Another Shot of Weirdness From Sarah Palin

Well, that's weird. Just in time to make everyone's Fourth of July really interesting, Sarah Palin resigns as governor of Alaska. Her resignation speech, at least what I've read of it so far, is just bizarre. Here's a taste;

Life is too short to compromise time and resources... it may be tempting and more comfortable to just keep your head down, plod along, and appease those who demand: "Sit down and shut up", but that's the worthless, easy path; that's a quitter's way out. And a problem in our country today is apathy. It would be apathetic to just hunker down and "go with the flow".

Nah, only dead fish "go with the flow".

"[O]nly dead fish 'go with the flow.'" OK, first of all, somewhere Taoists and Buddhists are screaming, but I suppose Sarah Palin isn't worried about losing that constituency. But what is this nonsense about keeping your head down and plodding along being a "worthless, easy path?" Huh? I was under the impression that meeting your commitments was a fundamental part of "being responsible."

Speculation is flying as to why she's doing this. So she can spend more time campaigning for president? Maybe, but quitting your job as governor is not a great way to demonstrate effective leadership. I think there might be a clue in one line in her speech:

Todd and I are looking at more than half a million dollars in legal bills in order to set the record straight.

She's referring to all of the ethics investigations that she is going through. That's a chunk of change. I think that might be part of it; she needs to make more money in the private sector to be able to pay all of these legal bills. But doesn't she have some kind of legal defense fund?

The speech is just riddled with the kind of boilerplate nonsense that is too stale to even pass off as cliched. But I love this euphemism:

In the words of General MacArthur said, "We are not retreating. We are advancing in another direction."

Then there are lines that just befuddle:

I cannot stand here as your Governor and allow millions upon millions of our dollars go to waste just so I can hold the title of Governor.

Millions of dollars will go to waste if you hold the title of governor? She's found a way to sound noble and proud about the fact that she is quitting her job well before it's done. How does this woman stay sane?

Josh Marshall and his crew are having a field day with this. I'm having fun just reading the headlines of their posts. My favorite so far is "Surreality Only Beginning."

Andrew Sullivan, who has made chronicling her lies (he's up to #30) a mainstay of his blog, had this comment, which sums it up pretty well:

I'm too stunned to say anything else, to tell you the truth. And yet not surprised at all.

Sully also gets some style points for quoting Wittgenstein. The quote is in German, which I don't know at all, but there is really one line from Wittgenstein that is a famous quote, and is somehow appropo for today: "Beyond that which we cannot speak, we must remain silent."

Oh, no. There's a lot we can say about this. And will.

Daily Kos has a great poll about why she's quitting. The number #1 answer, with 70%, is "There's another shoe left to drop." There is something else going on here. Maybe it's another good sex scandal!!! Let's not think about that. It's tacky. Funny and potentially very entertaining, but tacky. Also possibly sexist.

I think the person who may come out of this the best is David Letterman. I don't know this, but my guess is that he has felt somewhat chastised by his unfortunate encounter with her when he made that crack about her daughter. Not anymore! Now that she is, once again, proving herself to be a soap opera all by herself.

I think the best quote to sum all this up is from Hunter S. Thompson:

"When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro."