Donald Trump admits a mistake, and surprisingly it is NOT having Sarah Palin speak on his behalf.

"@Don_Vito_08: "A picture is worth a thousand words" @realDonaldTrump #LyingTed #NeverCruz @MELANIATRUMP pic.twitter.com/5bvVEwMVF8"

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 24, 2016

Courtesy of CNN:

Donald Trump admitted to The New York Times on Saturday that retweeting an unflattering photo of Heidi Cruz was a mistake and that he would not do it again if given the opportunity. 

"Yeah, it was a mistake," he told columnist Maureen Dowd. "If I had to do it again, I wouldn't have sent it."

I don't buy this. Trump had more than a week to apologize for the tweet, and instead he made excuses or doubled down and claimed that Cruz started it first.

But now suddenly he is admitting it was mistake because a female reporter is confronting him? 

Sounds like more pandering to me.

Speaking of admitting mistakes, I wonder if Trump will admit it was a mistake to fan the flames of violence at his rallies, now that he is about to be sued for the one in Kentucky?

Here is SNL's cold open from last night mocking Sarah Palin and featuring the amazing Tina Fey.

Okay that was awesome!

And you know the truly frightening thing is that if you close your eyes Fey sounds almost EXACTLY like Palin. Except when you look at her she is so much better looking.

Speaking of Palin, and you know she wants us to, Maureen Dowd had a rather interesting article published in the New York Times which explains how Palin has liberated people who are now allowed to openly criticize her without being called "sexist."

Here is a taste of what she wrote:

But when Palin turned out to be utterly unqualified and unintelligible, spouting her own special Yoda-like language, it did not reflect poorly on women as a whole — only on her and John McCain. What the hell were you thinking, Senator? 

Ordinarily, it’s considered sexist to call a woman shrill. But Palin liberated us on that score. She really is shrill. 

Ordinarily, it’s dicey to focus on what a woman in politics is wearing. But again, Palin has freed us up. She sported a cardigan so gaudy and rogue at her Iowa endorsement of Donald Trump (the man who viciously mocked her former running mate’s war record) that we would be remiss not to mention that it was the sartorial reflection of Palin and Trump themselves. 

Ordinarily, you have to tread gingerly in critiquing a working woman on her mothering skills. But Palin’s brawling brood runs so wild around the state she once governed, in a way that is so contrary to her evangelistic, sanctimonious homilies on family values, that it seems only Christian to advise her to study the Obamas to see what exceptional parenting looks like.

I LOVE that last line.

Boy I remember back to the days when damage con-trolls rushed over here to call me a sexist and a misogynist.

I guess I have Sarah Palin to thank for forever undermining their attack strategies.

Yeah, I'm not going to say thank you.

Maureen Dowd's vision of a Ted Cruz inspired American Armageddon. Think "The Terminator" meets Ayn Rand.

Courtesy of the New York Times: 

Dead cherry blossom trees litter the bleak landscape. Trash blows through L’Enfant’s once beautiful boulevards, now strewn with the detritus of democracy, scraps of the original Constitution, corroded White House ID cards, stacks of worthless bills tumbling out of the Treasury Department. 

The BlackBerrys that were pried from the hands of White House employees in 2013 are now piled up on the Potomac as a flood barrier against the ever-rising tide from melting ice caps. Their owners, unable to check their messages, went insane long ago.

Because there was no endgame, the capital’s hunger games ended in a gray void. Because there was no clean bill, now there is only a filthy stench. Because there was no wisdom, now there is only rot. The instigators, it turned out, didn’t even know what they were arguing for. Macho thrusts and feints, competing to win while the country lost. 

Thomas Jefferson’s utopia devolved into Ted Cruz’s dystopia. 

Law and order broke down as police, who were not getting paid, eventually decided to stay home. The fanatics barricaded in the Capitol dug in, determined to tear down what their idols, the founding fathers, had built. Darkness soon devoured the rest of the country.

Whose to blame you may ask? Who do you think?

A gaunt man and sickly boy, wrapped in blue tarps, trudge toward the blighted spot that was once the World War II monument, scene of the first shutdown skirmishes. They know they may not survive the winter. 

“How did this happen, Papa?” the boy asks. 

“Americans had been filled with existential dread since the 9/11 attacks, but they didn’t realize the real danger was coming from inside the government,” the man says. “It started very small with a petty fight over a six-week spending bill but quickly mushroomed out of control.” 

“Whose fault was it, Papa?” the boy presses. 

