I Can't Help Myself

I don't understand how people can actually have a serious conversation about Sarah Palin without suddenly breaking out in uncontrollable laughter. I have never seen anything like this. There's a part of Isaac Asimov's classic "Foundation" trilogy where a diplomat from the powerful people comes to visit the planet of the less powerful (sorry for the lack of detail, it's been probably 30 years since I read it). He does a great deal of talking during this time and when he leaves the general feeling is that he was supportive and consrtuctive and that relations will be better. Then linguists analyzed what he actually said and found that everything he said was canceled out by something else he said and that in total, he had said absolutely nothing. I felt this way sometimes during the vice presidential debate.