News Round for 7/15/09

Not known for her brilliance

-Headline of the day-
"Palin: All Tail, No Head."

I ask you, how could that not be the HotD?

Unfortunately, the first metaphor that pops into your head isn't the metaphor that wonky statistician Nate Silver is going for here. While he doesn't go out of his way to dispute the impression that Caribou Barbie might be all butt and no brains, what he's really getting at is that she's having a bit of a fundraising problem.

Turns out that, since the first of this year, Palin's political action committee, SarahPAC, has raised $773,000 and is set to break the million mark before the end of the year. The problem is that Mitt Romney, who isn't getting anywhere near the amount of ink that Palin's getting, has already raised twice as much. And Texas politico Kay Bailey Hutchison, currently running for governor, has raised nine times as much -- presumably just for her gubernatorial run.

The vast, vast majority of Palin's bucks come from donations of less than $200 -- 60% as of this date. "You don't wind up with a number like that unless two things are happening: you are raising a lot of money from small donors and you specifically are not raising a lot of money from large, establishment donors," Silver writes. In other words, the nuts at the tea parties may think she's the best thing ever, but the nuts in the corporate board rooms and GOP establishment circles do not. If she does make a 2012 run, she's going to have to do it broke.

So, is Sarah Palin the future of the Republican party? Not if you ask the Republican party. If you ever needed proof that the party establishment doesn't really give a crap what the grassroots thinks, here ya go.

They'll take your vote, Bubba. But then you can just go away. (FiveThirtyEight.com)


-Meanwhile, among the sane...-
...Sarah Palin can raise money hand over fist. But not for herself, for MoveOn.org.

After sending an email to supporters citing Palin's lies on the issue of cap-and-trade and global warming, the lefty org raised $100,000 in a day. "It is still pouring in -- at a good rate," says a spokesperson. A damned good rate. At that rate, it would take about a week for MoveOn.org to raise what Palin's raised since the beginning of the year.

Some see this as being about more than Palin, however. "It’s kind of amazing how motivated and energized her detractors are, particularly when it comes to pushing back against her high-profile claims on high-stakes questions like, you know, what to do to save the earth," writes Greg Sargent.

Yeah, I guess when the issue is basically future existence, that can be a real motivator. But when you can tie the future of mankind to how stupid Sarah Palin is, it's like a license to print money. (Plumline)


-Bonus HotD-
"Man's Debit Card Charged $23 Quadrillion, $15 Overdraft Fee."

That's right, if you use the Bank of America in Manchester, NH, you can withdraw $23,148,855,308,184,500 and only be charged 15 bucks. And, to make matters worse, there's probably not that much money in the world.

The first clue that should've raised a red flag for BoA is that theoretical quadrillionaire Josh Muszynski spent all that money at a gas station. After checking his account online, Muszynski was worried; "It's a lot of money in the negative, something I could never ever afford to pay back -- my children couldn't afford, grandchildren, nothing like that."

Dude, there isn't anyone on earth who could afford that. 24 hours later, everything was all cleared up. "It was back to normal," he said. "They reversed the negative balance fee, which was nice." I'll say.

So what happened? Who knows? When the local TV station tried to get an answer, BoA and VISA gave them the run-around. "WMUR News 9 contacted Bank of America about the statement mishap, but representatives said the card issuer, Visa, could only answer questions," the report tells us. "Visa, in turn, recommended that WMUR News 9 contact the bank."

Did I mention that we bailed out BoA yet?

Golly, you really wonder how they got in such a financial mess that they needed TARP funding, don't you? (WMUR News 9)