Sarah Palin is mixing it up with potential rival Rick Santorum, suggesting the former Pennsylvania senator and presidential hopeful is a "knuckle-dragging Neanderthal."

The eyebrow-raising slap came in response to Santorum's recent comments that Palin was likely skipping an annual gathering of conservatives in Washington this weekend because of other "business opportunities" and her mothering responsibilities.

More Articles

The key to decoding Fox News isn’t Bill O’Reilly or Sean Hannity. It isn’t even News Corp. chief Rupert Murdoch. To understand what drives Fox News, and what its true purpose is, you must first understand Chairman Ailes. “He is Fox News,” says Jane Hall, a decade-long Fox commentator who defected over Ailes’ embrace of the fear-mongering Glenn Beck. “It’s his vision. It’s a reflection of him.”[...]

Fear, in fact, is precisely what Ailes is selling: His network has relentlessly hyped phantom menaces like the planned “terror mosque” near Ground Zero, inspiring Florida pastor Terry Jones to torch the Koran. Privately, Murdoch is as impressed by Ailes’ business savvy as he is dismissive of his extremist politics. "You know Roger is crazy," Murdoch recently told a colleague, shaking his head in disbelief. "He really believes that stuff."

To watch even a day of Fox News – the anger, the bombast, the virulent paranoid streak, the unending appeals to white resentment, the reporting that’s held to the same standard of evidence as a late-­October attack ad – is to see a refraction of its founder, one of the most skilled and fearsome operatives in the history of the Republican Party. As a political consultant, Ailes repackaged Richard Nixon for television in 1968, papered over Ronald Reagan’s budding Alzheimer’s in 1984, shamelessly stoked racial fears to elect George H.W. Bush in 1988, and waged a secret campaign on behalf of Big Tobacco to derail health care reform in 1993. "He was the premier guy in the business," says former Reagan campaign manager Ed Rollins. "He was our Michelangelo."

In the fable Ailes tells about his own life, he made a clean break with his dirty political past long before 1996, when he joined forces with Murdoch to launch Fox News. "I quit politics," he has claimed, "because I hated it." But an examination of his career reveals that Ailes has used Fox News to pioneer a new form of political campaign – one that enables the GOP to bypass skeptical reporters and wage an around-the-clock, partisan assault on public opinion. The network, at its core, is a giant soundstage created to mimic the look and feel of a news operation, cleverly camouflaging political propaganda as independent journalism.

The result is one of the most powerful political machines in American history. One that plays a leading role in defining Republican talking points and advancing the agenda of the far right. Fox News tilted the electoral balance to George W. Bush in 2000, prematurely declaring him president in a move that prompted every other network to follow suit. It helped create the Tea Party, transforming it from the butt of late-night jokes into a nationwide insurgency capable of electing U.S. senators. Fox News turbocharged the Republican takeover of the House last fall, and even helped elect former Fox News host John Kasich as the union-busting governor of Ohio – with the help of $1.26 million in campaign contributions from News Corp. And by incubating a host of potential GOP contenders on the Fox News payroll– including Sarah Palin, Mike Huckabee, Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum – Ailes seems determined to add a fifth presidential notch to his belt in 2012. "Everything Roger wanted to do when he started out in politics, he’s now doing 24/7 with his network," says a former News Corp. executive. "It’s come full circle."

Take it from Rush Limbaugh, a "dear friend" of Ailes.

Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) suggested on Sunday morning that former Alaska governor Sarah Palin could defeat President Barack Obama should she run as the Republican presidential nominee in 2012.

Despite Trump's own claims that he's worth around $7 billion, last September the most recent Forbes 400 rankings -- which many consider to have overestimated the real estate developer's wealth in the past -- estimated his net worth at $2.4 billion, putting him in a six-way tie for 153rd-richest person in America.

And a deposition in a defamation lawsuit filed by Trump provides numerous examples of him stretching the truth about his success in real estate. Former New York Times editor and reporter (and current Huffington Post national editor) Timothy L. O'Brien wrote in his 2005 book, "TrumpNation: The Art of Being the Donald," that the developer was probably worth $150 to $250 million, rather than the typical estimates of $2 to $3 billion. Trump sued O'Brien for libel, claiming that the book's lower figure killed some potential deals and damaged his reputation.

An Internet poll sponsored by Newsmax.com reveals that Americans overwhelmingly favor Donald Trump as their preferred candidate for the Republican presidential nomination in 2012.

Online participants in the poll, which has drawn more than 550,000 responses, also support Trump by a wide margin in a head-to-head matchup with President Barack Obama.

If the election were held today, Trump would beat Obama in a landslide, 68 to 13 percent. But that lead is just as sizeable when Trump faces off against the best and the brightest in the oft-mentioned field of GOP contenders for 2012.

Would you like to read a long and enjoyable essay on why Ayn Rand was probably the most evil troll of the post-Hitler era? (Now we don't have to compare her to Hitler!) Here's the piece, on The Awl. You will enjoy it, we bet! Also, it gives us an excuse to post this video that's been floating around the last couple of days. Watch Ayn Rand explain why most of the useless-eater population needs to die!

Two remarkable admissions from FOX News's brilliant boss Roger Ailes yesterday in the wake of the Arizona shootings.
First, Ailes admitted that, in response to the shootings, he told his staff to "shut up, tone it down." 
This is a repudiation of FOX's rhetoric prior to the shootings, if not a tacit admission that this rhetoric might have had something to do with inciting them. (Why else would you change FOX's policy in response to the shootings?).
Second, Ailes finally admitted that FOX is on one side of a war fighting "the other side."

Back when Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour told a journalist that racism in his hometown of Yazoo City just wasn't "that bad," and credited the local Citizens Council for keeping a lid on the Ku Klux Klan -- yes, that would be the infamous White Citizens Council, enforcer of Jim Crow and purveyor of white supremacy throughout the South -- there was a lively debate over whether Barbour's remarks represented a gaffe.

Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC) doesn't think President Barack Obama should be considered the leader of the United States of America.

During a speech covering the national debt, earmarks, the 2012 Presidential election and the repeal of the health care law on Thursday, DeMint told members of the D.C. chapter of the conservative Federalist Society, "This whole idea that the President is the leader of our country is a mistake."

As the most famous Republican on radio, Rush Limbaugh has made a name for himself by creating controversy. But how about calling teachers "parasites"? Or union workers part of an "anti-democracy" movement? That's a bit much.

This audio is from The Rush Limbaugh Show, broadcast Feb. 17, 2011.

Former Vice President Dick Cheney on Saturday called Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak a good friend and U.S. ally, and he urged the Obama administration to move cautiously as turmoil continued to shake that nation's government.

Limbaugh: "You Don't Know What It's Like To Be Right As Often As I Am." From the November 8, 2010, edition of Premiere Radio Networks' The Rush Limbaugh Show:

Limbaugh: "The Center Of The Universe Is Not The RNC. It's Right Here." From the July 6, 2010, edition of Premiere Radio Networks' The Rush Limbaugh Show:

Limbaugh: "Glenn Beck Is A Result Of My Success." From the October 13, 2009, edition of NBC's Today:

Limbaugh: "In My Heart And Soul, I Know I Have Become The Intellectual Engine Of The Conservative Movement." From a July 6, 2008, New York Times article profiling Limbaugh:

Limbaugh: Everybody Supported Obama But Then "There Came One Voice. It Belonged To Me." From the January 21, 2010, broadcast of Premiere Radio Networks' The Rush Limbaugh Show:

Limbaugh Responds To Gallup Poll On Attitudes Toward Global Warming: "The Nation Is Thanking Me." From the March 11, 2010, edition of Premiere Radio Networks' The Rush Limbaugh Show:

Limbaugh Takes Credit For MA Senate Election, Stalling Health Care Reform, Cap And Trade -- But It's Not "An Ego Thing." From the February 10, 2010, edition of Premiere Radio Networks' The Rush Limbaugh Show:

Limbaugh: "I Have No Competitors"; "Things Only Take Off When I Mention Them." From the July 2008 New York Times article:

Limbaugh: Republicans Are "Probably All Waiting For My Next Leadership Step To See Where I'm Going To Take Them." From the February 19, 2010, edition of Premiere Radio Networks' The Rush Limbaugh Show:

Glenn Beck managed to lose roughly a million of his Fox News viewers in 2010, and his slide has continued into 2011. Beck's viewership numbers have gotten so bad that he has been only able to top 2 million viewers three times in the month of January. Beck has seen his ratings decrease by half, and there seems to be no end in sight for the viewer exodus from his program.

Republicans are always "Trash Talking" Democrats and blaming "The Left" for creating the huge federal deficit through what they call our "socialistic programs" like Medicare, Social Security, Unemployment Compensation, Needless Research like Stem Cell, NASA, School Lunch Programs and prosecuting Financial and Wall Street Fraud.

However, if we could focus on REALITY FOR A CHANGE, this is the day to do it. The total amount of our debt is racking up at an alarming rate. We are borrowing billions from Communist China - not loaning money to them. We are borrowing from China to pay for the REPUBLICAN DRIVEN WARS FOR THE PAST 20 YEARS. We are spending a billion dollars a day to fight wars to make the world a safer place, yet the world is not paying any taxes or even helping us.

IS THERE ANYONE AT HOME IN AMERICA? Have Republican "Talking Points" so confused everyone that we cannot see the trees for the forest? We are broke and deeply in debt to a Communist country. Why in the Hell are we constantly fighting conflicts and wars that financially benefit only a few arms dealers and suppliers, like say, oh, I don't know, HALLI-BURTON, Dick Cheney's former company. Halliburtion has made so much money from these conflicts/wars that they can easily pay $300,000,000 to keep the former Vice President out of Jail for committing war crimes.

