Barracuda Bandwagon

The media spotlight has swung back to Sarah Palin, and it's not just the designer outfits that cost more than some families might spend to send a kid to college.

It's not just that Obama is off to Hawaii. It's not just that McCain hasn't changed his stump speech for days. It's not just that we're all tired of Joe the plumber. It's not just that things are so slow Drudge is touting this link-- "VIDEO: Obama Sneezes on Reporter." (What's next, Obama scrapes gum from shoe?)

It's that the punditocracy has concluded the Republican ticket is going down and is already fighting the next war.

Doggone media -- they inflict this election on us for two excruciating years, and now, before it's even over, they've moved on to 2012.

Yes, the very same people who once told you Hillary couldn't lose are now handicapping Palin's chances in the Republican primaries four years from now. That is, when they're not churning out pieces about how Obama will govern.

Got whiplash yet?

I'm not buying that Barack has this wrapped up, even with the spate of favorable battleground-state polls. (Roughly tied in North Carolina? How can that be?) But I am interested in how the prognosticators can in one breath be portraying Palin as Ms. Liability and in the next talking her up as a presidential candidate in her own right. That's quite a comeback, especially when she hasn't yet lost this election. But I think it also has something to do with the ongoing civil war in conservative circles, as we've chronicled here, which is forcing some pundits to embrace or reject Palinism -- something that didn't exist (at least outside of Juneau) before Aug. 29.

So forget about the prospect of Vice President Palin. Or at least, scratch the vice.

Atlantic's Marc Ambinder kicks off the action:

"There's a suspicion in some McCain loyalist precincts that Gov. Sarah Palin is beginning to play the Republican base against John McCain -- McCain won't let her campaign in Michigan . . . McCain won't let her bring up Jeremiah Wright . . . McCain doesn't like her terrorist pal talks . . . Think ahead to 2010 . . . 2011 . . . 2012. Palin is ambitious. Very ambitious.

"And if she wants the job, she's easily the frontrunner to become THE voice of the angry Right in the Wilderness. She is a favorite of talk radio and Fox News conservatives, and speaks their language as only a true member of the club can. (Her recent Limbaugh interview was full of dog whistles that any Dittohead would recognize. Including her actual use of the word ditto.) . . .

"Palin will be judged to be 'ready' in four years. George Will and David Brooks and Peggy Noonan will all swoon over her once more. Ok, maybe not George Will. . . . Republicans tend to pick the next guy in line. Strangely enough, the next guy in line is now Sarah Palin, by virtue of her being the VP nominee this year. She will have the benefit of being both an outsider candidate and the natural heir to the nomination; indeed, the only candidate who will have experience in a general election campaign."