Doing no favors for their gender RICHARD L. CONNOR OPINION

TALK ABOUT A bad week for women in politics and business.

Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, one-time Republican vice-presidential candidate, announced she is quitting her job a full 18 months before her term expires.

Then Washington Post Publisher Katharine Weymouth mixed both politics and business and committed a huge gaffe that has damaged her reputation (young and building) and that of her newspaper (old and now declining), if only for a brief period.

Palin, emulating boxer Roberto Duran, said “No mas” July 3. She gave Alaska much-needed independence a day early.

Palin later tweeted or told her Facebook friends (or otherwise communicated digitally the way hip, “with-it” folks do these days) to say she would be working on matters that are vital to the world, not just Alaska. Good luck.

You know the existential question of whether a tree falling in a forest makes a sound if no one is there to hear it?

Well, