Will she or won’t she? In the wake of the mid-term elections in the United States earlier this month, all eyes are on Sarah Palin, to see whether or not she is preparing to run for president in 2012.
She is playing coy and will neither confirm nor deny the move. Meanwhile, she is doing all the things necessary to make a run. Including, this week, hiring a Dutch advisor. The former vice-presidential candidate has engaged the services of Dutch columnist Joshua Livestro. Why does she need a European advisor? Mr Livestro explains:
“Her interest in Europe is mostly due to worries about the financial-economic situation here and the fear that it could eventually harm the US.”
Anti-intellectual?
Mr Livestro is a conservative. He helped found the Edmund Burke Foundation, a conservative think tank, and maintains a blog, The Daily Standard, perhaps inspired by the US conservative publication The Weekly Standard. He also writes a weekly column for the largest Dutch daily newspaper, the right-wing populist De Telegraaf.
He was already actively plugging Ms Palin through the US website Conservatives4Palin.com. Nonetheless, why would Mr Livestro, who has a Philosophy Masters from Cambridge University and is a well-known commentator in the Netherlands, want to advise a candidate with a reputation as anti-intellectual?
“The cliché is of someone who can barely write her own name but I’d like to dispel this myth. She’s a perfectly intelligent, well-informed woman.”
Mr Livestro says he is doing this gladly because he agrees with what she stands for. That may be, but most US political observers do not give her much chance of winning the presidency.
Tea Party movement
Ms Palin has been in the spotlight of late, partly for backing dozens of candidates in the recent Congressional elections. But many in her own Republican party blame her and the Tea Party movement she supports for the party failure to wrest control of the Senate from the Democrats. Plus, more Americans have a negative opinion of her than ever before (52 percent) and fewer think she is fit to be president.
Mr Livestro is not bothered. He is attracted in part by her belief in the United States as the ‘last best hope of man on earth’, as she writes on the cover jacket of her new book, America by Heart. Does her new hireling believe she will become president?
“I sincerely hope so.”
Mr Livestro is not the first Dutch person to work on a US political campaign. Kirsten Verdel worked at Democrat Party headquarters during Barack Obama’s 2008 campaign. Kay van de Linde worked on both Walter Mondale’s and Al Gore’s presidential runs.
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Sarah Palin makes George W. Bush look like Einstein. She barely has a "Cliff Notes" understanding of any foreign policy. Her only "expertise" is supposedly in Oil and Natural Gas but that is only if you think being the governor of Alaska and signing a couple of deals means she's an expert. Frankly it sounds more like she could have been replaced with a rubber stamp.
The greatest show on Earth getting bigger and more ridiculous - at nauseam.
If she is to continue to coast on her looks, she'd better move fast. She's well past her 'best before' date. But maybe she'll put forth one of her kids. I hear that Bristol is an excellent politician.
If Bush (the son) can be president anybody is eligible, I won't hold my breath for the US of A although
I think it's a beautiful country and loved being there on many occasions but wouldn't want to live there now, having to raise a family. This planet is going to need us all, not just the politicians, if we're all to have a chance to have a sane life. The law of the jungle hasn't brought the States much, some great wealth for a period but bigger empires have gone down as well.
And SP may love the States that's great for the States, she's a great cheerleader for the US but the planet consists of more pieces of land and unfortunately the Americans only find out about that when they go and invade another country for their natural resources.How would they like to be invaded and bombed, how would they react and I don't mean a 9/11 I mean on a daily basis? How would it make them feel? That answer is simple, they would be aggressive/angry/violent for a very long time.
Why don't we learn from history? Calling people who want to share 'commies' is so simplistic and is just done to invoke fear in humankind, I mean when will we get it that we ARE sharing this planet and we'll all have to leave at a certain point, it's not ours to do with as we like.
We can of course keep doing that but nature has it's ways of showing us who's boss. May we all someday get the clue of being humble and instead of trying to improve our genes in order to stay young forever we might find a cure for greed as that would benefit us all.
If our children are to have any chance we will have to take responsibility for the mess we've made and try to clean it up, even a little bit would be good, before we go. Life's much shorter than we realize so why not share this planet and try to make sure everybody can have a living wage instead of making slaves out of somebody else's children. Thanks for having shared your thoughts online as it's always
good to read other people's opinions, a mind is like a parachute it works best when it's open.
Sarah Palin is not one of the political elite. She didn't go to an ivy league college, and doesn't come from a wealthy family. She's a self-made woman who became Gov. of Alaska by her own efforts with no help from the Republican Party a fact that endears her to the independents . She's a different kind of politician and I wish we had more like her. I haven't made up my mind yet, but I'm watching her with keen interest. I'll need to compare her to the other presidential candidates who surface. It's been a long time, since Ronald Reagan, since we had a President who really loves our country as Sarah does. The Left can go on saying she's stupid -- it will only work in her favor because by what they say, it's obvious that she's a threat to them. I'm sure they'd like her a lot more if she had a D after her name.
Don't know where you get your information, but here in the states more people have a higher opinion of Sarah Palin than BeAQuack Obama. 49% knew he would be awful, but now 40% have buyers remose with the remianing 11% being his hardcore pinko commie base. She'd win easily in in 2012 just by NOT being Obama or Pelosi.
Suggest you read www.newsflavor.com with the white house insider column. Its rather informative. Obama will be a one term president, no matter what it takes to get him out of office.
Hey COX! I would hardly call Obama a pinko commie. He didn't get disgustingly materially wealthy by sharing. He is as capitalist as you can get.
Of course Obama is going to lose the next election. He is the fall guy for over 200 years of living like fat pigs, but I don't think he will mind.
Sarah Palin is the next president forsure. We get what we deserve as far as politicians go.
Communist leaders do become multimillionaires, as have the ayatollahs in Iran.
Fidel Castro is listed in Forbes magazine as a multimillionaire.
By that, I don't mean to imply that Obama is a commie. His agenda for our country is a socialist
agenda, so that makes him a socialist. Being a socialist in our country does not prevent one from
becoming very rich.
Show the source of your numbers. From everything I have seen since Palin has show up, she has never rated higher than Obama...
Palin will NEVER become president, not even in a place as conservative as the USA. First off she is a spineless quitter, she quit being governor of Alaska to be a TV "actor" and habitual fear-monger/blatant lier on Fox TV. Her association with anti-semitic, conspiracy theorists like Glenn Beck only makes her look like more of a nut job to rational thinking, reasonable Americans. Furthermore she has no ideas on how to further world peace or bring economic stability to markets, she spouts right wing propaganda and speaks on vague generalities like "how much she loves freedom". Its people like Sarah Palin that give Americans a bad reputation all over the world.
"Its people like Sarah Palin that give Americans a bad reputation all over the world." So if she spouts left-wing propaganda and speaks on vague generalities like "how much she hate freedom" would she then give Americans a good reputation around the world? I think you are right because most of the world's nations are left-wing facists who hate it when someone stands-up for freedom. If you don't believe me, ask JW. He is an expert!
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