Palin Blew It With 'Un-Presidential' Speech

Sarah Palin had an opportunity to recalibrate her image and appear more like presidential material in the wake of the Tucson shootings—but she blew it, argues Howard Kurtz at the Daily Beast. It was unfair for liberal detractors to link Palin to the shootings and she had a right to be angry, Kurtz writes, but she could have chosen to speak to the country in a "calmer, more inclusive way" instead of fueling the fire with her "blood libel" remarks.

Palin's video escalated her war with the press and "continued her us-versus-them approach to political discourse," Kurtz writes. Hitting back at critics instead of trying to respond with a unifying message seems like "the response of someone who wants to stoke her base and further her lucrative career as a culture warrior—not someone who is plotting to run for president," he concludes. (More Sarah Palin stories.)