The man tries to explain: “The Grand Old Party, the proud haven of patriots who believed in a strong national security and fiscal responsibility, was infected with a mutant form of ideology. It was named the Sarahcuda Strain after the earliest carrier. Remember when you saw that old science fiction movie, ‘I Am Legend’? A scientist described the virus that burned through civilization as being like ‘a very fast car driven by a very bad man.’ That’s what happened: In the infected Tea Party politicians, brain function decreased and social de-evolution occurred. They began ignoring their basic survival instincts. 

“It’s hard to believe now, but they were fixated on stopping an effort to get health care to those who couldn’t afford it. It eventually led them to destroy all the things they said they held most dear.” 

The boy is confused. “They killed America because they didn’t care about keeping Americans alive?” he asks.

"The Sarahcuda Strain," I love it!

But yes in the final analysis the young boy's question is absolutely accurate.

I don't always enjoy Maureen Dowd, but this is a must read and it does a pretty great job of putting a rather ridiculous conflict into a context that is both entertaining as well as informative. .

Maureen Dowd bemoans the fact that Palin's insipid Facebook rantings may have had an affect on health care reform.

She took a forum, Facebook, more commonly used by kids hooking up and cyberstalking, and with one catchy phrase, several footnotes and a zesty disregard for facts, managed to hijack the health care debate from Mr. Obama.

Sarahcuda knows, from her brush with Barry on the campaign trail, that he is vulnerable on matters that demand a visceral and muscular response rather than a logical and book-learned one. Mr. Obama was charming and informed at his town hall in Montana on Friday, but he’s going to need some sustained passion, a clear plan and a narrative as gripping as Palin’s I-see-dead-people scenario. (You know the drill, just click the title to read the rest of Maureen Dowd's column.)

I have often been told by well meaning visitors that by giving attention to Sarah Palin I, and the MSM, are giving her credibility that she does not deserve.

I completely agree that she does not deserve ANY credibility, but I am well aware that if those of us on the right side of these issues did not take Palin to task that she would continue to spew her lies without correction.

You see she has direct access to her minions through Facebook (you know without the filter of that "gotcha" media), where she is free to make up whatever damn thing she wants and they simply accept it as fact. Then they disseminate that information as if it were found engraved on a stone tablet from the top of Mt. Sinai.

Though Sarah is lacking in any real depth of intelligence, she is communicating directly with others of low IQ and easily fanned hatred. They are the ones who show up at town halls with manufactured signs and minds already made up. They are the ones who show up outside the Anchorage Assembly with red shirts and black hearts.

If we do not confront this kind of disinformation and hate mongering there is a very real danger that it will rip our country apart.

Maureen Dowd calls me "Mavericky". Wow!

Palin is still obsessed with the blogosphere, which recently lit up with a rumor started by a fellow mavericky Alaskan, who also no longer has his job — that she and Todd were Splitsville. She sarcastically told Mike Allen of Politico that she loved finding out “what’s goin’ on in my life from the news.”

She deserted her post as governor to write her book about the “pioneering spirit,” as she told Allen. The contradiction seems lost on her.

And, as Talking Points Memo reported on Friday, she put up a demented, fact-free Facebook rant trashing the president’s health care plan: “The America I know and love is not one in which my parents or my baby with Down Syndrome will have to stand in front of Obama’s ‘death panel’ so his bureaucrats can decide, based on a subjective judgment of their ‘level of productivity in society’ whether they are worthy of health care. Such a system is downright evil.”

Do we sometimes drive ’em downright crazy? You betcha!

I am a huge fan of Maureen Dowd!

The fact that she wrote about my situation in her column absolutely makes my day.

And it is just the cherry on top of what has turned out to be an amazing weekend, (I will write more about that later.)

Please click the title to read this wonderful article in full.

Sarah Palin fantasizes she is a mama bear via Twitter. I have never seen a nervous breakdown tweeted before have you?

Great day w/bear management wildlife biologists; much to see in wild territory incl amazing creatures w/mama bears' gutteral raw instinct to16 minutes ago from TwitterBerry

(Wait why did she stop halfway through her thought? "Gutteral raw instinct to....what?" Oh wait it continues again down below.)

protect & provide for her young;She sees danger?She brazenly rises up on strong hind legs, growls Don't Touch My Cubs & the species survives13 minutes ago from TwitterBerry

(You probably did not catch it because it was done with such subtlety, but I do believe that this is Governor Sarah's sly way of comparing her defensiveness about her family to a mama bears aggressive disembowelment of anybody stupid enough to even try to take a picture of her precious cubs. But I digress, why don't we allow the Governor to finally finish tweeting her thoughts.)

