On Nov 6, 12:29 pm, wrote:
http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/sto...10-663,00.html

New allegations were yesterday emerging about her campaign behaviour
and out-of-control shopping sprees compared to "Wasilla hillbillies
looting (department store) Neiman Marcus from coast to coast".

Aides also told of an incident where Ms Palin appeared before staff in
nothing but a towel.

Ms Palin, the defeated Republican vice presidential nominee, came
under fire last month after it was revealed the party had spent about
$US150,000 on designer clothes for her and her husband.

But Newsweek magazine is now reporting that the shopping was far more
extensive than previously reported.

It also says Republican nominee John McCain rarely spoke to Ms Palin
during the campaign, and his advisers deliberately kept him in the
dark about the Alaskan Governor's shopping sprees for fear of
upsetting him.

Senator McCain yesterday retreated with his family to his Sedona ranch
in Arizona after he was defeated in a landslide by Barack Obama.

Senator McCain's advisers said he was expected to remain in the Senate
and look to rebuild his political clout.

Shattered top Republicans will meet today in Virginia to begin the
first of many post-mortems.

As the bloodletting and recriminations escalated, Ms Palin emerged as
a key target. McCain advisers have previously accused Ms Palin of
going "rogue" and acting like a "diva". One aide described her as a
"whack job".

The 44-year-old mother of five, who fired up the party's conservative
base but alienated more moderate Republicans and independents with her
hard-line right-wing views and character attacks, yesterday refused to
take any blame for the loss.

She denied she had been a "diva" during the White House race.

"It is absolutely false that there's been any tension, certainly from
my part or my family's part," she told CNN.

But Ms Palin said if she had harmed Senator McCain's chances in any
way, she would regret it. "If I cost John McCain even one vote, I am
sorry about that because John McCain, I believe, is the American
hero," she said.

She also avoided ruling out a run for the presidency on her own in
2012.

"It is a time for all of us to work together . . . 2012 sounds so far
off that I can't even imagine what I'd be doing then," she said.

She did not believe she had contributed to the Republicans' resounding
defeat.

"I don't think anybody should give Sarah Palin that much credit that I
would trump an economic time in this nation that occurred about two
months ago," she told CNN.

The attacks on Ms Palin are set to intensify, with McCain aides keen
to dish the dirt on their boss's running mate.

One aide estimated Ms Palin had spent "tens of thousands" more than
the reported $US150,000, and that $US20,000 to $US40,000 was spent
buying clothes for her husband, snowmobile racer Todd Palin.

"According to two knowledgeable sources, a vast majority of the
clothes were bought by a wealthy donor, who was shocked when he got
the bill," Newsweek said.

Another aide offered the "Wasilla hillbillies" comparison and said the
truth would eventually come out.

Newsweek also claimed that at the Republican convention in Minnesota
in September, two of Senator McCain's senior advisers went to brief Ms
Palin in her hotel room.

It said "after a minute, Palin sailed into the room wearing nothing
but a towel with another on her wet hair" and told them to chat to her
husband while she got ready.

As dim an opinion I have about Sarah Palin's knowledge about the world
and our civic government, I have to say this sounds like a combination
of :

1. "Sour grapes" from the faction in the McCain campaign who blame
Palin for the election loss, and who are angry (very, very angry, in
all likelihood) with the faction that supported her.

2. "CYA". Staffers who want to affix blame for the failure of the
campaign somewhere conveniently far away from themselves, so they can
continue to be hired as campaign advisors.

I don't think Sarah Palin is an extraordinarily well-informed person,
especially seeing how she handled interviews so badly and how often
she went into off-point "canned" material in the debate, but a
characterization like "Wasilly Hillbilly" sounds too much like she was
"elected" to be the official scapegoat for a campaign that had serious
problems.

IMHO, McCain lost the moment his strategy moved to attacking Barack
Obama's past associations, while the public wanted to hear a plausible
plan of action on the economic crisis. Enough people decided that
sitting on an education board with someone doesn't mean you share
their philosophy or ideology, and that political allies are not unlike
war allies - you take help where you find it, especially on your way
up - that this strategy did not work.

Had the economy not scared the public senseless, the McCain strategy
might have worked. But for better or worse, the public was focused
laser-like on who will better serve America's domestic future, and
McCain lost on that score as Obama stayed on topic all the way to the
end of the campaign.

Sarah Palin buys her clothes at www.outoftheclosetalaska.com store.
cuhulin