The new confusion surrounding Sarah Palin: Is she "back", or is she an "irrelevant hockey mom?" In any case, she does not like to be investigated, and her communications skills are in the toilet!

Photo credit: Marc Nozell, Flickr, Creative Commons License

By Patrick

What a mystery this woman is! Even after so many years, she is full of surprises. One day she appears together with America's latest "Dr. Evil", Senator Ted Cruz, giving her support to those Tea Party Republicans like Senators Ted Cruz and Mike Lee who tried very hard to severely damage the reputation of the USA by trying to force the USA to default. Then, just a few days later, Sarah Palin claims in a new facebook post that she apparently is an "irrelevant hockey mom", in a thinly veiled attempt to deter the media from investigating her.

Sarah Palin wrote on October 22:

Here’s the deal: all politics is local. And personal. Let me personalize this. It is UNBELIEVABLE that the press would investigate every nook and cranny of my life; send gullible reporters to my little town to kick over every rock any family member ever tread underfoot; scour every email I’ve written; research every Palin campaign disclosure like junkyard dogs; sic 12 AP reporters to fact check my book; breathlessly report about my wardrobe and an old used tanning bed I bought to get some sun during Alaskan winters as if these were vital national news stories; hound friends, personal doctors, strangers, and just downright strange people, etc., etc., etc., to know everything we do (and they still get the story wrong!). They blew and still blow all those resources “investigating” the irrelevant hockey mom from Wasilla. Meanwhile our government goes to hell in a hand basket right before the “elite media’s” closed eyes, and it took my friend Peter Schweizer to slap you upside the head to see any of this corruption? Good God. Be ashamed, media, be very ashamed.

Well, everyone knows by now that Sarah Palin hates to be investigated, because she has more skeletons in her closet than most people (and journalists) would be able to imagine in their wildest dreams. But this little rant still comes as a surprise, because: What is Sarah Palin afraid of right now? This really is an interesting question. After all, Sarah Palin over time turned from a more or less serious political contender into the "wet dream" of the Democrats: If the Democrats want to win an election, all they need is Sarah Palin.

These days, she is the "kiss of death" to the political ambitions of any candidate who is stupid enough to ask Sarah Palin for support. Nothing energizes Democratic voters more than having Sarah Palin as the "adversary." She is the Democrats' secret weapon, highly effective and free of charge. Republican candidate Steve Lonnegan recently had to learn this the hard way as well.

October 13, 2013: The irrelevant hockey mom goes to Washington

At the same time, she turned into pure political poison for the GOP, and she continues to slam the "GOP establishment", the "permanent political class" at any given opportunity. So maybe there are attacks in the works which actually come from the direction of the GOP? This would hardly be surprising, as she surely is a real thorn in the side of Karl Rove and colleagues.

This of course is speculation, but in my opinion, one thing is certain: Sarah Palin is starting to "crack." That something is really wrong with her, even above the usual standard of craziness she used to display during the previous years, recently also became obvious during Sarah Palin's confused and unhinged rant on Megyn Kelly's show at Fox News:

At this point in time, we can witness these unhinged outbursts by Sarah Palin virtually every day. The facebook post quoted above is another example, because apart from Sarah Palin's brain, who would think that an "irrelevant hockey mom" would have a political PAC, would appear prominently with somebody like Ted Cruz and Mike Lee, would give political speeches quite frequently and would appear on TV as a political hard right-wing pundit for Fox News on a regular basis?

Well, not many people. But Sarah Palin is not the only person who is confused, as it appears. The unwillingness of Sarah Palin to "go away" now gave CNN's political reporter Peter Hamby the weird idea that she is actually "back." In the best tradition of unbelievably naive mainstream reporting about Sarah Palin, Peter Hamby breathlessly reports at CNN that Sarah Palin has "returned" and that she apparently still will be a big player in the upcoming primaries and elections. He somehow forgets to mention, however, that Sarah Palin is not only America's biggest political joke, but also a huge liability for the GOP. Peter Hamby became a victim to Sarah Palin's own propaganda. She just loves to present herself as a big mover and shaker, and also loves to play fast and loose with the facts about her "endorsement record", a record which is actually not impressive at all.

CNN spotted a mirage: A "returning" Sarah Palin

CNN also broadcast this report about the story:

Peter Hamby really needs to wake up. He apparently still believes we are living in 2010.