& mama bear doesn't look 2 anyone else 2 hand her anything; biologists say she works harder than males, is provider/protector for the future10 minutes ago from TwitterBerry

(Brilliant! Sarah has masterfully made the point that she is completely self reliant like the majestic mother bear that she seems to admire so very, very much. Well except for the hired nanny who took care of little Trig on the campaign trail, you know when one of the girls was not saddled with the responsibility. And besides the per diem she charged the state while she was staying in her own house. And I am not so sure how "mama bear like" it is to constantly blame everybody else for mistakes that YOU made. But hey other than that Sarah Palin is EXACTLY like a mama bear! For example, and I did not want to reveal this earlier, but I have it on good authority that Sarah Palin does indeed shit in the woods.)

I wonder if Palin is planning to tweet her new book? I mean who needs a stupid ghost writer when you have so much practice typing clear and concise messages such as these?

(If you want to have more fun with Palin tweets then go read Maureen Dowds imagining of a twittered conversation between Governor Bat-Shit and John "You know I was tortured in Nam" McCain.)

Maureen Dowd posts Sarah Palin's "diary".

Dear Diary,

No one understands me. It’s like I’m speaking some Eskimo dialect or something. Andrea Mitchell follows me all the way to Kanakanak Beach and I get a French manicure and set up this huge photo op for her, even though she spooked the salmon.

Todd and me are in our cool fishing bibs. Piper’s helping out on the boat. It’s an amazing day that shows how our Creator favored my beloved Alaska, gatekeeper of the continent, and makes a great shot for all the network reporters up here to milk. This progresses me away from my image as some kind of flaky “rogue diva” and back to my image as a tough huntin’ and fishin’ gal.

But Andrea makes such a darn big deal about how I’m quitting in the middle of my term.

“You’re not listening to me!” I snap.

She says maybe I didn’t want to go back to the nitty-gritty of Alaska politics after the bright lights of the national campaign.

“The nitty-gritty, like, you mean, the fish slime and the dirt under the fingernails and stuff that’s me?” I said. Awesome response, huh?!!

It’s the same old double standard. I am not one of those who would whine and cuss. It’s just not how I’m wired!!! But the minute I start to whine and cuss, the mainstream media totally misunderstands my verbiage and the combination of things that brought me to this place of knowing. And I know that I know that I know those crappy bloggers will put out more confliction stories.

I LOVE Maureen Dowd!

I urge you to read the rest of this imaginary diary by clicking the headline.

Maureen really nails the batshit crazy conflicting narratives coming out of (soon to be ex-)Governor Sarah's mouth. Very entertaining.

(BTW TIME magazine lists what it thinks are the five best explanations that Sarah Palin resigned but misses the real reason.)

Maureen Dowd believes that Michelle Obamas sculpted biceps inspire Americans.

Let’s face it: The only bracing symbol of American strength right now is the image of Michelle Obama’s sculpted biceps. Her husband urges bold action, but it is Michelle who looks as though she could easily wind up and punch out Rush Limbaugh, Bernie Madoff and all the corporate creeps who ripped off America.

In the taxi, when I asked David Brooks about her amazing arms, he indicated it was time for her to cover up. “She’s made her point,” he said. “Now she should put away Thunder and Lightning.”

I’d seen the plaint echoed elsewhere. “Someone should tell Michelle to mix up her wardrobe and cover up from time to time,” Sandra McElwaine wrote last week on The Daily Beast.
Washington is a place where people have always been suspect of style and overt sexuality. Too much preening signals that you’re not up late studying cap-and-trade agreements.
David was not smitten by the V-neck, sleeveless eggplant dress Michelle wore at her husband’s address to Congress — the one that caused one Republican congressman to whisper to another, “Babe.”

He said the policy crowd here would consider the dress ostentatious. “Washington is sensually avoidant. The wonks here like brains. She should not be known for her physical presence, for one body part.” David brought up the Obamas’ obsession with their workouts. “Sometimes I think half the reason Obama ran for president is so Michelle would have a platform to show off her biceps.”

During the campaign, there was talk in the Obama ranks that Michelle should stop wearing sleeveless dresses, because her muscles, combined with her potent personality, made her daunting.

She ignored that talk, thank heavens. I love the designer-to-J. Crew glamour. Combined with her workaday visits to soup kitchens, inner-city schools and meetings with military families, Michelle’s flair is our depression’s answer to Ginger Rogers gliding around in feathers and lamé.

