Stop nailing Palin

June 12, 5:44 PMAlexandria Political Buzz ExaminerJung Lee

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Sarah Palin gained enormous popularity for the GOP after she had become John McCain's running mate, or vice-president.  Though McCain and Palin failed to establish GOP presence within the executive branch, there are talks for Palin in 2012.  Palin had become so popular, she was asked to headline a major Republican fundraising event on Monday night in Washington DC.  However, she became out-shadowed by former House Speaker Newt Gingrich; many  who say could be her number one rival for the GOP's presidential nomination in 2012.

"This particular potential primary match-up is fun to contemplate: Newt may be a figure from the past, but he remains one of the most intellectually interesting members of the GOP," said Robert Schlesinger, deputy editor at U.S. News and World Report. "And while Palin has the ineffable political "it" quality, and could well be the face of the party's future, she has given no evidence of being a deep thinker."

Robert is not the only one who claims Sarah Palin is not a "deep thinker."

"They see Sarah and they can't corral her and control her," Bay Buchanan, a Republican strategist said. "She could say anything, and this unnerves them."

So what are some things that Sarah Palin could say that would be considered unnerving to the GOP? Here are a few quotes she has said in the past:

• "As Putin rears his head and comes into the air space of the United States of America, where– where do they go? It's Alaska. It's just right over the border."
   
• "They are also building schools for the Afghan children so that there is hope and opportunity in our neighboring country of Afghanistan."
   
• "We believe that the best of America is not all in Washington, D.C. ... We believe that the best of America is in these small towns that we get to visit, and in these wonderful little pockets of what I call the real America, being here with all of you hard working very patriotic, um, very, um, pro-America areas of this great nation."
   
• "I'm the mayor, I can do whatever I want until the courts tell me I can't."

This however is not the only issue that Sarah Palin faces.  Recently, there had been allegations of Sarah Palin plagiarizing quotes from none other than Newt Gingrich during a speech in Anchorage on Wednesday, June 3.  According to Huffington Post's Geoffrey Dunn, there was much resemblance between an article Gingrich and Craig Shirley published in 2005 in the Manchester Union Leader, titled, "Republicans Need to Relearn Lessons of the Reagan Revolution," and Palin's speech where she declared, "screw political correctness," and wondered why "we have to pussyfoot around our troublesome foes." Here is a list of some of the resemblances:

• Palin: We have to remember that Ronald Reagan never won any arguments in Washington. He won the arguments by resonating with the American people.
  Gingrich/Shirley: Reagan never won an argument in Washington. Reagan won his arguments in the country with the American people.

• Palin: Remember this? His vision for the Cold War? We win, they lose.
  Gingrich/Shirley: On the inevitability of the Soviet Union, Reagan responded with a then shocking vision for the Cold War -- "we win, they lose."
   
• Palin: First, I think what we're going to learn tonight via Michael [Reagan] is that Ronald Reagan's ideas were the right ideas and all we have to do is look back at his record, his economic record and his national security record to know that his ideas were right.
  Gingrich/Shirley: What should Americans learn from this remarkable man and his remarkable Presidency?... The "right" ideas really matter (the left was wrong and Reagan was right about virtually every major public policy issue and the historic record is clear for those willing to look at it).
   
• Palin: And with detente, speaking of detente, he used two words: "Evil Empire."
  Gingrich/Shirley: Reagan replaced the entire vision of detente with two vivid words: "Evil Empire."

After Anchorage Daily News wrote an article evoking Sarah Palin of plagiarism, Palin's lawyer Thomas Van Flein wrote a letter to the newspaper to cease republishing the "serious, and false, accusation that the Governor plagiarized text from Newt Gingrich."

"This is just a completely false allegation, I’d call it defamatory as well," Van Flein told POLITICO on Monday. "To say that it is plagiarism really defies logic and represents a reckless disregard for the truth."

When Gingrich's camp was confronted with the matter, they passed it off as silly.

"I’m thrilled if Sarah Palin used a Newt Gingrich idea from an op-ed, or speech, or column or whatever," Gingrich spokesman Rick Tyler told POLITICO. "[Gingrich’s] response to people repeating his ideas has always been good.  I don’t understand what the issue is, she gave us credit. Are we supposed to say that every time someone quotes Reagan, it’s plagiarism? That’s silly, just silly."

Back in November 2008, Newt Gingrich was also asked if the Republican Party was struggling to find its identity, Newt replied:

"No," said Gingrich, "The Republican party's struggling to get beyond incompetence."

Sarah Palin asked to sign ball at Yankee Stadium in New York, Sunday, June 7, 2009
(AP Photo/Kathy Willens)