You already knew how the Republicans were going to attack Obama at their convention. The real lesson to be learned from the GOP is about Sarah Palin.

Yes, we all thought it was a stupid mistake but now their Palin strategy is clear. McCain is the maverick who can reach across the aisle. Sarah Palin is the ideological heir of George W. Bush. Besides picking apart Palin’s sorry record, you need to portray her as the second coming of Bush just a heartbeat away. Palin’s presence on the ticket is just what you need to cement the narrative McCain-Palin as four more years of Bush.

Go for the jugular!

I want to retract everything I may have said or implied about Sarah Palin being hot. The woman who stood on the national stage last night was a mean, smart-assed bitch.

I thought her speech was good in that it accomplished it’s mission. It was red meat night at the RNC and McCain’s speech writers gave Sarah some nice scraps to toss her rabid audience. If Palin had delivered her lines with half as much gusto as Giuliani I would say that she hit a home run. Instead she got a standing double. I was underwhelmed.

I understand that America doesn’t know her, but she lingered a little too long talking about her family. It seemed like she spent almost as much time on her family as she did attacking Obama. Palin’s main problem though was her sarcastic manner. All that mockery of Obama was just what the delegates wanted to hear, but it isn’t going to help McCain win. The Republicans have to resort to trash talk because that’s all they’ve got. I take that back, they’ve got a special needs child they can use as a prop too.

John McCain’s tepid appearance afterwards with the family did nothing to give Palin a boost. I thought it was funny when he shook hands with hockey-mullet baby daddy. It was as if McCain was reliving his glory days as a womanizer. As GeeDubya would say, “bring ‘em on!”

Update: The AP did a little fact checking on Palin’s speech. Ouch.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080904/ap_on_el_pr/cvn_fact_check

Deux – that’s elitistese for two.

Here I am again, hips parked confidently on my sofa in eager anticipation Sarah Palin’s acceptance speech. The killa from Wasilla. The Governor of the corrupt great state of Alaska. Beautiful state, shitty government. Caribou Barbie is going to be our 45th President. A 72 year old man has a 1 in 3 chance of not living until age 80. Maybe if Alaska secedes she can be it’s first female Vice-President.

8:10 – Flip Romney (stooge number one) is telling me that the problem with Washington is that it’s too liberal. I wonder if his magic underwear is too tight. Maybe it’s squeezing his brain because Flip appears to have forgotten who has been running the country for the last 8 years. The GOP is the party of ideas, not big brother. What?!?! Crappy ideas. Liberals are responsible for gas prices and the mortgage crisis. I need a break if I’m going to be able to stick around for Milfy McMooseBurger.

8:17 – USA! USA !USA! USA! McPalin is gonna kick the rest of the world’s ass!

Romney secretly wants McOld to lose so he can run again in 2012.

8:30 – Mike Huckabee (stooge number two) and Flip’s competition next time. Let us pray. Brother Fuckleberry sounds downright friendly. Ahhh, it’s so nice. What are they doing to me, playing good/cop bad cop? Talking to Europeans is bad. We’ll be talking to them a whole lot less when McCain is President. Mike liked FDR, Jesus and Elvis. Crickets. Next?????

9:11 (no joke!!) – Rudolph Giuliani (stooge number three). Skeletor is giving the keynote address. He supports McCain. Maybe he could give McLimp some cheating lessons. USA! USA!

McAncient has dedicated his extremely long life to national service. Did you hear that he was tortured and shot down? Stern look from Mc96yearoldmother. He was in congress too. Community organizers suck. Let’s mock Obama now. Rudy is being mean to my candidate. Rudy deserves a hot poker up the sphincter. Aww, what do I care, let them eat red meat. Skeletor has to get them all revved up for Moose Muffin. Obama may need on the job training but the VPILF sure as heck won’t!

9:17 – Drill, baby drill!!

9:20 – Rudy misquotes Harry Reid about the war being lost. I’m starting to get pissed off.

9:25 – McPalin is going to shake up Washington! How dare they ask whether Palin can care for her non-abstinent kids? Who is they?

9:30 – The Main event. Miss Congeniality is in the house! ShaaaaaWING!!!! I want to do her from behind while threatening to raise her taxes. She’s a christian and a bully! Woo hoo!!!

She sounds a bit robotic. Not saying anything surprising. Muffy’s accent is a little grating. She makes no effort to look like she isn’t reading off a teleprompter. Trig Track Toe off to Eyeraack we go. I like Sarah better when her hair’s piled up. Don’t wear it down anymore, please. There’s Todd, what a doofus. He supports drilling too.

