The Year Of Livingly Tediously - The 10 Worst Things About 2008

2) Sarah Palin.

No single person sucked in 2008 more than the Republican Vice Presidential Candidate did. Selected in a fit of pique by a John McCain miffed that he couldn't have his BFF Joe Lieberman as his VP candidate, she seemed to be the embodiment of all that is dark and terrible about the republican party: Lacking any discernible education and subsequently incapable of conjuring up coherent answers to questions about which any president should be able to discuss confidently; a tendency to substitute bullshit for actual ideas; a noxious penchant for Mcarthyist political slurs; Close ties to fanatical right wing political organizations; publicly supports right wing religious values, privately fails to live up to them, and yet is praised for it.

Sure, you say, but conservatives are a nasty, stupid lot who love being ignorant almost as much as they love accusing their opponents of ghastly crimes. Any number of Republicans embody these things. What is it that makes this one unique¹²?

Palin is what a toy company does after being severely criticized for not making any products for girls - take the most popular male character in a given line of toys and create a female version of it. She's She-Ra to Bush's He-Man and, like He-Bush before her, she became an infuriating pop culture phenomenon almost instantly.

Within days of her sudden selection to the Republican ticket, conservative women nationwide adopted Palin's hairdo and her fake nerd glasses. People cooed as she played up her ludicrous accent¹³ and uttered folksy nonsense like "you betcha!" and "say it ain't so Joe!". Conservative bloggers insisted that Palin is a smokin' hot fox that any red blooded man would want to bone. How this qualifies her for the Vice Presidency is unclear, but that's what they said. Meanwhile, SnL cashed in with a series of annoyingly even handed sketches featuring the only truly gifted writer they've had in 20 years as the VP candidate.

If Bush was the refined, Baroque form of America's stupidity problem, then Palin was the Roccoco, her every characteristic an elaborate, over-ornate take on everything that made Dubya the leader he was. For 8 years, Americans have demonstrated that we can be a vastly shortsighted, foolish society - at times it seemed that there was nothing people wanted to be on record as hating more than competence, education or ideas that work. Give us an affable idiot we can have a beer with and we'll treat them like Cicero, but show us someone who actually knows what they're doing and won't talk to us like we're 4 years old and we're publishing angry screeds in major papers about how they look "French." Fortunately, the percentage of Americans willing to fall for such bullshit has declined considerably, and McCain lost the election badly. Unfortunately, we're probably going to have to endure her pretend accent and pretend folksiness for another four years as she prepares to make an undeserved run for the top of the ticket in 2012. If this is democracy, we'll take Monarchy, thank you very much. Just about the only thing worthwhile about Governor Palin is the amazing number of scandalous rumors surrounding her, none of which turned out to be true, which disappointed your narrator considerably¹⁴.

In 2009 we have but one wish - That we never, ever, ever have to hear anything about this dangerous idiot ever again. (photo from smiteme, via Flickr)