VandeHei @ Politico: Palin is going nowhere politically but the MSM can't quit her

[BeyondGeography]

In so many words:

Why the mainstream media loves Sarah Palin

Fox News has been making a serious charge about mainstream political reporters: They hate Sarah Palin. This is not just wrong, it’s absurd. The reality is exactly the opposite: We love Palin. And if Palin does not exactly love us, she’s smart enough to recognize how quickly reporters devour every provocative remark she utters. She knows how to exploit our weakness to guarantee herself exposure far out of proportion to her actual influence in Republican politics. It’s a tangled, symbiotic affair — built on mutual dependency and mutual enabling.

...A new poll out Thursday should make those of us in the media take a look in the mirror and ask: Should we really be giving so much attention to somebody who faces so many hurdles to becoming president or even the GOP nominee in 2012? According to the Washington Post/ABC survey, she is viewed favorably by 37 percent of Americans, while 55 percent view her unfavorably. That’s what pollsters call being “upside down,” which for an incumbent would usually spell defeat. Furthermore, only a quarter of those polled said Palin was qualified to be president — and 71 percent said she was not. What’s more, 52 percent of self-identified Republicans — more than half — said she wasn’t qualified to be president.

...The hope among GOP elites is that she’ll keep annoying liberals, raise money for the party — and stay out of the 2012 sweepstakes. A National Journal survey — an imperfect measurement, to be sure — of some of the party’s top strategists illustrated this point. Palin finished fifth among those Republicans the operatives thought would win the party’s nomination — behind Romney and Pawlenty, as well as Sen. John Thune of South Dakota, Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour and Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels.

So why, given her poll standing and the history of the GOP, is she covered so intensely?

The bitter pill to swallow is that the Palin obsession says as much about the modern media as it does about the state of American politics right now: We just can’t quit her...

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0210/32885.html

[MineralMan]

1. She's like a scab on the back of your hand.

You know you should leave it alone, but you just keep picking at it until it bleeds. Then, you get a new scab.