Andrew Sullivan draws up to full 30-meter height in majestic indignation

You may have seen Sarah Palin's clever response to the criticism over her confused reference to "our North Korean allies." She strings together a number of Obama's verbal gaffes, thereby having some fairly gentle and tasteful laughs at the President's expense while making the defensive (in her case) and fairly broadminded point that every widely-quoted public figure makes verbal mistakes, even presidents generally regarded as verbally cogent and coherent. Sullivan, however, is incensed:

A simple respect for the office she seeks would not reflect itself in these increasingly callow, sarcastic, cheap jibes at a sitting president. But sadly, like so many now purporting to represent conservatism, there is, behind the faux awe before the constitution, a contempt for the restraint and dignity a polity's institutions require from its leaders.

There is no maturity here; no self-reflection; no capacity even to think how to appeal to the half of Americans who are already so appalled by her trashy behavior and cheap publicity stunts. There is a meanness, a disrespect, a vicious partisanship that, if allowed to gain more power, would split this country more deeply and more rancorously than at any time in recent years. And that's saying something.

It isn't just Palin--the whole country must be a bitter disappointment to a man of Sullivan's caliber.