The Right Sphere:

So, some reporter (and I’m using the term loosely) named Andy Barr over at Politico.com decided that he would try to start a fight between Sarah Palin and Rick Santorum. Why this kid thought this was a good idea is beyond me. Maybe he’s just trying to gain some street cred at his website? Maybe the fact that Journolist is gone has the guys over at Politico flailing from the lack of guidance. Does he think there’s a Senior Fellow spot to reach for over there? Who knows?

Kathryn Jean Lopez

He was asked a question. He answered. And his comments about her being a mom with financial concerns doesn’t seem hostile so much as trying to give an honest answer — yes, from someone who also has both a big family and financial concerns.

Gabriel Malor (of Ace) tweeted:

Looks like Politico was just trying to start something. (And succeeded, darnit).

Not surprised at unethical @politicoreporter @andybarr34’s hit job on Rick Santorum. http://bit.ly/ifa2EW

Gotta remember not to trust @AndyBarr34‘s reporting again without checking its truthfulness myself.

@allahpundit I watched the video. It really doesn’t seem like Santorum was criticizing Palin.

DrewM (of Ace) tweeted:

@gabrielmalor @allahpundit Having watched it, I don’t see how @politicosays Santorum “knocked” Palin. That’s not a fair read of his remarks

@gabrielmalor @allahpundit Also, they inverted the order of the quotes about kids and responsibilities to connect them in a way he didn’t.

Josh Painter (Texas4Palin)

Pollutico never misses an opportunity to use lies and distortions to paint Gov. Palin in a negative hue. In this case, Barr and his editors took an uncritical observation by Santorum and tried to make it appear that the former Senator from Pennsylvania was bashing Gov. Palin. The article also draws on one of the constant memes promoted on left wing blogs that Sarah palin is some kind on money-crazed fiend, simply because she gets paid well for her speaking appearances.

Michelle Malkin re-tweeted the Cubachi post and Noel Sheppard re-tweeted The Right Scoops post.

While on the other side of the argument:

Shane Vander Hart

I’ve seen Senator Santorum take the high road on similar questions like this and I’m disappointed he felt it necessary to respond.

He’s right he doesn’t have the other responsibilities that she has, and he doesn’t live in Alaska.  The only thing this week that I’ve that she has is her birthday on Friday and her husband is also getting ready for the Iron Dog Race that will start the following week.  I’m sure she has Fox News responsibilities, and she may have some speaking engagements.  The point is I don’t know, and neither does he.

Tammy Bruce tweeted:

Some say Santorum *wasn’t* smearing Palin? His message that Palin is opportunistic & not serious is clear & patronizing in print&audio

All Barr at politico did was print what Santorum said. Perhaps it’s a bit more stark in print, but there’s no way to gloss over the intent

JeanA55 tweeted:

Santorum was smearing Gov. Palin. He’s a sexist pig.

@trscoop @michellemalkin @Cubachi Come on! The man smeared Gov. Palin so stop covering the fact. Can you say sexist pig?

Tommy Christopher MediaITE

Let’s just break that down for a second. He’s essentially saying that Palin turned down the CPAC keynote slot because she’s too busy gettin’ paid (Palin does command hefty speaking fees), but that he wouldn’t have turned it down because he’s not “the mother to all these kids.” Palin has five children. Santorum has seven, so the implication is that there’s something about being a mom that necessitates whoring yourself out for speaking fees, while dude parents can freewheelingly stick to their principles.

Now, I’m certainly not afraid to criticize Sarah Palin when she deserves it, but Santorum’s remarks are not only unfair and offensive, they’re also completely unfounded.

What’s your thoughts? Did Andy Barr take things out of context and mislead in his story or was he right in his report and Santorum actually did take a cheap shot at Governor Palin?

UPDATE I: Santorum Tweets:

This article is garbage.All I said was- she is VERY busy, PERIOD. Reporter trying to create something out of nothing http://politi.co/gJ4ARo

CNN Reports:

Former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum is taking aim at Politico over a report that claimed he is throwing punches at Sarah Palin for turning down an invitation at a high profile gathering of conservatives in Washington.

