The Two-Line Pass

Two things on Sarah Palin in one post today so I can try to consolidate the hate mail right-wing nutjobs send me when I talk about her:

Sarah Palin story 1: Not a nice mom

We’ve all heard the kooky new age names Sarah Palin has for her kids. Track, Bristol, Willow, Piper, and Trig (I’m hoping Bristol’s kid is named something awesome, like Tree Fort) are all suitably awful. But in this brief in the Washington Post this morning, in which Palin oddly refers to herself as an “intellectual” — she’s probably one of the few that believes dinosaurs were alive 4,000 years ago, but I consider “intellectual” to be up there with “elitist” and “arugula-eating” on the scale of terms that are not patriotic or Real American — Palin revealed that any forthcoming sixth child, should it be a boy, would get a very hockeyish name:

“I always wanted a son named Zamboni,” she said.

The full interview will be in an issue of Time Newsweek US World and News Report The Brown Journal of World Affairs The Christian Science Monitor USA Today Mad Magazine People that comes out later this week. What, was Us Weekly all booked up?

If we can’t stop her from becoming vice president (although…), can we at least stop her from doing this to poor Zygote Palin?

Sarah Palin story 2: More like St. Louis Boos

This story came out yesterday. Another “swing state” that’s leaning blue, another puck drop, another season to ruin.

Sarah Palin, Governor of Alaska and candidate for Vice President of the United States of America, will be the guest of the St. Louis Blues on Friday, Oct. 24, when she will drop a ceremonial pregame “first puck” prior to the Blues’ game vs. the Los Angeles Kings.

Palin today confirmed that she will make the stop at Scottrade Center in St. Louis following a previous visit to Springfield, Mo., during her campaign trail in the state of Missouri.

Palin is a self-described “hockey mom” who is running with Sen. John McCain on the Republican ticket for President and Vice President of the United States.

Not quite so wordy or glowing as the Flyers release, is it? Of course, she’s showing up in the city where 100,000 people showed up to see Barack Obama speak last week, so I’m anticipating a reaction that’s eerily similar to the one she got two weeks ago.

In general, I don’t like the Flyers. I didn’t like the way they played last year (see: incredibly dirty) and I never even really cared for the players that didn’t play physical hockey (see: Dany Briere).

But tonight the City of Brotherly Love didn’t disappoint me.

Sarah Palin, accompanied by the two Palin daughters (the hot, pregnant one and the littlest one) who were used as a ploy to draw sympathy, dropped the first puck with some contest winner at the Flyers/Rangers game tonight. She was soundly booed by the assembled animals in the crowd. Shouldn’t have been a huge surprise given that this is the city that would boo a crippled kid who sings the national anthem, but I was worried that Flyers fans would arrive at their seats to find a note that read, “If you boo, Secret Service will come to your houses and snap all your necks while you sleep. No one is safe.”

The Flyers’ PA people, no doubt on the orders of team owner and Republican fundraiser Ed Snider, used a very loud orchestral song — and what sounded like piped-in cheers — to drown out the massively negative reaction.

Video’s here.

Alaska native Scott Gomez went out to center ice to take the faceoff against Flyers captain Mike Richards. Said Palin to Gomez, “HI SCAHTT!” and they did that almost-kiss-on-the-cheek thing. She also may have winked. It was adorable.

As Palin left the ice, and the Flyer fans never stopped booing, she waved to no one in particular to make it look like she wasn’t almost universally hated by the 19,519 in attendance. I’m actually shocked she wasn’t pelted with batteries.

With Marty Biron giving up a four-spot in the first period, the Flyers could have used Palin in net tonight.

Good for Flyers fans though. I know Wyshysnki was all like, “I’m candid about my political leanings, and I’ve been to Philly enough to know this will fall on deaf ears, but I’ll say it anyway: Polite applause will suffice. Don’t be a jerk and boo her, or toss beer on the red carpet. Save that stuff for Bettman.” Got nothin’ but love for ya, Greg, but come on. It’s not “being a jerk” if you boo her. First amendment and all that. We still have something resembling a Constitution in this country.

This “Ultimate Hockey Mom” contest wasn’t even announced until Sept. 12, meaning about a week after Palin accepted the VP nomination with “The ‘LIPSTICK!’ Speech.” In fact, in the Flyers’ initial announcement, they even used Palin’s famous, awful joke as the headline. And who do you think provided all the glowing quotes in that article? Ed Snider!? No WAY! I bet he had nothing to do with this contest getting off the ground at all. To highlight just how hastily it was thrown together, the winner of the contest was picked out of the crowd before the game tonight.

