Ignoring Sarah Palin is not an option.

One of the comments that keeps turning up here with irritating regularity is the "Stop talking about Palin, it's what she wants." Or "If you stop talking about her she will just go away."

Trust me I understand the sentiment, believe me I do, I just disagree with the rationale.

As I have discussed before, after Palin quit the governorship a bunch of us Alaska bloggers got together to celebrate and, I'm not ashamed to admit,  give out a couple of pats on the back for a job well done.

During that get together we did discuss no longer having to write about Palin, and many agreed that they would gladly remove her name from their vocabulary.

However I disagreed, and said that we could not afford to ignore her, because for one thing I did not think she was done causing harm, and for another she provided a living breathing metaphor for what was happening to the Republican party.

Not to toot my own horn, but I believe what I said that day was somewhat prescient. Especially if you remember that this was before the Tea Party gained national attention, before Gabby Giffords was shot, and well before the traveling side show that made up the Republican primary candidates of 2012.

Take a second to read this from the Examiner:

We, progressives, ignore people like Sarah Palin at our own peril. She, along with Cruz and Lee and Hannity and others, will seek to dismantle any healing we attempt in this country, will not be content with bi-partisanship or the concept of coming together as a nation. In her recent roll-out, Palin casually called our President a murderer, is seeking vengeance on the more sensible wing of the Republican Party who, in the end, voted to end the nonsense driven by the House tea party caucus, and is, once again, recklessly striving to create conflict and foment hatred. 

"What emboldened our enemies," Palin told Megyn Kelly recently, "And what empowered competitors was his [President Obama's] promise to fundamentally transform America from being a solvent, free exceptional country into something that we're not gonna recognize . . . then of course he, having left behind . . . our brave men in Benghazi to be murdered . . . and then . . . he, using our military .. . our military, our vets, shutting down their memorials and holding them hostage in terms of budget deals . . . ." 

Palin's blatant, reckless dishonesty regarding the facts of the Republican government shutdown, and her use of incendiary rhetoric, is predictable, yet no less shocking for its predictability. This recent battle reflected the willingness of some in the Republican Party to do the right and sensible thing, and they will pay a price from those, like Palin, who believe there are only two options - her way, or her other way. 

Her re-emergence on the national stage is alarming, unnecessary, and harmful to any American values. Though hope springs eternal that her relevance is vastly diminished, we've seen what type of havoc the right-wing fringe can wreak. This country has no more room for radical, bitter, enemies to America, domestic terrorists who will stop at nothing to see this President (along with everyone in this country, if that's the price) brought to his knees.

Look, ignoring small pox did not defeat it. Ignoring a tornado does not protect you from danger. And ignoring Sarah Palin does not mean that she will disappear like the things you imagined living under your bed as a child. 

I seriously doubt that the folks over at MSNBC enjoy listening to hours upon hours of taped idiocy from Glenn Beck, or Sean Hannity, or Ann Coulter. But they do it in order to call them out on their lies and shine light on their attempts to undermine the President. Ignoring them would only mean that their messages would go out to the world without clarification or scrutiny.

THAT is kind of what they hope will happen.

Today fewer and fewer people are taking Sarah Palin seriously.

That did not happen because I, or anybody else ignored her. It happened because we refused to do so.