Palin Family Circus News - Wednesday, August 25, 2010

The NY Daily News has "Levi Johnston, ex-beau of Sarah Palin's daughter and mayoral hopeful campaigns at gun shop in Alaska:"

Levi Johnston is gunning for a win.

The former boyfriend and baby daddy of Sarah Palin's daughter made his first official stop on the campaign trail . . . at a gun shop, TMZ reported. ...

... And he wasted no time. The hunting loving, limelight seeking candidate stopped into Wasilla's Chimo Guns with a full camera crew over the weekend. He shook hands with customers and turned the visit into a photo op.

Johnston scoped out a few weapons of his own — including a $2,000 Weatherby Ultra Lightweight hunting rifle. In the end, he made no purchases. ...

Wasn't it guns and abortion that propelled Sarah Palin to victory in Wasilla? You know, it's interesting how some people win local races on issues that aren't decided locally.


Lisa Murkowski is going to wait until the votes are counted. If she loses and doesn't run without a major party's backing, then the seat could be picked-up by Democrats. Wouldn't that put egg on Sarah Palin's face? I agree with Gryphen's assessment that it was not Sarah Palin but Ballot Measure 2 that drove turnout. The Associated Press' Becky Bohrer wrote an interesting article about the race and came to a different conclusion.


Breaking News: Californians Aware is claiming that California State University, Stanislaus, has been ordered by a judge to release its contract with Sarah Palin and "any documents related to the use of university property or services during her visit." Palin spoke at the university in June.

Palin Family Circus News - Friday, August 13, 2010

Watch these Jimmy Kimmel videos for some insight into Sarah Palin's family life. Levi is done buying rings. Levi and Bristol are taking a break. Ma & Pa Palin found out about the engagement from a magazine, and that was Bristol's idea! Aren't they just like the rest of us?

Levi's run for Mayor of Wasilla should make a mockery of Sarah Palin's experience as mayor. People are going to say that Levi can do just as good a job, possibly a better job than Sarah.


Breaking: TMZ (Palin family news outlet) is reporting a child custody deal.

Palinpalooza still rollin' - how long can the wheels stay on?

Multiple Bristol/Levi + Baby shows are being shopped, according to TMZ.

Hey! They could do parodies of stories from Going Rogue! Would they cower in the car all night staring slack-jawed at some Mama Grizzly stealing food from their campsite? No! As soon as Bristol said, "Levi, I've seen this movie before," it'd be, KABOOM! Problem solved.

But Celebrity Cafe is being more cautious regarding the rumors of any show:

... No one has been able to confirm that the reality show deal even exists. Palin’s reps have yet to comment concerning such a program and Johnston’s attorney Rex Butler didn’t return phone calls for a statement.

Bravo and MTV both verified that no shows about the pair are in the works. Two nameless prominent reality-show producers said that a show about Palin and Johnston were not even being considered in the shopping stage.

One producer said, “If they prove to be bankable — and the Us Weekly cover could prove that — there could be a number of companies who want to air their story.”

These kids are entrepreneurs. Sarah should be proud of them.


Daily Beast's Mark McKinnon wrote, "She's Running!" Oh! But Jonathan Bernstein says anyone claiming to know what she'll do should be ignored. Pick your poison.


Associated Press is reporting that Palin was paid $75000 for her appearance at California State University, Stanislaus. The Los Angeles Times has a story, too.

This disclosure certainly gives organizations that might engage Palin a starting point in their negotiations with her agent, Washington Speakers Bureau. An excellent negotiating strategy would be to determine how effective a Palin appearance is. For example, an organization might ask, concerning appearances she's already made, "What percentage of the money raised was paid to Palin?" And, "What were the event's total costs, as a percentage of the money raised?" If they would do that, organizations could determine whether a Palin appearance is cost effective. It could be that more traditional fundraising techniques are more cost effective, i.e., more efficient.

For example, if the $207000 being reported is the net from the event, with Palin's fee $75000 and other expenses, assumed, $50000, then $125000 + $207000 = $332000 was raised. $207000 is only 62% efficiency ($207000/$332000). Charitable organizations with efficiencies less than 80-90% are generally considered rip-offs, because their cost of raising funds is too high.


Greg Sargent's got his ear to the ground, listening for that stampede of Pink Elephants. Today he reports on a new Gallup poll that shows Sarah Palin with a high favorability rating among Republicans, but high negative ratings among Americans overall:

... The numbers from Gallup tell the story. Palin has a whopping 76 percent favorability rating among Republicans; only 20 percent don't like her. That's significantly higher than the other GOP 2012 hopefuls.

At the same time, among all Americans, she's viewed unfavorably, 47-44. That's also significantly higher than all the other GOP 2012 hopefuls. Only nine percent of Americans don't have an opinion of Palin, while that number is in high double digits for all the others. Her situation is different than that of her rivals: They have room to expand their appeal, and she doesn't.

As Ben Smith has noted, Palin's strategy of going around the lamestream media filter has been a huge success with the Palin Nation hordes but it has failed in that she continues to grow more unpopular with everyone else. As the above numbers demonstrate, this works for her in her current role, but make it increasingly unlikely that she'll succeed if she ever sets foot outside of the bubble she's created for herself. ...

See Sargent's post for late-breaking news about why Democrats may find reason to like Palin!


It was a blogging frenzy kind of day, today, and I did three other posts! Just scroll down to read them: People are thinking of Sarah as Pat Buchanan in drag? The nerve of them! Gail Collins foresees a Palin-Johnston edition of "Dancing With the Stars." Shoot your TeeVee. Some anonymous Romney/Palin aides got into it ... Romney tweeted about their stupidity (take that, Palin-aide!).