Slate magazine is just one of the countless media outlets convulsing with St. Vitus' Dance over that demonic succubus Sarah Palin. In its reader forum, The Fray, one supposed Palinophobe took dead aim at the former Alaska governor's writing chops, excerpting the following sentence from her book:
"The apartment was small, with slanting floors and irregular heat and a buzzer downstairs that didn't work, so that visitors had to call ahead from a pay phone at the corner gas station, where a black Doberman the size of a wolf paced through the night in vigilant patrol, its jaws clamped around an empty beer bottle."
Other readers pounced like wolf-sized Dobermans on an intruder. One guffawed, "That sentence by Sarah Palin could be entered into the annual Bulwer-Lytton bad writing contest. It could have a chance at winning a (sic) honorable mention, at any rate."
But soon, the original contributor confessed: "I probably should have mentioned that the sentence quoted above was not written by Sarah Palin. It's taken from the first paragraph of Dreams From My Father, written by Barack Obama."
The ruse should have been allowed to fester longer, but the point was made: Some people hate Palin first and ask questions later.

I'm fairly certain that if you read many of her public-policy positions but concealed her byline, many of her worst enemies would say "that sounds about right," and some of her biggest fans would say "that sounds crazy." But most people would say that her views are perfectly within the mainstream of American politics. She may be more religious than coastal elites in the lower 48, but that is something some bigots need to get over anyway.

I'm happy about the books she's selling thanks to the controversy over her, but that doesn't mean I think these controversies are justified. Palin holds no public office and, as of yet, is not running for one. But the Associated Press assigned 11 reporters to fact-check her book, while doing nothing like that to fact-check then-candidate Obama's or current Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid's no doubt riveting book.

Prescott wrote:

Mitt Romney

Do you really believe that??

CenterBHSFan wrote: Here's the thing about all ther "a heartbeat away from Presidency" nonsense:

ALL the VP's are a heartbeat away from being President.

No snow we go! wrote:

CenterBHSFan wrote: Here's the thing about all ther "a heartbeat away from Presidency" nonsense:

ALL the VP's are a heartbeat away from being President.

I am sorry if the "heartbeat away from the Presidency" comment was nonsense to you.... I should have said most people I know (mostly republicans) did not feel she was capable/qualified of being President. I do not want to debate whether she was more qualified than President Obama...

I do not want to debate whether she was more qualified than President Obama...

What is the single worst sentence in Sarah Palin's Going Rogue? According to Slate's Going Rogue index, it comes on Page 102: "As the soles of my shoes hit the soft ground, I pushed past the tall cottonwood trees in a euphoric cadence, and meandered through willow branches that the moose munched on." Michiko Kakutani of the New York Times didn't have to read past the first paragraph for her nomination: "I breathed in an autumn bouquet that combined everything small-town America with rugged splashes of the Last Frontier."

These sentences have the markings of what might be called the high Palin style (her writing, as opposed to her speeches): multiple references to local flora and fauna, heavy use of PSAT vocabulary, slightly defensive tone, difficult-to-parse meaning.

Do you think you can write like Sarah Palin? If so, we want to hear from you. The goal is to write a sentence that could be mistaken for one from her book. Keep it to a single sentence of fewer than 150 words and send your entry to [email protected] by Wednesday. We'll publish our favorites later in the week.

Sage wrote: Slate wants to know....
(http://www.slate.com/id/2236477/)

What is the single worst sentence in Sarah Palin's Going Rogue? According to Slate's Going Rogue index, it comes on Page 102: "As the soles of my shoes hit the soft ground, I pushed past the tall cottonwood trees in a euphoric cadence, and meandered through willow branches that the moose munched on." Michiko Kakutani of the New York Times didn't have to read past the first paragraph for her nomination: "I breathed in an autumn bouquet that combined everything small-town America with rugged splashes of the Last Frontier."

These sentences have the markings of what might be called the high Palin style (her writing, as opposed to her speeches): multiple references to local flora and fauna, heavy use of PSAT vocabulary, slightly defensive tone, difficult-to-parse meaning.

Do you think you can write like Sarah Palin? If so, we want to hear from you. The goal is to write a sentence that could be mistaken for one from her book. Keep it to a single sentence of fewer than 150 words and send your entry to [email protected] by Wednesday. We'll publish our favorites later in the week.

Obviously, Sarah didn't write this book--but did she read it? I mean, who the hell talks like that? I may buy the book just to see if the entire book is that hokey.

CenterBHSFan wrote: Word for word?

Prescott wrote: Guess who wrote this sentence.

"The apartment was small, with slanting floors and irregular heat and a buzzer downstairs that didn't work, so that visitors had to call ahead from a pay phone at the corner gas station, where a black Doberman the size of a wolf paced through the night in vigilant patrol, its jaws clamped around an empty beer bottle."

http://www.dispatch.com/live/content/editorials/stories/2009/11/20/gold20.ART_ART_11-20-09_A15_LTFNV1V.html?sid=101