Pining for Palin under marmalade skies

The most potent, most hallucinogenic, most addictive drug ever invented is Palin Crack. One hit and you're a junkie for life. Political reporters are especially susceptible to its clutches. Now that Chris Christie has bid adieu to the GOP race (again), TNR political writer Ed Kilgore predictably asked, "Could This Be Sarah Palin’s Moment?" After all, he declared, "Politics, like nature, abhors a vacuum." Actually, purple haze aside, it is political pundits who abhor a vacuum. Lest we forget, upon tiring of Rick Perry after 30 days, they are the ones who really created the Christie boomlet (who never had more than 32% actual support among Republicans). When the Jersey Shore governor said "forgetaboutit" today, few should have been surprised. But now, the pundits have no one left to pine for -- except Palin, the girl with kaleidoscope eyes. "Yes, this could be Sarah Palin’s moment to confound her critics, to send the GOP establishment types she hates even more than liberals into frantic hysteria, and most of all, to gain the attention she craves," Kilgore writes as he lounges amid cellophane flowers of yellow and green. And since "grassroots conservatives" -- the hardcore voters who will decide matters -- are (a) fundamentally crazy, and (b) utterly unconcerned about Palin's “electability” issue, Kilgore asserted, they could sweep "St. Joan of the Tundra" to the GOP nomination. All of this makes perfect sense -- along with plasticine porters with looking glass ties -- but only if you're strung-out on Palin Crack. Even if the GOP went insane and truly embraced Saint Sarah, nominating "Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds" would guarantee a 50-state landslide for President Obama. So, despite a trippy political landscape filled with tangerine trees and marmalade skies: It. Ain't. Gonna. Happen.