Circles.

I don't wanna go over Palin's video like it's the goddam Zapruder film, so after this I will move back to titties and high school (luckily Sully is doing most of the heavy lifting re: obsessing over her, so I can take a breather), but Ezra Klein writes HERE

What is remarkable to me, however, is Palin's ability to never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity. Palin didn't ask to be part of this story. But she did choose how to respond to it. Imagine if Palin had come out and said, "My initial response was to defend the fact that I had never condoned such violence, and never would. But the fact is, if I in any way contributed to an unhealthy political climate, I have to be more careful and deliberate in my public language rather than merely sharpen my defenses." That would've been leadership: It would have made her critics look small, and it would've made her look big. Those who doubted whether Palin could rise to an occasion that called for more than sharp partisanship would've been silenced.

Which is exactly what I said a few days ago:

If I'm one of Palin's advisers, I'd tell her to come out and, while rightfully denying any direct responsibility, use this as an opportunity to take the lead in saying "hey, maybe we're using the wrong kind of language here, and we need to change it." People would feel for her, they'd be impressed with her being an adult, and it would put her at the head of the Beck/Limbaugh/whothefuckever pack.

But of course, this is more of what we got:

But I'm not her adviser, so I'm guessing she'll express outrage over being accused of spreading hate, turn herself into the victim, triple down on using that kind of violent language just to show us fags that's how they do it up in Alaska, and make up some story about meeting Giffords family and Jesus and blah blah blah blah.

I am one made-up story from her about talking to Giffords' family from what we in the business call a "sweep."

Also, I am in the midst of the single worst cup of coffee I've ever had. I'm not kidding.

The big joke of course is whether this will hurt her presidential chances, or make her finally "go away." That's laughable - for one, she was never gonna actually run anyway. And it's exactly shit like this that makes her cult following batten down the hatches and clone their fervor like Gremlins, and Republican leadership of course stands by complicit in their silence, letting it go on because in the end it will help them, and liberals like me find her combination of hot looks and unstoppable stupidity way too tantalizing to ignore. Six months from now, it'll be a different episode, same show.