Steven Waldman

Steven Waldman

Sarah Palin: Couldn’t Find McCain Staffers to Pray With

posted by swaldman | 6:11pm Thursday March 26, 2009

Sarah Palin told a group of Alaska Republicans last week about preparing to go on stage for the vice presidential debate. “So I’m looking around for somebody to pray with, I just need maybe a little help, maybe a little extra,” she said. “And the McCain campaign, love ‘em, you know, they’re a lot of people around me, but nobody I could find that I wanted to hold hands with and pray.”McCain staffers have taken umbrage at the suggestion that they’re not the praying types.The rest of the anecdote (starting at the 4 minute mark) is actually quite charming. She asks her daughter Piper to pray that God gives her strength and “speaks through me.” Little Piper responds, “That would be cheating!”What’s politically interesting is that Palin could easily have told the Piper anecdote without dissing the McCainiacs. You can see why religious conservatives love her: unabashed about her faith and her contempt for McCain staffers.



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Comments read comments(8)
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Charles Cosimano

posted March 26, 2009 at 7:37 pm


That’s the best thing I’ve ever heard about McCain’s staff.



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pagansister

posted March 26, 2009 at 8:02 pm


Gee! Poor Sarah. She couldn’t just go off and pray by herself, since she found it that important?



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Michael

posted March 26, 2009 at 8:32 pm


A viper. She tells that story, with her aw shucks manner, while stabbing people in the back in order to make her look good.



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WWJD

posted March 26, 2009 at 11:34 pm


Gee, I wonder how often Jesus found himself in a room full of people, none of whom he would stoop to praying with.



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Karen Brown

posted March 27, 2009 at 8:19 am


I don’t know. I think I found it worse that she wasn’t necessarily saying they /wouldn’t/ pray with her. But that there wasn’t anyone she /wanted/ to hold hands with and pray. Like there was something wrong with them, or they weren’t good enough for her to want to touch them, even to pray.



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Tim

posted March 27, 2009 at 10:37 am


I’m with Michael. This is a detestable story.



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pagansister

posted March 27, 2009 at 12:00 pm


Wonder if it is a requirement that one “hold hands” while praying? What does it say that SHE couldn’t find a person SHE wanted to hold hands with?? Also I wonder if no one qualifies as a hand holding prayer partner, does that mean you have to hold your own hands?



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s. martinez

posted March 27, 2009 at 5:01 pm


Think of where Sarah Palin was, the purpose of the venue from which we can infer her purpose, when she made her statement that she could find no one with whom she wanted to pray – then consider this scriptural food for thought:
Matthew 6:1-6 (New International Version)
Matthew 6
1″Be careful not to do your ‘acts of righteousness’ before men, to be seen by them. If you do, you will have no reward from your Father in heaven.
2″So when you give to the needy, do not announce it with trumpets, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and on the streets, to be honored by men. I tell you the truth, they have received their reward in full.
3But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing,
4so that your giving may be in secret. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.
5″And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by men. I tell you the truth, they have received their reward in full.
6But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.



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