The presidential turkey pardon is by far the corniest of all Thanksgiving traditions, but what's Thanksgiving without a little easily-ignored corn. (Sorry.) But the president isn't the only person who gets to pretend he's supreme ruler of all things feathered and fowl–every Thanksgiving season governors all over the country regularly issue pardons in their own personal turkey fiefdoms, including this year Governor Sarah Palin.
But while the presidential turkey pardon is a highly sanitized event–taking place in the White House Rose Garden, with two of the fluffiest, cleanest, most beautiful turkeys you'll ever see, and many scripted gobble gobble punchlines–Governor Palin chose to keep her turkey pardoning real. Like dirty turkeys, and doing a post-pardon interview in front of live turkey slaughtering real.
Sarah Palin is becoming more and more like those indignant mothers on the Maury Povitch show who overfeed their toddlers and yell at the audience, refusing to admit their mistakes. I'm sure someone from her staff pointed out the fact that turkeys were being slaughtered right behind her, and she was like, "Yeah. So what? You don't know me! You don't know me! I'll do what I want."
If you eat meat (or turkey), you shouldn't be squeamish about where that meat comes from, that's a given. Still, that doesn't mean you should give an on-camera interview about the economy and which government programs should be on the "chopping block" (Nice one, unseen reporter) ten feet away from turkeys being slaughtered. It's just kind of, what's the word, weird? Aggressive? Tacky? Then again, maybe this should become Sarah Palin's thing: doing interviews in front of turkeys getting their heads cut off. If nothing else, it provides a great distraction from what she's saying. She should have her aides set up an animal kill station behind her in every interview. This way the discussion moves from, "What did she just say?" to "Oh my god! That guy behind her just cut a goat's throat!"