Her arms, and her complete confidence in her skin, are a reminder that Americans can do anything if they put their minds to it. Unlike Hillary, who chafed at the loathed job of first lady, and Laura, who for long stretches disappeared into the helpmeet role, Michelle has soared every day, expanding the job to show us what can be accomplished by a generous spirit, a confident nature and a well-disciplined body.

Now before I start making any comments I must confess that I know absolutely NOTHING about fashion. I think I watched an episode or two of Top Model, and have seen the actresses walk the red carpet for the Academy Awards, but beyond that I am fairly un-evolved when it comes to what is considered "in style" or not.

However, like everybody, I do know what I find personally appealing.

And I did find Mrs. Obama's sleeveless dresses appealing. Not in an overtly sexy way, but just that they seemed to make her feel comfortable and looked very chic on her.

I am also somebody who appreciates a fit body, whether male or female, and Michele's choice of attire reveals a body that is being well maintained. In a time when health care is on every Americans mind, it is a good reminder that HEALTH care is about eating right and exercising, and that what happens in the doctor's office or hospital is actually SICK care.

And possibly the main reason that the stuffy Washington crowd may find themselves intimidated by Michelle Obama's shapely arms is that it is constant reminder that their sedentary overfed lifestyle makes them her physical inferior.

Let's face it if the President wanted to guarantee getting his policies passed through Congress and the Senate he could just invite them to arm wrestle Michelle over it. Most of them would run away in terror and those that accepted would suffer yet another humiliating defeat at the hands (or arms) of the Obamas.

Maureen Dowd finally takes on the McCain trump card. His POW excuse.

The Rev. Kirbyjon Caldwell, the pastor who married Jenna Bush and who is part of a new Christian-based political action committee supporting Obama, recently criticized the joke McCain made at the Sturgis Motorcycle Rally encouraging Cindy to enter the topless Miss Buffalo Chip contest. The McCain spokesman Brian Rogers brought out the bottomless excuse, responding with asperity that McCain’s character had been “tested and forged in ways few can fathom.”

When the Obama crowd was miffed to learn that McCain was in a motorcade rather than in a “cone of silence” while Obama was being questioned by Rick Warren, Nicolle Wallace of the McCain camp retorted, “The insinuation from the Obama campaign that John McCain, a former prisoner of war, cheated is outrageous.”

When Obama chaffed McCain for forgetting how many houses he owns, Rogers huffed, “This is a guy who lived in one house for five and a half years — in prison.”

As Sam Stein notes in The Huffington Post: “The senator has even brought his military record into discussion of his music tastes. Explaining that his favorite song was ‘Dancing Queen’ by Abba, he offered that his knowledge of music ‘stopped evolving when his plane intercepted a surface-to-air missile.’ ‘Dancing Queen,’ however, was produced in 1975, eight years after McCain’s plane was shot down.”

Nicely done.

I have noticed, along with many others, that McCain has been using his experiences as a Vietnam prisoner of war as a shield to block every single possible criticism.

At first it worked perfectly. If a reporter asked a question which questioned McCain's qualifications, he simply whipped out the POW card and the journalist simply slinked away and hoped no Republican blogger would eviscerate them for daring to insult a war hero.

But since McCain has used his POW status with such reckless abandon he has not only reduced it to an excuse for his every gaffe or mistake, but he is also in danger of making the experiences of other POW's into a joke

Maureen Dowd on recent Hillary RFK gaffe.

As usual Dowd does a great job of making pithy observations and painfully true characterizations that shine a bright light on the facts that many would rather remained hidden from scrutiny.

I think the sentence that I agree with the most is this one:

Maybe a tired, stressed Hillary was giving an unfiltered version of a blunt conversation that she’s had with her husband and advisers about staying in the race, using R.F.K. as an anything-can-happen example, in the same way she fantasizes about Sean Hannity breaking a story that would demolish Obama.

Because isn't that really what most of us kind of assumed? I mean who would mention this historically painful assassination out loud unless you had been talking about it privately? And then why would you be discussing it privately? In what context would it come up?

I think most of us can easily imagine in what context it would come up.

And that is why we felt stung and horrified that she actually made this statement in front of the camera. It simply reinforces the idea that she is wishing for some horrible catastrophe to befall Obama and get him out of her damn way!

But hey, she is not actually SAYING she wants anything to happen. At least not in front of the camera.