Or at least I hope it is. Sarah Palin is beginning to get a lot like herpes. Just when you think she is gone, she flairs up again. And then there is this nagging feeling is she is going to be around for ever. Not happy to be quiet for longer than 2 weeks after going toe to toe against Letterman, Sarah Palin is quitting her job as Alaska Governor. BUT she didn’t quit the day she has announced, she is quitting next month. Oh but she isn’t quitting, she is a “fighter”, looking at “other avenues to make effective change”. Nope Sarah, when you resign you have quit. It’s okay to quit. I quit Freshman Football in high school, but when I quit it, I said I quit. I didn’t say I am looking at other venues to pursue team contact sports.
I don’t like Sarah Palin. And the reason I don’t like her is not because she is a Republican or a Conservative or because she seems to have an exaggerated sense of self importance. (Although all of those are certainly good reasons to start). I don’t like her because when she speaks she doesn’t make any sense. I watched her 6 minute QUITTING speech. It rambled on with one political catch phrase followed by a series of prepositional phrases usually never followed by a direct or indirect object, and then back to another political catch phrase again. (And a saying from a magnet from her parents refrigerator) She actually said nothing. I think we may all just be inferring she is quitting. She may not be. With Sarah it is hard to say, well at the very least hard to understand.
She is so weird. Most people who enjoy the sound of their own voice seem to say something. It seems like Sarah, like a toddler who has just learned to scream, only likes the sound her voice makes.
So hopefully we have heard enough from Sarah for a while. Probably not, she has a book coming out. But a boy can dream.
That brings us to Michael Jackson. I secretly think Sarah Palin only resigned because she was upset about all the media coverage he was getting.
Michael Jackson dying is sad. Yes, I have taken a lot of shots at Michael Jackson, and certainly spent a fair amount of time making fun of him. Regardless of where you stand on liking his music or thinking he was over rated, or if he was weird or if he really did the things he was accused of, all of that is kind of irrelevant. At the end of the day, 2 parents lost a son, 5 brothers and 3 sisters lost a brother, and 3 children lost a father. If Michael Jackson were a bus driver, that would still be sad.
And yes the coverage has been too much. A report on one the channels called “Is There Too Much Media Coverage of Michael Jackson?” That sort of made me laugh. But is the coverage just the result of a slow news month or it is actually the product of actually talking about what is going on. It not like there is 24 hour coverage and there is no one on the streets of LA, New York, Tokyo, Gary Indiana, or wherever, crying and grieving. There are hundreds, maybe thousands in each place. If a thousand people get together, isn’t that news worthy? So I don’t know, it could be a little of both.
I watched the memorial. I saw a story on CNN where someone “reviewed” it. That struck me as odd. If your grandmother dies no one from the local paper comes to review it. Yet Michael Jackson’s memorial gets a “review”.
I get bothered by memorials. I seem to think that the people who speak should be people who knew the deceased relatively well. But sometimes people make other’s deaths about themselves, and not the deceased. So a lot of times you get people speaking at memorials who hardly knew the person that died. I find it tacky.
I started to think that about Brooke Shields, who I thought gave one of the better speeches. I was like “Brooke Shields?” and then I remembered that she went to Grammys with him and Emanuel Lewis. (Then I shook my head). But I really liked what she had to say. Most of the speakers talked about Michael Jackson’s accomplishments, but hers involved actually what it was like to sort of hang out with Michael Jackson. Of course "hanging out with Michael Jackson" involved sneaking into Liz Taylor’s room, while she was asleep, and making fun of his glitter glove. It's not something most people can say they did too. But going someplace you should not with a good friend is. I wish more of the speakers had told those kinds of stories.
Some other things stuck me as unintentionally funny. Jermaine saying he did not have the words, while Jesse Jackson inched his way to the microphone. Or when Marlon came up to speak and all I could do was flashback to the miniseries on the Jacksons where young Marlon was one who kept messing up the dance moves, and making the brothers miss playing outside. Then his daughter cries and its hard to remain a cynic.
As much as Michael and Sarah have permeated pop culture, I am kind of hoping that we can get a break from them. Sure there will still be hoopla around Michael Jackson’s will, autopsy, etc, for months and years to come. It will be a circus, sure, but I think the big part of it is over and hopefully he and we can all get a rest.
I don’t think the same can be said for Sarah. I am sure the metaphoric Valtrex will where off and she will flair up. She will realize that no one has mentioned her in the press and do something. Her book is still coming, which if she writes the way she talks, then God help us all. At least Michael will be spared.
Jason
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