Fareed Zakaria finally says what almost EVERYBODY is thinking.

Will someone please put Sarah Palin out of her agony? Is it too much to ask that she come to realize that she wants, in that wonderful phrase in American politics, "to spend more time with her family"? Having stayed in purdah for weeks, she finally agreed to a third interview. CBS's Katie Couric questioned her in her trademark sympathetic style. It didn't help. When asked how living in the state closest to Russia gave her foreign-policy experience, Palin responded thus:

"It's very important when you consider even national-security issues with Russia as Putin rears his head and comes into the airspace of the United States of America. Where—where do they go? It's Alaska. It's just right over the border. It is from Alaska that we send those out to make sure that an eye is being kept on this very powerful nation, Russia, because they are right there. They are right next to—to our state."

There is, of course, the sheer absurdity of the premise. Two weeks ago I flew to Tokyo, crossing over the North Pole. Does that make me an expert on Santa Claus? (Thanks, Jon Stewart.) But even beyond that, read the rest of her response. "It is from Alaska that we send out those …" What does this mean? This is not an isolated example. Palin has been given a set of talking points by campaign advisers, simple ideological mantras that she repeats and repeats as long as she can. ("We mustn't blink.") But if forced off those rehearsed lines, what she has to say is often, quite frankly, gibberish.

Can we now admit the obvious? Sarah Palin is utterly unqualified to be vice president. She is a feisty, charismatic politician who has done some good things in Alaska. But she has never spent a day thinking about any important national or international issue, and this is a hell of a time to start.

Thank you, thank you, thank you Mr. Zakaria.

Thank you for saying in print what ALL of us are saying in private.

Sarah Palin is so unfit to be the Vice President of this country that she often appears as a parody of somebody who is really trying to run for the Vice Presidency.

In Alaska we have to watch her television interviews between our fingers because our hands are clapped over our eyes. I know somebody who seriously has to turn the television off every time she is about to speak because of the shame they feel that they voted for her to be Alaska's Governor. "If I had only known" is a mantra often repeated around here.

My friends and I cannot decide if we want to watch Palin self destruct in the Vice Presidential debate on October 2nd, or if we just want to be put out of our misery sooner. As a blogger I can hardly wait to write about Palin's debate with Joe Biden, but as an Alaskan I just don't know how much more I can stand.