“This article is garbage,” Santorum tweeted Wednesday morning. “All I said was- she is VERY busy, PERIOD. “

Barr quickly fought back:

Rick Santorum is quickly backpedaling from his critical remarks over Sarah Palin’s decision to blow off CPAC, going after POLITICO for spotlighting his attack.

“This article is garbage,” Santorum tweeted this morning, linking to the POLITICO story. “All I said was- she is VERY busy, PERIOD. Reporter trying to create something out of nothing.”

Except, that’s not all he said.

Santorum said in an interview with conservative commentator S.E. Cupp that Palin has “other business opportunities” that are taking up time in her schedule, implying that she’s rebuffing the annual conservative gathering for a paid speech.

“I have a feeling that she has some demands on her time, and a lot of them have financial benefit attached to them,” Santorum said.

Santorum also said Palin has “responsibilities” as a mother that he doesn’t as the father of seven, which some interpreted as sexist.

UPDATE II: People have been emailing me asking me what my thoughts are on this.

When I first read the Politico report I was ready to take Santorum down. After watching the interview I was more inclined to give Santorum the benefit of the doubt,  Santorum has a record of being respectful of Governor Palin.

So here’s my take.

Santorum was asked an off the cuff question, his response was well intended and I don’t believe he meant to knock Governor Palin. I think he responded with what he believed to be the case and in his mind he meant to defend Governor Palin for not accepting the keynote speech.

However, Santorum is a politician who is at least thinking about running for president. He should have been smart enough to know that every comment he makes about Governor Palin will be scrutinized and may well be taken out of context. The smart thing would have been to just stop after saying “I don’t know” or he could have responded with what Governor Palin has publicly stated and answered “Governor Palin says she has a scheduling conflict, I take her word for it”.

As for Andy Barr, I personally believe that in his mind he believed he’s doing Palin a favor or something. He saw the interview he took Santorum’s comments as a critique of the Governor, as did many of Palin supporters, and with everyone in the media desperately waiting to jump on everything Palin related, for better or for worse, he ran with it.

However, he did make it appear worse than it really was and he stirred up a pot that was unnecessary and caused himself more trouble than is worth.

Bottom line: This is a case of two people saying what they really believed to be the case both thinking that they are defending Governor Palin.

My advice for both: Governor Palin is quite capable of defending herself she doesn’t need anyone’s help and more often than not saying nothing will make you appear smarter than you really are, as the poet Thomas Carlyle writes: Speech is silver; Silence is golden.

“Silence is the element in which great things fashion themselves together; that at length they may emerge, full-formed and majestic, into the daylight of Life, which they are thenceforth to rule. Not William the Silent only, but all the considerable men I have known, and the most undiplomatic and unstrategic of these, forbore to babble of what they were creating and projecting. Nay, in thy own mean perplexities, do thou thyself but hold thy tongue for one day: on the morrow, how much clearer are thy purposes and duties; what wreck and rubbish have those mute workmen within thee swept away, when intrusive noises were shut out! Speech is too often not, as the Frenchman defined it, the art of concealing Thought; but of quite stifling and suspending Thought, so that there is none to conceal. Speech too is great, but not the greatest. As the Swiss Inscription says: Sprecfien ist silbern, Schweigen ist golden (Speech is silvern, Silence is golden); or as I might rather express it: Speech is of Time, Silence is of Eternity.”

Sometimes people should just do what they keep demanding of Governor Palin; sit down and shut up.

UPDATE III: The thought just hit me. One name left out of this entire debate is S.E. Cupp herself.

Why at all did she even raise the question? Why do people keep asking other people to “speculate” why Gov. Palin does or doesn’t do this or that?

I like S.E. Cupp but on this occasion she failed to do her research before she laid out the question. As we noted above Governor Palin has already stated why she couldn’t make it and she repeated it in her interview with David Brody saying that “It really is a matter of time for me”.