The "cracking" Sarah Palin also gave an "impressive" appearance when she yesterday starting a totally insane feud with Piers Morgan, who, refreshingly, made it clear that he is not afraid of the notoriously combative Sarah Palin. You don't have to love Piers Morgan, but I really wished that more journalists would take on Sarah Palin like that. Piers Morgan, who dared to anger Sarah Palin on Twitter, received the biggest possible retaliation in return - an insulting facebook rant by Sarah Palin, including a tasteless photo with which she somehow tries to insinuate that she really, really likes dead things:

She wrote:

Oh dear Piers, thank you so much for all your invitations to appear on your shambolic show, including the adoring message you sent. But is it still any wonder why I've politely responded that I'm too busy doing, um, er... pretty much anything to accept the invite? (At least I didn't tell you to "get stuffed".) And to all our British friends: we ask, what did your friends across the pond ever do to you to deserve your Piers? :-)

By the way, Sarah Palin is wrong: She has no "British friends." Whoever told her that was lying. :-)

Very sorry, Sarah, but the British think that you are a dangerous, uninformed idiot

So, what comes next? The next "shocker" cannot be far away, as Sarah Palin's communication skills really are in the toilet these days.

Refreshingly, Piers Morgan was not scared off by mean girl Sarah Palin and tweeted:

What surprised me most about the new story at CNN is that some journalists apparently still have no idea who Sarah Palin really is. Some years ago, most journalists thought that she is just a "politician", and reported accordingly. But a politician (usually) employs reason, logical thinking, intelligence, ideally empathy as well. These were never Sarah Palin's strong points. But most importantly, Sarah Palin is in the first place a narcissistic and deeply disturbed woman who first and foremost wants three things: She wants to be famous, she wants to be rich, and she wants to fight against her perceived "enemies."

Also, she is a huge fraud, whether the media acknowledges it or not.

Sarah Palin's real character has long been exposed. Andrew Sullivan for example wrote at the Daily Dish in March 2012:

Anyone with even the faintest grasp of Palin's reality – including former close aides like Frank Bailey – understands that she is emotionally unstable, paranoid, vindictive, self-destructive, religiously fanatical and clinically deluded. Her "wonderful mothering" led her to take a tiny child with Down Syndrome and parade him in front of the cameras as a political prop, and later hauling him out half-naked at night to show off to fans on her book tour. None of her children has made it to college; one was a teenage vandal, another a teen mom. A man who lived in her house, says her children had to raise themselves. She quit office in mid-term because her vanity and rapacity were more important to her than public service. The victims of her vicious career lie strewn all over Alaska. Anyone faintly aware of reality also knows that John McCain was as cynical, brutal and expedient a figure as anyone to run for president – and that Palin's selection was an act of such grotesque vanity and cynicism that it instantly disqualified him from the presidency.

I suspect the real truth about how this deranged, comic, vicious ignoramus nearly became a heartbeat away from the presidency will only be absorbed in the future, when we are not so close to the embarrassment.

Liberals are restrained from really laying out the truth for fear of further attacks from the Palinite right. Establishment conservatives cannot bring themselves to understand what they did – although Steve Schmidt has admirably copped to intense and abiding remorse for his part in the process. The far right, which Palin helped bring to further heights of lunacy, has continued to debase any prospect of a sane two-party system in the US. Palin's legacy lives on to damage the country.

Of course, Game Change was not The Rogue. And Hollywood is neither. The truth was far more interesting and infinitely darker.

These days it seems certain that the "irrelevant hockey mom" Sarah Palin, who begs not to be investigated, will show more and more cracks. Where is this all going to end? God knows!

To complete this "roundup" of the latest Palin-related events: It comes as no surprise of course that Sarah Palin, who once thought that it was a good idea to investigate Barack Obama's birth certificate, again shows her willingness to promote a conspiracy theory and suggested on facebook that the Democrats could have staged the "fainting pregnant lady":

Whether accurate or not, for some reason I found this hilarious! Am I out of bounds for cracking up when I saw this take on a nauseated Obama fan, her absentminded pal, and our President's heroics this week? If so, penance paying I'll accept. With the Obama White House’s total lack of transparency, it’s no wonder that some will ask whether they staged even a fainting lady in the Rose Garden. What was once a major leap in logic has become a single step because President Obama has lied so often and so blatantly ("If you like your health care plan, you can keep your plan" comes to mind!).

