Palin Escalates War of Words on Nuke Policy

(April 9) -- The flap over Sarah Palin's criticism of President Barack Obama on nuclear policy is mushrooming.

In a conversation Tuesday night with fellow Fox News personality Sean Hannity about the New START pact with Russia (See correction below) president's new policy on the use of nuclear weapons, Palin likened Obama to a kid in a playground fight who says "go ahead, punch me in the face and I'm not going to retaliate."

Asked during an interview Thursday with ABC News' George Stephanopoulos to respond to Palin's remarks, the president said, "I really have no response to that."

Then, without missing a beat, he responded.

"Last I checked, Sarah Palin's not much of an expert on nuclear issues," Obama added. He went on to say "if the secretary of defense and the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff are comfortable with it, I'm probably going to take my advice from them and not from Sarah Palin."

Palin is not known for letting criticism go unanswered and took advantage at a speech Friday afternoon at the Southern Republican Leadership Conference in New Orleans. The crowd there has already cheered Liz Cheney for charging that the president is putting American "on the path to decline" and Newt Gingrich for branding Obama "the most radical president in American history."

Just a few minutes into Palin's speech, Palin pounced: Despite Obama's "vast nuclear experience acquired as a community organizer, as a part-time senator and as a full-time candidate," he still hasn't gotten agreements with North Korea and Iran, she complained. (Click here to watch video.)

The war of words is playing into the partisan divide. On the right, pundits are calling the president, among other things, "arrogant" or are arguing that Obama isn't much of a nuclear arms expert either.

Several have picked up on the suggestions that Defense Secretary Roberts Gates isn't really gung-ho about the new protocols on nuclear response. As Hot Air's Allahpundit notes, a speech Gates made days before Obama was elected sent a different message.

Blogs for Victory's Mark Noonan is among the conservatives who think Palin gets Obama "rattled," which he calls "a fairly easy task when one is a down-to-earth person facing off against a self-absorbed elitist."

The left has an entirely different view of the ex-governor's down-to-earthiness.

"Sarah Palin keeps running around with her 'I'm an everyday American hockey mom' persona. The downside of that sales pitch is that it stresses just how unqualified Sarah Palin is outside of being an everyday American hockey mom," contends Zandar, whose blog is Zandar Versus The Stupid.

"That woman is an idiot," MSNBC's Keith Olbermann declared Thursday night after running the clip of Palin's comment. And Mediaite columnist Frances Martel is backing him up, saying "even the biggest Palin fans" must have been thinking the same thing after hearing the former GOP vice presidential nominee reduce the complexities of potential nuclear retaliation scenarios to a schoolyard brawl.

The Atlantic's Andrew Sullivan, also no fan of Palin's, takes aim at "the sheer crudeness of her rhetoric, the vast ignorance it champions" and warns that any "sane" response "simply feeds the Palin media machine."

Would Palin love to goad the president into escalating this war of nuclear words? You betcha. Will Obama take the bait? Don't hold your breath.

CORRECTION: Although Republicans have also criticized the New START agreement with Russia signed this week, Hannity's question and Palin's response referred to the Obama administration's updated Nuclear Posture Review, which includes this statement:

"... the United States will not use or threaten to use nuclear weapons against non-nuclear weapons states that are party to the (Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty) and in compliance with their nuclear non-proliferation obligations."