9:38 – Pick it up baby, so far you’re a little underwhelming. I mean I had low expectations already, but come on. The little family introduction is going over like tax hikes. Did she just say Todd has a great package? Jesus, we’re getting her Dad’s autobiography now. Missouri? You’re supposed to be ripping Obama, honey.

9:42 – Hockey, PTA, small town, good grief. She only did PTA for like one year. A small town (meth capital of Alaska) mayor is sorta like a community organizer except a mayor has responsibilities. Like showing your conservative credentials by raising taxes AND creating a huge deficit. By the way, she needed an administrator to help her run a town of 5,000. Do community organizers need those too? Finally some red meat. Let him have it! That’s it?

Not a member of the permanent political establishment (yet). Republicans just hate the establishment. Someone get me a drink. Barracuda wll serve the people. I’m so pissed off tonight I can’t think of anything funny to say.

9:47 – Leave the nation better than she found it? Somebody tell Bush. Palin says she has integrity. Apparently that’s good enough for the repugs. Sarah the reformer! She shook it up. The government of Alaska is now on the side of the people. OK, here’s the list of accomplishments. Wake me up in ten minutes.

11:00 – Damn, parental duties interrupted the second half of boring speech. I know I missed all the good stuff. Will read all about it in the liberal media tomorrow.

Tonight I forced myself to endure GeeDubya’s prime time RNC address. I have been a bad boy and this is my punishment. I was hoping McCain would get away with his scheme to scuttle the current occupant’s speech; old blood ‘n guts must have been so disappointed that Gustav only limped ashore with a whimper.

For now, I rest comfortably on my sofa, merrily hammering away at my laptop. I wonder if I’ll need some sort of Clockwork Orange device to keep me staring at the screen.

8:40 -  There’s an old guy named Swindle on my TV who was a POW with McCain. They had to eat rats while living in their hole in the Hanoi Hilton. Americans will have to eat rats too if McCain wins.

The repthugs are honoring veterans. Veterans are cool. The GOP should stop using them as props unless they’re going to give them proper benefits. Do they have any respect at all for GeeDumbya’s military service? How many veterans are going to have to stand up before Swindle goes away? Standing veterans are even cooler. This guy Swindle knows how to whip a hall half full of conservatives into a frenzy.

Laura Bush. Shiny red dress. This the woman who spreads her legs for the prez. Laura and I have something in common since Bush has fucked both of us. What does she see in that nimrod? The crowd goes wild – not. The lady gives a better speech than her toungue-tied hubby. “My God” she’s thinking, “George will be out of work soon!” She’s proud that the first female VP will be a Republican woman. It would be weird if it was a Republican man. Where is Larry Craig tonight? Apparently the GOP is the party of women, so long as they don’t want to choose or earn equal pay. Republican women must like being second class.

8:50 – Laura promises facts and “straight talk” about W. If only I could slip her some truth serum. W is the edumacation presidunce. Bush’s Judges, like the ones who appointed Bush in the first place, respect the constitution. 4th amendment schmorth amendment. I can barely take my eyes off of Mrs. Bush long enough to type. W has increased the number of Africans with AIDS medications from 50,000 to 2,000,000. Thank gawd; they’ll need it since he won’t help them prevent infection in the first place by giving them condoms. Iraqis live in freedom because of Bush. Freedom from clean drinking water, electricity…… My head may explode like an IED. No, Bush has kept me safe she says, smiling. Safe from having to worry about whether my email and bank records are private, safe from hurricanes and habeas corpus, safe from having to be taxed to pay for a war. So much easier to borrow the money from China. I feel safe again.

8:55 – Bill Clinton got a five minute standing ovation at his speech, but the GOP means bidness. Shrub stands at his podium, lookin real prezidentshul and just dives right in. He can’t be in St. Paul in person because he’s bizzy overseein’ the relief efferts. The reepublican guvners are  coordinatin’ and everythin’ is peachy. See how much better natural disasters are when the govner of Looziana isn’t a defeatocrat? Bush’s beady little eyes dart around. McCain is a great Amerrkin. Bush loves his mama and daddy.

The decider knows what it takes to be prezdint, see? He reads the presidential daily briefs (pdb) – like the one on 8/6/01 entitled “Bin Laden determined to strike in U.S.” That’s the one Condi couldn’t remember the name of. After being briefed on that pdb the decider decided a decision which was to decide to continue his vacation rather than taking action.

