Showing a level of cluelessness that is surprising even for them, a Tea Party PAC is trying to recruit Sarah Palin to run for the U.S. Senate in Alaska.
Todd Cefaratti of the Tea Party Leadership Fund sent out a fundraising email urging tea partiers to give his group money so that he could recruit Sarah Palin to run for Senate in Alaska. Cefaratti, who apparently hasn’t kept up with current events much since the 2008 election, wrote, “You and I both know that Sarah Palin is a fighter who will stand up to Harry Reid and his pals in the Senate to protect our Constitution in issues like amnesty, gun control and our nation’s crushing debt. We know that, with Sarah in the Senate, conservatives across America can rest a little easier at night knowing that she’s at the watch.”
You may be familiar with the Tea Party Leadership Fund from an incredibly annoying ad that features a beeping alarm clock, and sixty seconds of complete lies about Congress coming to take away your guns.
There are several problems with what the tea partiers are suggesting. First, Sarah Palin has repeatedly demonstrated that she has no idea what is in the constitution, so relying on her to protect your constitutional rights probably isn’t the best plan. Second, Sarah Palin was such a fighter that she couldn’t handle the ethic complaints filed against her in Alaska, so she resigned halfway through her only term in office. I believe the word Mr. Cefaratti meant to use was quitter, not fighter. Third, the other reason why Palin quit as governor was that she thought she was a big star, and couldn’t wait to get out of Alaska. In fact, Palin spends most of her time in Arizona now. She really doesn’t live in Alaska anymore.
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There is also the little fact that Alaskans really don’t like Sarah Palin. Palin is so unpopular in Alaska that a February 2013 poll found that she would lose the state to Hillary Clinton by 16 points. Her approval rating in the state is 37%.
In many ways, this is typical tea party behavior. They are trying to recruit an ignorant, uneducated, ideological candidate to run in a state where she isn’t popular because they are under the delusional belief that she could win. There is no such thing as being too extremist or too dumb for the tea party.
The biggest problem with the idea that Palin could run for Senate is that it would require her to actually do something. Sarah Palin doesn’t want to work. Much like a Kardashian, she wants to be paid for being famous. For her part, Palin has been so busy attacking charity events on Twitter and Facebook that she hasn’t said a word about a potential return to politics.
This whole thing reeks of a Tea Party PAC pulling a “Palin.” They are trying to dangle the possibility of her running for Senate to get her fans to give them money.
Sarah Palin isn’t going to run for anything, but it speaks volumes about the desperation of many on the right that they would even consider the idea of her being a candidate for any office. Only in the tea party could somebody who was fired by Fox News be seen as a potential candidate for one of the highest offices in the land.
Jason is the managing editor. He is also a White House Press Pool and a Congressional correspondent for PoliticusUSA. Jason has a Bachelor’s Degree in Political Science. His graduate work focused on public policy, with a specialization in social reform movements.
Awards and Professional Memberships
Member of the Society of Professional Journalists and The American Political Science Association
