PALINBOTS MISSING THE POINT: SCARBOROUGH'S ATTACK IS A BANK SHOT AIMED AT OBAMA

Palinbots are furious at Joe Scarborough for his Politico attack on Sarah Palin, and for this:

TV's Joe Scarborough, who today dismissed Sarah Palin as a symbol of "anti-intellectualism" with a "dopey dream" of being president, will help headline the launch next month of a new national group dedicated to restoring civility in politics.

Scarborough, a Republican, former Florida congressman and host of "Morning Joe" on MSNBC, will participate in the debut event of "No Labels" on December 13 at Columbia University in New York.

New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg is also expected to take part, along with an array of other self-described centrists, including retiring Sen. Evan Bayh (D-Ind.) [and] Sen. Joe Lieberman, (I-Conn.)....

Nancy Jacobson, a leading Democratic fundraiser and wife of Clinton-era pollster Mark Penn, launched "No Labels" last year with major advice coming from Mark McKinnon, who was media advisor to George W. Bush in 2000 and Sen. John McCain in 2008....

But, um, at the risk of saying something glaringly obvious, what exactly do these people think the real aim of this campaign is? If its first high-profile act is an attack on the words and deeds of Palin -- rather than, say, an attack on the thousand other examples of Republican extremism and intransigence Scarborough could have mentioned -- then its obvious intent is to prevent the reelection of Barack Obama. I realize Palinbots can't allow themselves to imagine that Palin's nomination would inevitably lead to a second Obama term, but can't they at least grasp that other Obama loathers -- including presumably (despite agreements with him on one or two issues) Scarborough, Daddy Warbucks Bloomberg, and Penn -- believe that, and are doing anything they can to prevent this outcome?

(By the way, President Obama, so much for your efforts to carefully court Bloomberg.)

There's one possible alternate explanation for all this: Scarborough and puppetmaster Bloomberg are doing this because they actually want it to help Palin -- because, in other words, they think it will endear her to her base even more, thus increasing the likelihood that extremist Palin and "extremist" Obama will be the 2012 nominees, and centrists Bloomie and Joe will just have to ride to the rescue. But, nawww, I don't think that's what's going on. Guys like Bloomberg don't work by indirection -- if they want something, they demand it directly and they think they're always powerful enough to steamroll anyone who stands in their way. So I think this is an attempt to get an electable Republican nominated -- and elected. And, Palinbots, it'll probably be someone you'll like just fine, once it's the fall of 2012 and he's hating on the president.

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On a somewhat related subject, I'm surprised to see that John Thune is doing well in online betting pools for the 2012 nomination. I don't know if he's really going to run, but really, how could he possibly win?

I'm not saying this just because he vted for TARP, which all by itself could sink him. I'm saying it because, while we really aren't sure whether many A-listers -- Palin, Huckabee, Gingrich -- are really going to run, the one guy we all think is 100% certain to run is Romney. How on earth would Thune win the nomination if he's competing for the not-completely-crazy voting bloc with a zillionaire who's a household name? If Thune got traction, wouldn't they split the not-completely-crazy vote, thus probably throwing the race to Palin? I know you can't predict the outcome of these things two years in advance, but I think you can predict that Thune doesn't have a path to victory, even if it's not clear who does.