This from a woman who faked a pregnancy and then used the baby for political gain - a fact which the media (at least officially) refuses to believe, but which is actually just the "tip of the iceberg", as far as Sarah Palin is concerned.

+++

Bonus - Part 1:

At the last post, I left the following comment - it's probably worth to repeat it here, and I have nothing else to add to it:

Hi guys, there is one "secret" to share - I didn't mention it so far, well, due to the "old standard" of Palingates/Politicalgates that we only make claims which we can "back up" with additional evidence...

Ok, to make a long story short, a story for which we have no "hard proof": We know from a very good Alaskan source already for quite a while that Sarah did not shoot the caribou on her reality show. It turned out that she was not hitting anything while shooting, so a guide from Alaska (who accompanied the film team), whose name we unfortunately do not know, finally shot the caribou, and then the footage was edited accordingly (with the caribou in the "crosshairs"...).

Well, I thought long about writing a post about it, however, it's difficult. I myself of course know that the source is excellent, but I cannot "prove" it to the outside. So I now throw this little piece of information out there. Just for you. For your entertainment. The world doesn't "believe" us anyway. :-)

+++

Bonus - Part 2:

In case you haven't seen it yet - Miley Cyrus took part at SNL in a totally awesome must-see GOP-shutdown parody clip, in which her own totally awful "We Can't Stop" video clip was appropriately ridiculed as well - there is hope for Miley Cyrus! :-)

(h/t Kathleen)

(Original link to the video here)

Here are the lyrics to this SNL-parody song called "We Did Stop":

It’s our party

We can do what we want

It’s our party

We can say what we want

It’s our party

We can stop what we want

We can vote how we want

Defund what we want

Red states and sweaty bodies everywhere

Bill’s in the house like we don’t care

‘cause we came to shut it all down now

No government around now

If you’re not ready for health care

Can I get a “HELL, NO!”

‘Cause we’re gonna keep it out shut down

D.C.is a closed town all-round

So la da di da di

Republican Party

Repping G.O.P.

Doing whatever we want

This is our house

This is our rules

And we did stop (the government)

Yeah, we did stop (shut it down)

Can’t you see it’s we

Who are right?

Can’t you see it’s we

Who ‘bout that life?

To my government workers on the furlough

Even though you’re already paid low

Remember only God can judge us

Forget the haters ‘cause somebody elected us

And everyone in line for early childcare

Anyone who planned to see a grizzly bear

We are all shut down here

Getting so shut down, yeah, yeah

So la da di da di

Republican Party

Repping G.O.P.

Doing whatever we want

This is our house

This is our rules

And we did stop

Yeah, we did stop

Can’t you see it’s we

Who are the right?

Can’t you see it’s we

Who ‘bout that life?

It’s our party

We can do what we want

It’s our party

We can say what we want

It’s our party

We can stop what we want

We can vote how we want

Defund what we want

Shut it down.

+++

Have  a nice weekend, everyone!

+++

UPDATE:

I very much like the following headline and the photo beneath it at the "Guardian":

Ted Cruz's father Rafael Cruz in taped speech: Suggests that Barack Obama is a "Muslim", says that Obamacare provides "suicide counseling" and that the "RINO's" should be replaced by "Constitutional Conservatives" - In earlier interview Rafael Cruz says that his son is "destined for greatness", and explains how he politically educated him

Ted Cruz appearing together with his father Rafael Cruz

By Patrick

The rise of Ted Cruz also put a spotlight on his father Rafael Cruz, who is a radical right-wing pastor in North Texas. At closer inspection, it becomes apparent that Rafael Cruz had a significant influence on Ted Cruz's political beliefs, and they both appeared together numerous times.

Just a few days ago, a tape was published with excerpts from a speech by Rafael Cruz at the Adams County GOP Lincoln Dinner in Thornton, Colorado, which took place on September 27, 2013. At this event, Rafael Cruz was not shy to show his true colors: He made it absolutely clear that he agrees with the notion that President Obama is a "Muslim", he used outrageous lies to rant against Obamacare and he wants the "RINO's" to be thrown out of the Republican Party.

(via "Political Carnival" and "Talking Points Memo")

Watch:

Kathleen transcribed these remarks by Rafael Cruz:

Rafael Cruz: Obama's fault (inaudible)….shift on the side of the Muslims.

Woman: He is a Muslim.

Rafael Cruz: Pah! McCain couldn’t say that because it wasn’t politically correct. It is time we stop being politically correct!

Rafael Cruz: Our lives! Well look at what is happening to our lives. From the cradle, 55 million babies have been murdered by abortions since 1973. At the other end, Obamacare with denying care to the elderly with care being rationed, with care being postponed for twelve to eighteen months. With care being controlled by a group of bureaucrats that on the basis of cost benefit will decide whether you get a medical procedure or not they’re destroying our end of life. As a matter of fact one of the things in Obamacare is that for the elderly every five years you must have end of life counselling. Translation: Suicide counselling.

Rafael Cruz: I know that I am in an Republican Party meeting. If you want to throw tomatoes at me, throw tomatoes at me! But unfortunately, you cannot say that the Republican Party is without blame. We have too many RINO’s in the Republican Party! (Applause and whoops). They have their minds made up and basically their ideas is this “You are too stupid! I know what I am doing.” Well, I’ll tell you what, we the people are not stupid. We the people are smart enough to vote them right out of office or primary them and put constitutional conservatives in their place! (More whoops etc.)

But there are more facts about Rafael Cruz which are noteworthy. He himself is very proud that he apparently had a great influence on the political and religious beliefs of his son Ted, which Rafael Cruz explained in great detail in an interview from July 2013. There, he also claimed that his son Ted is "destined for greatness."

Watch:

Transcript via RightWingWatch.org:

David Brody, Christian Broadcasting Network: Talk me about your son and his rise. This must be a thing of God. It's meteoric.

Cruz: Yes, but you know something, it is not something that started a couple of years ago. Let me just go back to when he was maybe four. When he was four I used to read Bible stories to him all the time. And I would declare and proclaim the word of God over him. And I would just say, ‘You know Ted, you have been gifted above any man that I know and God has destined you for greatness’. And I started making declarations about the Word of God to him every day. When he was eight years old I was very active in an organization called the Religious Roundtable.

...

This was a coalition of Christians and Jews who was very instrumental in helping Reagan get elected. I was on the state board of the Religious Roundtable, so when my son Ted was eight years old, all we talked about around the dinner table was politics because I was so involved with the Reagan campaign. So during that time is when I asked him so many times, ‘You know Ted, when I lost my freedom in Cuba I had a place to come to. If we lose our freedoms here where are we going to go? There is no place to go.’

...

Ted enters high school, the Free Enterprise Institute organizes a group of five kids, called them the Constitutional Corroborators, now Ted is reading the The Federalist Papers, The Anti-Federalist Papers, and each of the five kids memorized the entire US Constitution.

...

So before my son left high school he was passionate about the constitution. He was passionate about freedom and free markets and limited governments. Before he left high school he knew without a shadow of a doubt what his purpose in life was and it was to defend and protect freedom and the Constitution, to fight for free markets and limited government, and it became a passion in his life. So this is not a trajectory of three years, this is a trajectory of 30 years.

This is interesting. Knowing how Ted Cruz was indoctrinated by his radical father from a very early age onwards, it is much easier to understand the "crusader" Ted Cruz these days - where he comes from, and why it is virtually impossible for him to agree on a compromise. For true "crusaders", there can be no compromise. It is all or nothing.

When it comes to crusading, Ted's father Rafael Cruz certainly aspires to be on the forefront: In another  "rousing" speech, this time from July 2013 at a Tea Party event in Dallas reported by RightWingWatch.org, Rafael Cruz demanded more political participation by evangelical Christians and said that "we have what we deserve, we have allowed the wicked to rule us", and claimed: "We could take every position in office, from dogcatcher all the way to the highest position in life."

In this speech, Rafael Cruz also says that the US Constitution and the Declaration of Independence are "divine revelations from God." 

Watch the excerpts:

The full speech by Rafael Cruz from this event can be viewed here.

Rafael Cruz surely is on a "big tour" right now, appearing at many events, trying to rally the evangelicals. In yet another speech from August 2013 at the "Family Leadership Summit" in Iowa, he crusaded against gay marriage and declared that a godless "socialist" government is behind "homosexual marriage", trying to destroy "traditional marriage" as well as "loyalty to the family."

Quote (via "Burnt Orange Report"):

RAFAEL CRUZ: When you hear this attack on religion, it's not really an attack on religion. The fundamental basis is this: socialism requires that government becomes your God. That's why they have to destroy the concept of God. They have to destroy all loyalties except loyalty to government. That's what's behind homosexual marriage. It's really more about the destruction of the traditional family than about exalting homosexuality, because you need to destroy also loyalty to the family.

