Out of the Inkwell

Betty Boop and Sarah Palin?! How did this tidbit escape me?

"CNN compares winking Sarah Palin to Betty Boop
David Edwards and Muriel Kane
Published: Tuesday October 7, 2008

Republican vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin's exaggerated winks during her debate with Democrat Joe Biden last week have received a great deal of attention and inspired a considerable amount of comedy.

CNN's Jeanne Moos surveyed some of the reactions to Palin's winks, from Alec Baldwin's imitation on Real Time with Bill Maher to Tina Fey's impersonation of Palin on Saturday Night Live.

The Huffington Post created a music video out of Palin's repeated winks, Jay Leno joked about it, and Bill Maher got laughs just by reading out conservative Rich Lowry's description of how he "sat up a little straighter" in response to the wink.

Conservatives, in turn, have been retaliating by accusing Biden of botox use, comparing his smooth forehead at the debate with a crinkled photo from a few years ago.

CNN asked people on the street about Palin's winks, getting reactions ranging from "a nice fresh face" to "totally fake."

However, CNN may now have found the ultimate Palin comparison -- a 1932 cartoon titled "Betty Boop for President," in which Betty winks broadly while singing, "Some of you have money, while some are poor, you know. If you send me to Washington, I'll just divide the dough, oh!"

No doubt Palin, who insisted at the debate that paying taxes is "not patriotic," would consider Boop's plans for income redistribution -- along with her promises that "we will get things for nothing, movies, cabarets and jazz!" -- to mark her as a wild-eyed radical and probable associate of the Weather Underground.

Watch for yourself.