Presidents have to make tough calls. McCain’s refusal to leave the pow camp was undeniably a tough call so there can be no doubt McCain is qualified. Human life must be defended, as long as it’s in the womb. Fetuses rule. Unless you’re an Iraqi fetus. Mac wants to make Georgie’s tax cuts permanent even if he must flip flop to do so. Hooray for offshore drilling! McSame is an independent thinker who disagrees Bush (10% of the time) except when he saved the troops from calls of retreat with the courage and vision to escalate the war. The crowd seems underwhelmed. I think they’re wishing W. would just go away.

9:00 – It’s only been five minutes? Jesus W. Superpatriot is still a-talkin’. Only McCain can stop attacks afore they commence to happenin’. Sarah Palin is strong and principled. McCain found out all about that when she was vetted the day before he asked her to join him. I’m glad he took his eyes off her ass long enough to learn about her principles. Oops, I spilled my drink.

9:01 – W. is optimistic about achieving peace through war. Is this a political convention or an AARP meeting? The crowd applauds approvingly, the camera pans across their white faces, glowing with conservative pride. Hey, what’s that brown face doing in there? Security!! Oh, it’s just McLame’s adopted daughter, the one Karl Rove said was McCheater’s illegitimate black love child back in 2000 when the repugnicans didn’t think McLoser measured up to their standards and needed a good smearing.

9:02 – W. is finished. Thank god it’s over, man it was short. That’s what Laura said. Speaking of which, here she is again to pick up the crap Dumbya left behind. Gathering shit could be a new career for her when they retire to the ranch.

9:05 – Tribute to Dutch Reagan, B movie star turned President. Wait, you mean the Gay Old People nominated a CELEBRITY?!? My head hurts. Picture of Ronnie Raygun in football uniform, picture of same in an army officer’s cap. All he did during the war was make movies but he sure looks heroic. Raygun was a maverick too. Must keep watching. Don’t stop now. Raygun got government off my back. What a charming old codger, he was so adorable when he drooled all over his jelly beans, fell asleep in cabinet meetings and couldn’t recognize his own HUD secretary.

9:09  – OMG its Fred W. Thompson, who electrified the nation with his losing bid for the GOP nomination. He sure does look like a president, unlike the pasty old McCain. Yay, the economy isn’t really down! America is a great country goddamit! Look at him shake that fist! Palin has small town values. I agree that “small” is about the right adjective here. All Biden does is go on talking head shows and drink cocktails. Old Fred is fired up for Sarah Palin. Viva Viagra!

9:12 – I can’t peel my eyeballs away from the TV. Palin is a courageous reformer. If only I had known before I said all those mean things about her! And she can dress a moose! I’m starting see why the cons like her so much. Fred says that McPain has been tested like no other presidential candidate. Washington and Lincoln must be rolling over in their graves.

Cut to one of McCain’s kids. I think I saw a smirk. Don’t rewind, it only prolongs the agony! Fred’s jokes are getting cornier. Where’s my remote? What’s on the history channel? Oh wait, McCain was the leader of the trouble makers at Annapolis. I’m riveted again. Republicans like trouble makers, especially the kind who make trouble in the middle east. McCain had a corvette and dated a titty dancer. I’m thinking about switching my vote. Memo to Diebold: would somebody please make this man President?

9:23 – Uncle Fred sounds like he’s giving a school report on McCain. The long list of injuries sounds like something from a Mel Gibson flick. (Is Fred back in show biz?) My dog just farted. When McLiar was told by the gooks to give up his fellow pilots’ names or else McPrevaricator gave them the Packers’ starting lineup. [laughter] Or was it the Steelers? It’s so hard to remember who you’re pandering to when something so dramatic is seared into your memory.

9:25 – USA! USA! USA! USA!

9:30 – Fred said that Obama wants the largest tax increase in history. I think the Republicans live in an alternate universe. Or maybe there’s still some cryptosporidum in St. Paul’s drinking water. Did a bridge collapse on his head?

9:40 – Joe LIEberman. Every rapeublican’s favorite pro-abortion liberal Democrat. Joe is deranged, I can’t take it any more! Wait, Joe-mentun just said that “country matters more than party.” Then what the hell was McPoorjudgement thinking when he picked Palin?!? Blood pressure rising. Rage building. McCrazyoldgeezer supported the surge. The surge was wonderful. I’m feeling a surge right now, the kind I feel after too many burritos and cheap tequila. Must turn off TV. My kids need to go to bed so they can rest up before McCain reinstates the draft.