She's a Doll

Anyone who knows me or reads this blog knows about the Palin Be Gone Wager that I had with one of the LLWL members. Our bet was whether Sarah Palin would continue her celebrity status in the aftermath of the election. As I described it before:

Although I'm normally not a gambler, I even agreed to a wager. My bet was that Sarah would slink off sooner rather than later, while my colleague said Sarah's staying. The loser has to buy pizza for the office from Old Forge, located nearby my hometown of Scranton (which I have bragged for years has the best pizza ever). After much back & forth on the matter, we decided that the Ides of March would be the date of determination. At that point in time, would Sarah Palin still be in the news?

Admittedly, Palin certainly continued full blast in the early post-election days, but then began to pale as time went on. I chronicled her decline in Out of the Spotlight and Off The Radar.

And yes, although the drop dead date for the bet was March 15th, we've yet to declare a winner. I've acknowledged that Palin has had a resurgence of sorts since the Ides of March, The Wasilla Snowbillies, but that doesn't help my erstwhile colleague. Of course, as I've mentioned before, she's willing to call it a tie, but lord knows I can never concede defeat. So our Old Forge Pizza fest is on hold, to the consternation of the rest of the office.

Along with our Palin Patter, I received an official Sarah Palin calendar as a surprise holiday present from my gambling pal. See The Year of Living Palin. It's prominently displayed on the wall facing my credenza, much to the shock & surprise of clients & friends who happen by the office. Of course, I rarely discuss politics with clients, but a few who know me well at least suspect my liberal leanings, even if they do not share them. So the expression on their face as they gaze at Sarah's face is priceless, with a look of bewilderment and confusion.

When I received my Christmas present, I was told that there was yet another present coming, but that it had been delayed. Well, it finally arrived yesterday.

My very own Sarah Palin doll!

Sexy, Sassy Sarah.

This treasured collectors item has arrived just in time too, since Sarah's been named to The 2009 TIME 100, with her praises sung by no less a luminary than Ann Coulter, who says of Palin:

Sarah Palin was arguably the most influential person in 2008, but no one notices because she wasn't influential enough to overcome the deficits of her running mate and win the election.

* * * *

John McCain was so preposterous a candidate (at least on a Republican ticket) that Palin was responsible for far more votes than the usual vice-presidential candidate. The biggest red flag proving her popularity with normal Americans is that liberals won't shut up about her. Palin is a threat to liberals because she believes in God and country and family — all values liberals pretend to believe in but secretly detest. There's a reason there's no "Stop Olympia Snowe before it's too late!" movement.

On the other hand, it all depends on your perspective. I'm not sure that Coulter gets the last word. Mitt Romney may have called it, when he remarked:

In the latest instance of a high-profile GOP member taking a passing swipe at the party's 2008 vice presidential candidate, former Massachusetts governor and GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney jokingly dismissed Sarah Palin’s inclusion on Time’s list of influential people in an interview broadcast Sunday.

He asked, was “the issue on the most beautiful people or the most influential people?”

And finally, after playing the tease for a while, Sarah Palin to be part of the National Council for a New America, the latest rebranding effort by the GOP.

So, my Palin doll will be a conversation piece for a while.