Watch:

Therefore Rafael Cruz is living the American dream like he sees it, preaching bigotry, hate and division as a pastor, tax-free and surely with substantial financial backing.

The "origins" of Rafael Cruz himself are murky, and just how he established himself in the USA as an immigrant from Cuba is clouded in a lot of secrecy. Ted Cruz himself claims that his father never was an illegal immigrant, and at this moment, we have to take his word for it, because evidence to the contrary is hard to come by  - although serious doubts about this bold claim certainly remain. The most extensive account of the "official" Cruz-family story can be found in an article by the Dallas Morning News from October 2011:

Cruz, though, has remained silent as others incorrectly placed his father among the many Cubans who left the island nation after Castro took power, rather than as someone who fought on the same side as Castro to topple a rightist dictator, though he departed for Texas before the revolution succeeded.

"He was a guerilla, throwing Molotov cocktails and blowing up buildings," Ted Cruz told the Austin American-Statesman for a profile published in January 2006.

Earlier this month, Liberty Institute president Kelly Shackelford introduced Cruz to 3,000 Christian conservatives at the Values Voters Summit in Washington, D.C., as "the next great conservative hope."

"He's the combination of the intellectual skill and principle of [Utah GOP Sen.] Mike Lee and the story, the personal story of a Marco Rubio -- his dad having escaped Fidel Castro, came into the United States, working as a dishwasher," Shackelford said.

Last month, a Houston Chronicle political blog described Cruz as "a Cuban American whose family escaped from Castro tyranny."

In an interview Monday, Cruz professed not to be aware of confusion about when his father, Rafael Cruz, left Cuba.

"If Kelly [Shackelford] said that, I did not notice that statement," he said. "That's certainly not something I say because it's not the case."

Cruz said he hasn't misled.

"I have many, many times described the full context of his fighting with [Fidel] Castro -- in the broader sense, ... not side by side, but on the same side as Castro," he said.

Shackelford, reached on Monday, said his point was the elder Cruz "came here for freedom" after being a "political prisoner."

"As to whether it was Batista or Castro [in power,] I'm like, it doesn't really matter," Shackelford said. "There was one dictator replaced by a future dictator."

Cruz, a former state solicitor general enjoying tea party and social conservative support, is one of four major Republican candidates in the March primary to succeed retiring Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison.

He said his father began fighting against Batista's regime when he was 14, in 1953. When the elder Cruz was 17, he was imprisoned and tortured by Batista's government, his son said. The next year, 1957, Rafael Cruz legally went to Texas on a student visa issued by the Batista regime, Ted Cruz said.

Ted Cruz, who opposes amnesty for illegal immigrants, said at no time was his father an illegal immigrant. He said his father, who graduated from the University of Texas in 1961, eventually became a permanent legal resident. The elder Cruz is now a U.S. citizen, living in Carrollton, his son said.

Ted Cruz said his father described himself as among young teenage boys who fought Batista and allied with Castro's forces because "they didn't know Castro was a Communist, what they knew was that Batista was a cruel and oppressive dictator."

Cruz said his father became a staunch critic of Castro, along with several family members who remained in Cuba, when the rebel leader took control and began seizing private property and suppressing dissent. Rafael Cruz' younger sister and their parents eventually made it to the U.S. during the 1960s, Ted Cruz said.

It is much easier to understand the current actions of Ted Cruz if one is aware of the details of the extremist political views of his very outspoken father, and of the role his father played in the political and religious education of Ted Cruz. 

The last thing the USA need right now are hard-right political and religious crusaders for who there can only be "victory or death", because anything else would be a betrayal of the just and righteous cause.

Ted Cruz surely is a dangerous extremist, but I am confident that the American people won't be fooled in the end and will reject him and his ilk.

+++

Read the follow-up at Politicalgates:

NEW VIDEO: Rafael Cruz, father of Senator Ted Cruz, caught lying on tape about President Obama, trying to discredit Obama's Christian beliefs - Watch the video evidence!

+++

"The radical religious friends of Senator Ted Cruz: Anointed by Dominionists who want to "wage war to restore America to our Judeo-Christian heritage" - The overlooked religious extremism of the new rising star of the GOP"