Did Hong Kong punk Palin?

By GottaLaff

Previously, I posted about Death Panel Barbie's Big Speaking Engagement at a Hong Kong investment forum. That seemed a little like inviting Glenn Beck to a spelling bee. I had even asked what could have possessed them. I mean, D.P. Barbie being paid the big bucks to speak at such a Very Important and Serious Venue was crazy! Far fetched! Ludicrous!

But wait. What have we here?

Think she'll cancel, claiming she had never committed to the engagement to begin with? At least she has a humiliating track record of unreliability and, well, quitting, to back herself up.

If this is what it appears to be, then I only have one word: Suh-nap!

Remind me to send a thank you note to CLSA.

H/t: Mudflats

Sarah Palin to speak at Hong Kong investor forum... but will she show?

By GottaLaff

Sarah the Quitter isn't the most reliable date keeper, now is she? Nor was she a very reliable governor. She continues to turn the phrase, "I just can't quit you" on its head:

According to this story in the Anchorage Daily News, people counting on Palin to be their keynote speaker sometimes get stood up. "Organizers of an Anchorage event that has been billing Sarah Palin for weeks as a star speaker were left scrambling Wednesday after learning that the former governor won't be there for tonight's event and claims to have never been asked," the newspaper reported last Wednesday. "It would be at least the fourth time in recent months that an anticipated Palin speech has fallen through after Palin and her camp disputed they had ever confirmed it. That includes the brouhaha over whether she'd speak at the annual congressional Republican fundraising dinner in Washington, D.C., this summer."

So how insulted would CLSA be if she backed out of this speaking date? Or will she once again claim that she had never committed to it? Why, that could spark an international kerfuffly kerfuffle! You betcha:

CLSA, the Hong Kong-based brokerage, announced today that the hockey mom who quit her job as Alaska governor last month will be the keynote speaker at its annual investor conference in September.

Maybe they could invest in some I.Q. points for her while she's there.

Come to think of it, why exactly did they ask her, of all people, to speak? What possessed them? That is a question for the ages...

The CLSA forum is a big deal, having attracted not only Clinton, Gore and Greenspan in the past but also heavyweights like Nobel Peace Prize winner Archbishop Desmond Tutu, former Walt Disney boss Michael Eisner and scientist Craig Venter (who founded the Institute for Genomic Research and led the team that sequenced the human genome). [...]

The press release from CLSA also has this surprising bit of news: The trip to Hong Kong will be Palin's first trip to this part of the world. [...] During last year's campaign, the governor touted her state's proximity to (the Asian part of) Russia as proof of her foreign-policy bona fides, so I'm surprised to read that she has never actually been here.

I'm not.