Peggy “No New Taxes” Noonan wrote a magnificent WSJ editorial about the power of the Palin addition to the ticket.
Apparently, this Thang was on when Noonan said that, well, it’s over.
Despite her dishonesty, Noonan is an excellent writer and a smart lady. Is she right?
A full transcript can be found here: Chicago News - Chicago Tribune - Chicago Tribune
And here is the youtube link.
Edit: changed link since first one went down fast.
I think it’s a perfect window into the Brave Face/United Front that certain (but not all) factions of the GOP are showing to the public while secretly knowing that this was, for a variety of reasons, an undeniably cynical and pandering choice by their candidate.
With the speed that this is circulating, I am speculate how many people will see this before she speaks tonight.
What affect will this have on the way you receive her speech?
It’s amazing how much more thoughtful and interesting they all get when they’re saying what they actually think. I think Murphy nailed it best when he said the saddest part is that this was a cynical pick for McCain but “McCain’s greatness is no cynicism.”
Why would it? So three pundits are bloviating while the cameras are off. This changes things how?
Now, if you’d caught McCain saying this, you’d have something.
The best lesson to be learned from this for Republican pundits is that the media is not their friend, and even if the network wouldn’t screw them by distributing their off-air commentary to the world, the earnest young recording engineer with the Obama button on his jacket just might…
The person who comes out of this the worst is Peggy Noonan, unfortunately. Because she has a reputation that is supposed to be above this sort of thing to a certain degree. The other two are just political operatives. Of course they’re cynical - that’s the playground they play in. Noonan is supposed to be more inspirational than cynical. That’s her brand, and she’s tarnished it.
Of course, she’s not the one who did most of the talking, and the sentence or two she said was slightly ambiguous enough that she might try to claim she was misunderstood.
Mike Murphy is in a world of hurt in terms of his career, I’d guess.
What’s the correct link? I want to see this.
You do not believe that Republican elites showing no confidence in the current ticket is not going to change anything? I assert otherwise, especially in the case of Peggy Noonan. She wrote an over the top yet extremely compelling piece on Palin not this morning yet obviously has no confidence in this candidacy. The players here are not random, know-nothing blowhards.
Why shouldn’t people take this seriously?
No. The best lesson to be learned for Republican pundits is that they need to refamiliarize themselves with Rule #1 of broadcasting: the mic is always on.
It lifts the veil a little on what the insiders really think.
Please, you think they wouldn’t do this if they caught…say…Jesse Jacksom syaing he wanted to cut Obama’s nuts off? Oh, wait, they did. The lesson is that there’s no such thing as a cold mike. It’s not partisan. If they had caught somebody like Carville and Donna Brazile smacktalking Obama, you think they’d bury it?
I don’t see how any of them come off badly. They didn’t say anything offensive or untrue. Murphy even praised McCain. And since when is Noonan not cynical. She does snark, not inspiration. She’s the Republican Maureen Dowd.
Sam, do your shoulders ever get tired from carrying all their water?
I just want to point out that although many of the headlines are saying something like “hot mike catches GOP insiders trashing Palin”, technically speaking Noonan and Murphy were trashing the decision to nominate Palin. The worst thing they said about the nominee herself was that she was not the most qualified woman for the job.
I’m just thrilled that Republicans who aren’t just holding out for a strong pro-lifer are not nearly as happy about this as they appear to be on camera. Peggy Noonan pretty much got caught lying about how much she likes Palin, and about the chances for the campaign.
I feel validated. I now know that people who think about politics professionally and who do want to see McCain in office also think that Palin was a blunder. It’s not just partisanship or ignorance on my part that makes me feel that way.
No, this itself won’t matter, but the attitude revealed will. Noonan and Murphy can’t be the only ones who feel this way.
This is the funniest thing I’ve read all week. The mainstream media loves conservative pundits. They would marry them if they could.
Wow, what a masterpiece of obfuscatory, revisionist, backscrabbling, media blaming bullshit.
Too bad it’s too late. The toothpaste is out of the tube.
A funny gaffe (as was the Jesse Jackson episode), but not meaningful.
I regret that there are so few pundits who are willing to abandon their partisanship in order to say what they really think.
Yeah, that’s bullshit.
And again, I don’t think this thing has legs. It’s way too inside baseball for that. Way too easy to spin Noonan and Murphy as mavericks (lol) or buy some bullshit like the above. While I can’t believe that their attitude is exactly rare in the GOP, I have way to know whether or not they’ll still give McCain their all.
I just like it for the thing that it is. Ahhh.
To paraphrase the Master, this does for bullshit what Stonehenge did for rocks.
Sounds more like the bloviation was happening when they knew the cameras were on.
Yeah, I’ll believe that when the media stop giving air time to blatantly lying right-wing gasbags.
Now that Murphy and Noonan have, “off-air,” admitted that they were bullshitting the audience when they knew the mic was on, do you think they’ll have any problems getting on teevee in the future? Hell, do you think any of their fellow pundits will even ask them about this moment, on-air?
Whoa - she’s got a reputation.
I keep hearing this stuff from conservatives lately on this board. Can we stop confusing reputation with reality?
Oooh - her brand. Yeah.