Palin: Not Silent On Non-Roe Cases

No...no...not silent. Not silent at all, as Christopher Orr notes.

Rather, she just...keeps...spewing...words...

Silly, senseless, stupid words.

What about other cases she doesn't agree with? vaporous generalities. No, wait, how about an example? Response: Roe again. No, other than Roe. Response: "I would think of any again that could best be dealt with on a local level...I would take issue with..."

Huhwha?

Here she sounds like a student who doesn't know the answer to an exam question, but who keeps...writing...anyway. Most students have learned (because they've mostly had bad teachers), that if they write something--anything--they'll get more points than if they just admit they don't know. (This is a horrific lesson to teach students, incidentally. My policy, not that anybody cares, is to give students a very hefty (though non-passing) number of points for admitting ignorance. Students who BS get slammed, however, frequently getting flat-out zeros.) Palin knows that if she admits that she doesn't know, or just remains silent, it's all over. But if she just keeps talking in very general, basically unfalsifiable terms, she can survive. Basically, folks like K-Lo want so desperately for Palin to be qualified that, as long as there is any way at all for them to do so, they will spin her words into something passable. (Witness K-Lo's defense of Palin's inability to name any news publication she reads. Truly sad.)

So: don't admit ignorance or error, don't say nothing at all, and don't say anything that can be checked against the facts. Pull that off and the people who really want to back you will be able to fool themselves enough to sleep at night while doing so. Palin is an idiot, of course--but she seems fairly adept at this particular game.