In the Annals of "Stop Digging"

A coworker of mine, given to wearing muu-muus, occasionally likes to remark on my outfits. Once, I wore a long, hand-knit sweater, and after she commented how it looked like a robe, she then proceeded to furiously attempt what she thought was backpedaling but was really just compounding of the initial affront: "oh, I don't mean to say it looks bad!" "it's a pretty color!" "robes are nice!" etc.

In similar fashion:

[Sarah Palin] responded to a recent Fox News report that quoted anonymous McCain campaign staffers who said she did not know Africa was a continent, not a country, and could not name the three countries in the North American Free Trade Agreement.

“If there are allegations based on questions or comments I made in debate prep about Nafta — about the continent versus the country when we talk about Africa there — then those were taken out of context. And that’s cruel, it’s mean-spirited, it’s immature, it’s unprofessional and those guys are jerks if they came away with it taking things out of context, then tried to spread something on national news,” Ms. Palin said.

I am so pleased that, soon, this will all just be a bad dream, and we'll be bitching about the tax policies (coherent and well explained though they may be!) of the Obama administration. That's going to be so refreshing.