This New Yorker piece calls attention to a passage from Scott Conroy and Shushannah Walshe's recently biography of Palin, in which Palin's own father says she left because she was apparently "uncomfortable around Asians and Pacific Islanders" -- which, you may have heard, the Aloha State has a lot of. From The New Yorker:
Palin, though notoriously ill-traveled outside the United States, did journey far to the first of the four colleges she attended, in Hawaii. She and a friend who went with her lasted only one semester. "Hawaii was a little too perfect," Palin writes. "Perpetual sunshine isn't necessarily conducive to serious academics for eighteen-year-old Alaska girls." Perhaps not. But Palin's father, Chuck Heath, gave a different account to Conroy and Walshe. According to him, the presence of so many Asians and Pacific Islanders made her uncomfortable: "They were a minority type thing and it wasn't glamorous, so she came home." In any case, Palin reports that she much preferred her last stop, the University of Idaho, "because it was much like Alaska yet still 'Outside.'"You gotta love it -- young Sarah Palin, scared out of Hawaii by too many darn yellow folks. Is anyone really surprised by this little revelation? It's not like I needed more reason to dislike Palin... but hey, it would appear that she dislikes me back. Or at least, in large quantities, I make her very, very uncomfortable. Well, welcome to the real United States of America.
