1.) Palin running for president… maybe — As TheDC’s Jeff Poor reports, last night Greta Van Susteren asked Sarah Palin if she has “the fire in the belly” for a 2012 presidential campaign. And Palin ran with it: “That’s a great question. I think my problem is that I do have the fire in my belly. I am so adamantly supportive of the good traditional things about America and our free enterprise system and I want to make sure America is put back on the right track and we will do that by defeating Obama in 2012. I have that fire in my belly… It’s a matter for me of practical, pragmatic decisions that have to be made. One is, with a large family, understanding the huge amount of scrutiny and the sacrifices that have to be made on my children’s part in order to see their momma run for president. But yeah, the fire in the belly — it is there.” In case you missed it: Sarah Palin has the fire in the belly. So either she’s running for president or she’s been putting too much paprika in the moose chili.
2.) Barack talks — President Barack gave another speech yesterday. He said words and made gestures. TheDC’s Neil Munro has more on this historic event: “President Barack Obama’s speech on Middle East policy combined a notably hard-line toward allies Israel and Bahrain, favorable references towards President George W. Bush’s policies, and unsentimental and unflattering depiction of Arab economies, societies and hatreds toward Israel. The sharpest reaction to the speech came in response to Obama’s statement that Israel should return to its pre-1967 borders (with agreed land swaps), prior to any Arab acceptance of a Jewish state on lands that are regarded by most Arabs as Muslim territory, dubbed the ‘umma.’ The statement, which some see as reversing U.S. policy, will reduce Arabs’ incentive to negotiate and leave Israel with less reason to trust U.S. committments, said critics. The speech marks a major rhetorical and strategic shift from Obama’s 2009 speech to Middle Eastern Muslims, during which he repeatedly flattered his audience, demeaned his predecessor and offered little of substance.” Stay tuned for Barack’s next speech, which will be followed by a speech and other speech, with maybe a speech or two thrown in there just to change things up.
3.) Willie Nelson bogarts endorsement — As Gary Johnson can tell you, calling for the decriminalization of marijuana is a double-edged sword. Sure, your stance might earn you endorsements from famous people. But then again, those famous people will be very, very high. TheDC’s Amanda Carey writes: “On Tuesday, word was legendary music star Willie Nelson had endorsed former New Mexico Governor and presidential candidate Gary Johnson. But by Thursday, things had changed. According to a blog post on the TeaPot Party’s website — a group Nelson co-founded — the singer had second thoughts about Johnson once the news hit the air waves and wider web. ‘My position is [it’s] too early for me to endorse anyone,’ wrote Nelson in an email to fellow TeaPot Party member Steve Bloom. ‘And I think everyone should vote their own conscience.'” It’s like Willie always sings: “Mamas, don’t let your babies grow up to be… hnn, hnn, hnnnnn… What? No, who even… Hey, anybody feel like pizza? I could really go for… What?”
4.) Service secretive — The Secret Service entered the 21st Century this week, and they’re learning that throwing themselves in front of bad guys is much more fun and rewarding than being on Twitter. On Wednesday, someone with access to their newly minted Twitter account posted the following: “Had to monitor Fox for a story. Can’t. Deal. With. The. Blathering.” Secret Service spokesman Ed Donovan tells TheDC’s Alex Pappas why these guys are sitting around watching Fox News and tweeting about it: “Here’s the thing. This is the public affairs office. We have employees that watch TV during the day, watch the news stations during the day for stories that affect the Secret Service.” And what was the story affecting the Secret Service? Mike Levine at Fox News thinks he knows: “Earlier in the day, Fox News had been covering the story of Vito LaPinta, the 13-year-old from Tacoma, Wash., who was recently visited by a Secret Service agent for posting a message on Facebook suggesting President Obama should watch out for terrorist attacks in the wake of Usama bin Laden’s killing. LaPinta’s mother was not present when the Secret Service interviewed her son, a move she decried as inappropriate.” So it goes something like this: The Secret Service responds in person to a Facebook post, watches the news reports about that response, and then complains on Twitter about the news reports. Maybe it’s time to change the name from the Secret Service to the Blogger Squad.
5.) True Lies 2: Egocentric Boogaloo — The reports of Arnold Schwarzenegger’s showbiz career being alive and well were greatly exaggerated. Even in America, you can only go so far on ego, willpower, and massive amounts of steroids. The Sacramento Bee reports: “Embattled former Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is delaying his return to the movies, stopping any negotiations or planning on projects to focus on ‘personal matters,’ according to a statement.” And here’s the statement: “At the request of Arnold Schwarzenegger we asked Creative Artists Agency to inform all his motion picture projects currently underway or being negotiated to stop planning until further notice. Governor Schwarzenegger is focusing on personal matters and is not willing to commit to any production schedules or timelines. This includes Cry Macho, The Terminator franchise and other projects under consideration. We will resume discussions when Governor Schwarzenegger decides.” No Governator cartoon? Dylan! If only there were some way Arnold could go back in time and prevent the child that’s causing him so many problems from ever being born… Nahhhhh.
6.) America’s love affair with Keith Olbermann to start any minute now — Arnold Schwarzenegger’s career might be in trouble, but at least he’s not hosting a show on Current TV. We’re just a month away from the debut of The Keith Olbermann Show You’re Even Less Likely To Watch, and the other night Keith told fellow aging crank David Letterman why he left MSNBC to go work for yet another aging crank, Al Gore: “Well, you know, at some point in the last years that I’ve been doing the news in the way that I do it, it’s occurred to me that the best place for me to start doing the news, hopefully to continue it that way, would be at a place that’s just in the news business and nothing else, that doesn’t also own an amusement park in Orlando, or doesn’t have outdoor advertising or, you know, beet plantations in the Azores or whatever else. A company that just did news and we could kind of make every decision relying on that. And that had been in the back of my mind for a while.” Also, he sucked and he got fired. By the way, “doing the news in the way that I do it” means “printing out the stories from that day’s Daily Kos and Media Matters, and then reading them into a camera very loudly.”
VIDEO: A look back at the good old days, before Arnold ran out of funny quips