Sarah Palin is 'this close' to doing face-painting for tips at your next garage sale

Under normal circumstances I don't like doing back-to-back posts on Princess Dumbass of the Northwoods (a trademark of Charles Pierce Worldwide Industries) but I fear that her time amongst the C-list glitterati draws nigh.  Click-hungry headline writers and bloggers hardest hit.

According to Robert Costa, writing at the WaPo, Sarah Palin isn't exactly packing them in up to the rafters these days as her schtick is growing as old and tired  as Sarah Palin her own bad self. Before heading off to the NRA convention where she threw pre-chewed red meat to America's premier terrorist organization (sorry KKK - how's that rebranding going?), Palin popped into Iowa during her 'Heels On, Gloves Off' Tea Party lady-endorsement tour and, even  in Iowa - which is the Venice of butter sculpture - people still found something better to do with their time:

When Palin took the stage at the Hy-Vee Conference Center under a banner that read “Heels On, Gloves Off” on Sunday at an event for Senate candidate Joni Ernst, the ballroom was half-full, with a couple of hundred attendees scattered in clumps. Three people held signs and, while Palin was received warmly, only about 50 people stayed after to shake her hand on the rope line as Shania Twain’s “She’s Not Just a Pretty Face” blared from the speakers.

Craig Robinson, a former political director for the Iowa GOP, said that it was Palin’s smallest in-state crowd ever. Organizers blamed heavy rain.

Yuh-huh.

These days Sarah is in the candidate endorsement bidness funded by her SarahPAC which pays for her to fly around the country and stay in hotels; living large on room service and $14 bags of mini-bar cashews. That beats the hell out of Wasilla any day of the week, month, or year. If some of that sweet PAC money actually trickles out to a candidate or two, well, it's the cost of doing business and, according to the Washington Post and the AJC, business is pretty damn good for PAC grifters, big and small:

Out of the $37.5 million spent so far by the PACs of six major tea party organizations, less than $7 million has been devoted to directly helping candidates, according to the analysis, which was based on campaign finance data provided by the Sunlight Foundation.

[...]

Roughly half of the money — nearly $18 million — has gone to pay for fundraising and direct mail, largely provided by Washington-area firms. Meanwhile, tea party leaders and their family members have been paid hundreds of thousands of dollars in consulting fees, while their groups have doled out large sums for airfare, a retirement plan and even interior decorating.

Also, too:

[Jenny Beth} Martin, the super PAC’s chairwoman, oversees all its expenditures, according to [Tea Party Patriots spokesman Kevin] Broughton, meaning she sets her own $15,000 monthly fee for strategic consulting — payments that have totaled $120,000 since July.

She also draws a salary as president of the Tea Party Patriots’ nonprofit arm — getting more than $272,000 in the 2012 fiscal year, according to the group’s most recent tax filing.

Her twin salaries put her on track to make more than $450,000 this year, a dramatic change in lifestyle for the tea party activist, who had filed for bankruptcy in 2008 and then cleaned homes for a period of time to bring in extra money.

This, I should point out, is not a bad thing.

Few, if any, dollars go to campaigns for Tea Party candidates meaning they mostly remain shouty annoyances rather than well-funded viable candidates. Of course, even when they do manage to get elected, they don't seem to last long, leaving either by hook or by crook. As a public health benefit this grift may even rival Obamacare;  every dollar sent to a Tea Party PAC is a dollar not spent by a Tea Partier on a bullet or a high-fructose snack that causes diabetes foot.  So, you know, silver linings and all of that...

As for our gal Sarah, she has income from Fox and her upcoming cable network and her teevee show that nobody watches on that network that nobody knows exists. But  she is not above picking up a little pin money here and there to keep her wardrobe full with the latest from the Forever 21 sales racks. Want to put on a school fundraiser and a cupcake sale seems too labor intensive? Just call Sarah.

Sarah Palin, former governor of Alaska and vice presidential candidate, will be in Williston in October to be the keynote speaker for a Trinity Christian School fundraiser.

Palin will speak Oct. 13 at The Well at Williston State College for the school’s annual fundraising banquet. The theme of the banquet is the oil industry and Christian education, according to the school’s website.

Williston is the eight largest city in North Dakota (suck it, Wahpeton, you losers!).

You see: Sarah Palin is still big, it's the venues she appears at that got smaller...