Barack's Palin "Pig" Remark: No Accident

Carol Platt Liebau | September 09, 2008 10:03 PM

Despite the Obama campaign's protestations that his "pig in lipstick" remark didn't refer to Sarah Palin, there are two clear indications that, in fact, it did.

First, note that the lefty blogosphere has been referring to Governor Palin in those terms for days now (for example,

here and here and here and even in a press release from NARAL as noted here). So is it just coincidence that Barack Obama would use the same terms? Riiiiight.

Second, look at the entire quote:

You can put lipstick on a pig. It's still a pig.

You can wrap an old fish in a piece of paper called change. It's still gonna stink.

We've had enough of the same old thing.

Taken together, it's obvious that Barack is referring, first, to Governor Palin and then to Senator McCain. And really, the rhetoric is disgusting. Sure, one can disagree with them, but has political discourse really become so degraded that the great messiah of a "new kind of politics" is reduced to comparing his female opponent to a "pig," and his male opponent -- a war hero -- to "an old fish"?

Spare us the commentary about how all this is just coincidence. When Michael Dukakis said, back in 1988, that

"a fish rots from the head down," everyone knew who and what he was talking aobut. Even amid some criticism, at least he was man enough to stand behind what he said, as distasteful as it was. It's not likely we'll see the same from the Obama campaign.

Barack owes Governor Palin an apology -- and Senator McCain, too, for that matter.

This is not the kind of behavior that Americans want, welcome or deserve from their presidents -- aspiring or elected.