By Jonathan Capehart
"CBS Sunday Morning" aired a profile of Aaron Sorkin yesterday. The peg was his best screenwriter Oscar nomination for "The Social Network." But it was his spot-on comments about Sarah Palin that piqued my interest. "I have a big problem with people who glamorize dumbness and demonize education and intellect," Sorkin said. "And I'm giving a pretty good description of Sarah Palin right now." As if on cue, the queen of the Tea Party movement and half-term governor of Alaska emerged this past weekend (after the debacle of herresponse to the Tucson tragedy) to prove Sorkin right.
In an interview with CBN News White House correspondent David Brody, Palin delivered an incomprehensible slam against President Obama's handling of the crisis in Egypt. "This is that 3 a.m. White House phone call, and it seems for many of us trying to get that information from our leader in the White House," she said, "it seems that that call went right to the answering machine." She goes on to say:
And nobody yet has explained to the American public what they know, and surely they know more than the rest of us know, who it is who will be taking the place of Mubarak. I'm not real enthused about what it is that is being done on a national level from D.C. in regards to understanding all the situation there in Egypt, and in these areas that are so volatile right now, because obviously it's not just Egypt, but the other countries, too, where we are seeing uprisings. We know that now more than ever, we need strength and sound mind there in the White House. We need to know what it is that America stands for, so we know who it is that America will stand with. And we do not have all that information yet.
Whoever advised Palin to say this should be fired. Oh, wait, she heeds her own counsel and that of her husband, Todd.
Palin doesn't make much sense either when asked whether she wanted to make the mainstream media irrelevant.
I think much of the mainstream media is already becoming so irrelevant because there is not balance. There is, in many cases, David, there is not truth coming out of the mainstream media, and I know that first-hand. I live it every day. And what would give me great joy is if what would become irrelevant is just the untruthful the misreporting out there. I want the mainstream media, and I've said this for a couple of years now, I want to help 'em. I have a journalism degree, that is what I studied. I understand that this cornerstone of our democracy is a free press, is sound journalism. I want to help them build back their reputation and allow Americans to be able to trust what it is that they are reporting. We're so far from being able to trust what so many of the mainstream media personalities, characters, feed the American public that it scares me for our country. What would give me great joy is what would become irrelevant is the misreporting that comes out of the mainstream media.
Yes, the cornerstone of our democracy is a free press. But implicit in that is the expectation that journalists will hold people in positions of authority and influence accountable and responsible for their words and actions. An expectation that Palin thrives on flouting. How can the American people trust what the media say about her when she won't allow herself to be subjected to intense scrutiny? Palin happily resides in the safe bubble of Twitter and Facebook. And when she does answer questions, she does so from sympathetic inquisitors or from the comfort of her Fox News security blanket.
At festivities Friday marking the centennial of Ronald Reagan's birth, Palin gave a dark speech that was at odds with the sunny optimism of the 40th president. Slamming Washington for doing nothing to promote responsible domestic oil drilling, Palin said, "This is not the road to national greatness, it is the road to ruin." The same could be said of her actions on the national political stage. Pity Palin can't see that.
By Jonathan Capehart | February 7, 2011; 2:17 PM ET
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