Loved by Many, Understood by Few

mmcirvin and james_nicollpointed out that Governor Sarah Palin had said some notable things about President Obama's State-of-the-Union message in an interview on Fox News.

So I read the Talking Points Memo entry and then I played the second half of the video interview (resolutely ignoring the obligatory commercial for Olive Garden). Sure, enough, the Governor said some dubious things about the USSR's victory in the Space Race, and how it was thereby doomed...

...and then she started talking about SPUDNUT MOMENTS.

No, really.

I wasn't expecting this.

She actually named the SPUDNUT SHOP IN RICHLAND, WASHINGTON-- one of the last surviving Spudnut Shops!

Spudnuts.

I learned about Spudnuts from Gharlane of Eddore. I spent years (sporadically) investigating a possible connection between Spudnuts and a potato-flour doughnut recipe invented by Edward Elmer Smith, Ph.D.

In the middle of a Worldcon, this led me to a store run by enigmatic tattooed Cambodians on the fringes of Los Angeles.

I have also corresponded with the curator of the Spudnuts Museum. Prof. Kathryn Sherony chose her museum's motto: Loved by Many, Understood by Few. Turns out the Spudnuts founders concocted a potato-doughnut recipe with no help from the creator of the Lensmen. Too bad; it would have been nice to have an official doughnut for enthusiasts of space opera, but it was not to be.

I did not know this at the time of my visit. For the sake of my investigation, I brought back a couple of dozen Spudnuts to Worldcon. I fed some to Phil and Kaja Foglio. I wound up with a decorated bakery box depicting a potato embracing a doughnut-- imaginary packaging for space-opera-themed Spudnuts. "FROM OUTER SPACE TO YOUR FACE."

Every once in a while I pull out the greasy piece of cardboard to look at it and think, "I could get a hundred dollars for this at any comics convention in the country."

Crack investigative journalists have ascertained that Sarah Palin does indeed patronize the Spudnuts Shop on occasion. Here is a transcript of the Governor's words:
That was another one of those WTF moments,
that when he so often repeated,
the Sputnik Moment
that he would aspire Americans to celebrate
and he needs to remember that
what happened back then,
with the former Communist USSR
in their victory
in that, er, race to space--
Yeah, they won,
but they also incurred so much debt
at the time
that it resulted in the inevitable collapse
of the Soviet Union.
So I listened to that Sputnik Moment talk
over and over again
and I think,
No, we don't need one of those.
You know,
what we need
is a Spudnut Moment
and here's where I'm goin' with this, Greta:
And you're a good one 'cause
you're one of the reporters
who gets out there
in the communities
find these hard-workin' people
and find solutions to the problems
that Americans face.
Well, the Spudnut Shop
in Richland, Washington:
It's a bakery,
it's a little coffee shop
that's so successful.
Sixty-some years
generation to generation
a family-owned business
not looking for government
to bail 'em out
and to make their decisions for them.
It's just hard-working,
patriotic Americans in this shop.
We need more Spudnut Moments in America
and I wish that President Obama would understand
in that heartland of America
what it is
that really results
in the solutions that we need
to get this economy back on track.
It's a shop like that!
Nice to know the Governor has a high opinion of Spudnuts. I never thought this would become a political football. There's no contradiction, really-- Spudnuts people and Sputnik people should be able to get along.

I wish Gharlane could have lived to hear this.

(I guess Sputnik people are those who learned a lot of science and math in preparation for lives in the Space Age. So I must be a Sputnik person. If I parse her remarks correctly, the Governor wants more of us to work in doughnut shops. Maybe the Cambodians are hiring.)