I think it’s safe to say that S.E. was well aware of Governor Palin’s reasons. After all Cupp will be attending CPAC and I’m sure she’s been following the story of Governor Palin’s potential appearance closely so she probably know about Palin’s reason for not attending. She decided to run with the question anyway.

What did Ms. Cupp expect Santorum would tell her other than from what we have heard from the Governor herself?

The only conclusion we can come to is that Cupp was baiting Santorum for a soundbite that would gain traction for her show, and she got it. Anyone who hadn’t heard about the launch of her new show now has. Cupp was the only one to gain from all this.

Nice work Ms. Cupp, using Governor Palin for a free piece of advertising.

So let me repeat the question who is the real culprit here?

UPDATE IV: This just get’s better by the minute. Look what S.E. Cupp just tweeted:

“SE Cupp Show” makes Politico: “Rick Santorum says Palin’s Skipping CPAC for C-Notes”http://tinyurl.com/47gomyu

From all the reports out on this story, S.E. choose to tweet the one that trashes Santorum. Is Cupp just excited about being mentioned in Politico even though it’s a negative story arguably taken out of context , or does she have an hidden agenda (e.g. publicity stunt)? We report you decide.

UPDATE V: Well, it appears Andy Barr is doubling down. He’s up to his third post on the topic. He begins with challenging Palin to respond and manages to drag Mitt Romney into the mix.

Sarah Palin’s camp hasn’t yet responded to Rick Santorum, but some of her supporters are already lighting up the former senator for his criticism of Palin’s choice to skip CPAC.

[…]

Palin will likely get asked the question at some point, but since one of her aides swatted at Mitt Romney’s team in July, they have held off on attacking fellow Republican contenders.

Barr predicts the governor will be asked the question since some Palin aide once took a swat at Romney’s team. Who is the aforementioned Palin aid you wonder. Guess what? It’s unnamed. But here is the best part. Guess who his source is, the one he links to in his post? Some reporter at Politico named “Andy Barr”.

Barr only wants Governor Palin to be asked about it so he can then run with a story questioning the Governor for “inserting herself” into the story and trash her for “feeling the need” to respond to every little thing.

I’ll give Barr a little heads up here. If Governor Palin is asked the question she’ll be much smarter and more gracious than you and Santorum combined as evident in this video.

Barr Continues:

Still, Palin-friendly conservative radio host Tammy Bruce is usually a good gauge of what PalinLand is thinking, and she has come out swinging at Santorum.

“Some say Santorum *wasn’t* smearing Palin? His message that Palin is opportunistic & not serious is clear & patronizing in print & audio,” Bruce tweeted.

[…]

Bruce is a favorite in Palin’s camp and was the platform of choice for one of Palin’s aides to comment in the wake of the shootings in Tucson.

Look at this Barr suddenly likes Tammy Bruce. How things can change when you need to use someone to defend yourself.

This post alone has more links to posts by Palin supporters criticizing Barr than posts by those defending him. But he picked the one he liked, crowned her as “PalinLand” and ran with it.

Tammy Bruce is great and we love her but even Tammy will tell you that she’s not the voice of the Palin camp. Tammy has her opinions and we often agree and sometimes disagree and she’s OK with it. Tammy appreciates honest debate and she understands we wont always agree on everything. That’s one of the things we like about her.

Well Andy, it appears more people in “PalinLand” are against you than are sticking up for you. You may want to change that title to “PalinVillage” or “PalinRoad” or something.

I tried to give Barr a fair shake, but as it turns out it is obvious that his objective is solely to create divisiveness in the GOP and drive up a fringe among conservatives and uses his own anonymous sources to do so.

I have no idea who the dumb idiot at Politico is that’s encouraging Barr to keep going on about this story. With all the problems going on in the world today, don’t they have anything more important to worry about? Barr should just knock it off and move on.

UPDATE VI: We’ve been linked by HotAir. Lesson learnt? Hard work pays off. Thank you @allahpundit

UPDATE VII:

Governor Palin Talks to Sean Hannity

Rick Santorum Talks To Greta Van Susteren

May this saga rest in peace