off campaign an energy boost. And while Palin isn’t the only big name Republican to turn out for Chambliss, others include Huckabee, Romney, and McCain, she is most certainly the brightest star at this point.

With a close race against Democrat Jim Martin on his hands Chambliss can certainly use all the support he can get. Hopefully this, coupled with the lack of Obama voters for Martin, will put Chambliss over the top.

We shall see…

Congratulations on your historic win.

Celebrate to your hearts desire tonight.

We will start it all over again tomorrow…

And here is the related real life incident…

How lynching Sarah Palin relates to the tolerance of the left

“They’re in charge of the United States Senate. So, if they want to, they can really get in there with the senators and make a lot of good policy changes.”

Here’s the title of the CNN story (as it appears on CNN.com) regarding her comments:

“Palin misstates VP role”

Now, I’m no constitutional law expert but luckily for me the constitution is written in English so I can pretty well understand it.

And to be quite honest, the constitution doesn’t much address what the specifics of the Vice President’s role are…

In fact, here is the one and only provision pertaining to the Vice President in regards to the Senate:

“The Vice President of the United States shall be President of the Senate, but shall have no Vote, unless they be equally divided.”

Seems to me that being the president of something means you are “in charge” of it, at least formally, and when you’re trying to explain what the VP does to a third grader thats not a half bad way of doing it. So if that wasn’t the offending part of this excerpt it must have been the insinuation that the Vice President, “if they want to”, can influence senators on policy.

But if the Vice President isn’t supposed to influence policy in the Senate then what exactly are they supposed to do? Just wait around for the President to die? I mean, besides outlining how the VP is elected (and revising it in the 12th amendment and several others), impeached, and that the VP assumes the office of the President if the President is unable or unfit to fulfill the duties of that office what does the constitution tell us?

Again, only that the Vice President is the president of the Senate and casts the decisive vote when there is a tie. And, again, I’m left wondering what CNN sees as the gaffe in Palin’s statement…

They quote Donald Ritchie, a historian in the Senate Historical Office for what seems to be the real crux of their argument:

Donald Ritchie, a historian in the Senate Historical Office told CNN that Palin’s comment was an “overstatement” of what her role would be.

“The vice president is the ceremonial officer of the Senate and has certain ceremonial functions including swearing in new senators and can vote to break a tie,” he said. “It’s a relatively limited role. It’s evolved into a neutral presiding officer of the Senate.

Ritchie also noted recent vice presidents have played a behind-the-scenes lobbying role on Capitol Hill for an administration’s policies, but called it “somewhat limited.”

Personally, I find these assertions to be contentious. Who is Ritchie to say what kind of Vice President Sarah Palin will be? And if anything the office of Vice President has been moving away from its “somewhat limited” role of influencing senate policy decisions, you only need to look at Dick Cheney to figure that out. Plus, everything I’ve heard Palin say about the kind of Vice President she’ll be points to one that is very engaged in influencing policy. After all, she has the right to be that kind of Vice President if she so chooses.

So, really, CNN has absolutely no basis for characterizing Palin’s view of the Vice Presidency as a misstatement. But, hey, they’ve got a narrative to keep so any chance they get to paint Sarah Palin as incompetent, stupid, unqualified, corrupt or all of the above they’re gonna jump at it. Oh yeah, they aren’t the only ones either…

PS. CNN must consider this an important story since they keep bumping it to the top of their “political ticker”…

UPDATE: Oh, would you look at this, Biden said the exact same thing about what he plans to do as VP.