Twenty years, let me break it down for our Tea-Republicans, that is two decades or 4 times the duration of the Civil War. Get it? Twenty years of spending over a billion dollars per day will add up over a 20 year period to half of our national debt.

NOTE: To my fiscally Conservative Republicans, friends, if you want to balance the budget, restore prosperity to America and create a robust economy - STOP STARTING WARS that are not necessary to protect the sovereignty of our country and bring the troops home. I know that Republicans count on the military to help get them elected, so, hear me, I am not saying that we need to downsize the military right now.

Hell, no bring them home and put them to work where the real threat to America is: ON OUR SOUTHERN BORDER BETWEEN THE US AND MEXICO. Sorry, for the caps, but I personally know Tea-Republicans and I know that the only way they are going to read the Constitution is to Have It Read To Them and the only way that can see this is with the CAPS ON!

Try this FOR A MATH TEASER: Take 365 times One Billion dollars x 20 years. That's a big number isn't it, Mr. Patriot? Half of our debt.

CONSERVATIVES, Tea Republicans and Republicans are you really that dense that you can not see that it is you, the Republicans, that have busted the bank, collapsed our financial institutions, allowed Wall Street Con Artists to Rip Off Trillions of dollars from your Fellow Americans. It is you and your simplistic policy that drove the country to the brink. President Obama is trying to back it away from the edge. Get in! You got in when it was going the wrong way.

Chill out, your bible thumping rhetoric does work with really slow out of work under educated people who are voting for you because Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck and the entire staff of Hate TV at Fox TV Nyetwork News tells them. It is really simple!

• • Getting back to saluting the original Constitution and quoting it at every opportunity is not the solution and really it makes for a very boring dinner party. Not a big help.
  • Repealing the Health Care bill passed by your colleagues is not going to significantly reduce the debt even if you constantly keep call it a "Jobs Killing Bill."
  • Repealing Roe vs Wade is not going to do it either.
  • Voting to place "The Ten Commandments on Every Building in America" is not much help, either, and, just guessing, but it might cost a boat load of dough.

No, my flag waving, gun toting, bible thumping, Evangelical Twisted Sister, that love to quote Ronnie Reagan, the secret is: NO MORE UNNECESSARY WARS.

Got it, now get off your pompous, federally tax sucking asses and march right in there and OPT OUT OF YOUR OWN FEDERAL, TAX PAYER PAID FOR HEALTH CARE, then bring the troops home and pass a resolution that under no circumstance will you ever listen again to DICK CHENEY. OK? The next time that you want to do something - DON'T!

In his first television interview since he underwent heart surgery last summer, former Vice President Dick Cheney says rebounding poll figures haven't changed his mind on President Obama. In the interview, set to air Tuesday morning on TODAY, Cheney tells NBC News national correspondent Jamie Gangel "I think he's enacted a program that a great many people are very worried about."

[...]

I think his overall approach to expanding the size of government, expanding the deficit, and giving more and more authority and power to the government over the private sector is a lack of– sort of a feel for the role of the private sector in– in creating jobs, in creating wealth and getting our economy back on track. Those are all weaknesses, as I look at Barack Obama. And I think he'll be a one term President.

The gay blogosphere is abuzz with rumors that anti-gay U.S. Lindsey Graham, R – S.C., is about to be outed.

Mike Rogers, who's made it his life mission to out anti-gay leaders, says he has pictures of one of Graham's boy toys leaving the lifelong bachelor's home after spending the night there, according to several bloggers. Rogers claims to have a 100-percent track record as an outer.

Rogers tweeted on Dec. 18 that he had a meeting with his lawyer about the imminent release of his pictures. Wonkette displayed the tweets online today

"There is a war underway. I'm not talking about Washington's bloody misadventures in Afghanistan and Iraq, but a war within our own borders. It's a war fought on the airwaves, on television and radio and over the Internet, a war of words and images, of half-truth, innuendo, and raging lies. I'm talking about a political war, pitting liberals against conservatives, Democrats against Republicans. I'm talking about a spending war, fueled by stealthy front groups and deep-pocketed anonymous donors. It's a war that's poised to topple what's left of American democracy."

Today I discovered a link to the Republican National Coalition for Life PAC, where they rate GOP candidates on their anti-abortion purity, and my jaw is on the floor at how many of these candidates support the cruelest and most extreme anti-abortion positions — forcing a woman to give birth to a rapist's baby, even if the rapist is her father.

By the sheer number of these people, it looks like there's going to be a very big push to make abortion flat-out illegal in all cases, coming soon. If I'm reading the page correctly, 112 of the GOP candidates in this election support outright bans on abortion: 2010 Election Candidates responses to the RNC/Life Questionnaire.