There may still be some people on this planet who need further proof that Sarah Palin is little more than a bullhorn with lipstick. It may not be enough that she doesn’t understand national politics. Or how to deal with foreign leaders effectively without having them leer at her and flirt. Or even what the job of the Vice-President is. For those of you still not impressed by her extraordinarily shallow intellect, Sarah has now suggested that when the media criticizes her they are violating her right to free speech. That oughta do it for you.

In an interview last Friday on a conservative radio show in Washington, Sarah said:

“If [the Media] convince enough voters that that is negative campaigning, for me to call Barack Obama out on his associations, then I don’t know what the future of our country would be in terms of First Amendment rights and our ability to ask questions without fear of attacks by the mainstream media.”

Boy, you have to hand it to her - few people can overspeak a sentence the way Sarah can. There’s just so many words, it’s hard to find any intelligent thought that might be rattling around in there. Seems like all politicians use too many words, though. For instance, they always say they are running for President - of the United States - of America. Just to differentiate themselves from candidates running for President - of the YMCA - of Omaha. But you have to admit, when it comes to political babble, Sarah is in a class of her own. And who said she had no class?

For some reason, Sarah seems to think that pointing out bad things about your opponent without pointing out good things about yourself is not negative campaigning. Really? I don’t know, maybe that’s the way things are in the land of the midnight sun - having to wear your shades in the middle of the night must mess up your perspective. Because Elizabeth Dole has been running ads alleging that her opponent pals around with atheists, and nobody with half a brain would describe those ads as not being negative. So how is what Sarah’s been doing any different? Or maybe they didn’t teach that kind of logic at any of the FIVE colleges she went to.

In addition, Palin implies that the media attacking her when she says such stupid things is a violation of her constitutional right to free speech. Excuse me - what? Under the first amendment, she has a perfect right to say stupid things, but the media has an equally perfect right to call them stupid. The first amendment guarantees Freedom of the Press, not freedom from criticism. Could she really believe that criticism of her (or anybody) by the Press is unconstitutional? Wow. We haven’t been treated to this much verbal nonsense since Spiro Agnew called the Press “effete snobs”.

Anyway, another day or two and none of this will matter - either because Sarah will be packing up her $150,000 wardrobe and going back to Alaska, or will be headed to Washington to dazzle us with her with her oratory for four long years to come. In which case, everything I just wrote will probably be declared unconstitutional.