This was a cheap political stunt by Snider, who has attended a fundraiser for Palin herself and and donated $25,000 to the McCain campaign, to help a doomed ticket in what could have once been considered a swing state (right now Pennsylvania’s +10 Obama). Any talk otherwise is unbelievably naive. The fact that a left-leaning major city booed her shouldn’t have surprised anyone. The battleground of the state is much farther to the northwest than liberal ol’ Philly. She should have dropped the puck in Pittsburgh (or even Columbus) if she, or anyone else, didn’t want this reaction.

As a result of tonight’s events, I shan’t say anything bad about Philadelphia fans or teams for at least a week.

UPDATE: Here’s a video of Palin doing an sit-down chat with a way-too-energetic Philly interviewer. She only really “folksy colloquialism-ed” about hockey, and got about as many softballs as she did from Sean Hannity. I was very disappointed that we didn’t get to hear her ask, “In what regard, Coatsey?” or stumble her way through an explanation of which hockey blogs she reads (”All of ‘em. All the different ones”).

She did, however, note that she was one of those crazy hockey moms that’s banging on the glass until he told her to stop embarrassing him. So many jokes there (for example: replace “him” with “the GOP” and “banging on the glass” with “getting simple facts about Afghanistan wrong” and you’re in LOL City).

Said Palin: “I put my passion towards hockey better use by becoming the hockey manager. The team mom, y’know? Workin’ on the stats, workin’ on the executive side of the sport, and hopefully that was put to better use.”

So now she can add “team mom” to her list of executive experience. Boon for the McCain campaign!

UPDATE 2: This is hilarious.

Everyone’s all up in arms about Sarah Palin dropping the ceremonial first puck at the Flyers/Rangers game tomorrow night, and mostly for valid reasons. But the complaint about Palin in political circles, apart from her apalling history of controversy, scandal and hunting wolves from helicopters, is that she has no experience.

Well here’s something you can cross off that list. You may be asking, “In what respect, Charlie?”

Tomorrow, she will likely meet players from the United States (which isn’t the same thing as a person from Alaska. Those people are freaks and outcasts that neither the US or Canada wants), Canada, Finland, Switzerland, Sweden, Russia, and the Czech Republic. If Alaska’s proximity to Russia basically amounts to foreign relations experience, this is like touring the UN Building in New York at least three times.

You’re darn right the Dallas Stars are down with the “hahckey mahm.” You betcha!

(The number on her jersey, by the way, denotes the place her ticket will come in on Nov. 4)

First it was the team’s name that drew my ire. Then they offered Brett Favre a contract so everyone could yuk it up and get some cheap publicity. Now, there is a confluence of two events that make me seriously dislike the Iowa Chops even further.

First is that they’re having a contest to name their squad of ice girls. The names you can choose from are exactly as bad and pun-filled as you’d expect. There’s the Ice Girls, which is as inoffensive as it is uncreative. There are the Bacon Bits, Baby Backs and Applesauce, because get it the team’s name is Chops and the logo is a pig! There are also the Chop Chicks and Chopettes.

My favorite, though, is “the Hat Tricks.” Now, I’m not one to feel as though I’m “down” with what happens on “the streets,” but I believe Dr. Dre has a song in which he implies that women are nothing but “hoes and tricks.” So let’s hope that one wins.

The other big reason to dislike the Chops is that they, like John McCain, are now using vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin as a marketing tool.

The other day, she gave a speech in Cedar Rapids, Iowa in which she expressed her belief that the name Chops was “cool.” Of course, she felt the same way about the Bridge To Nowhere and forcing some poor high school hockey player into a shotgun wedding and the national spotlight, but who am I to judge? Later in the speech, she said she might round up a few local Hockey Moms (yech) and hit up a Chops game. More campaign promises upon which a candidate won’t deliver, and another $100 to the Alaska Special Olympics from stupid Keith Olbermann.

So it begs the question, if Sarah Palin has heard of the Iowa Chops and plans to attend a game, why don’t you?  Opening night (Friday, October 10th at 7:05pm vs. Peoria Rivermen) is just three weeks away, so now is the perfect time to pick up your tickets for the upcoming season.  There is a new team, new affiliate, and lower ticket prices, so now is the time to find out what Sarah Palin knows… it is time to Dig the Pig!

HEY! Barack Obama got in a lot of trouble for using a phrase like that. Apparently, even the elitist, arugala-eating Iowa Chops aren’t above dirty campaign tactics.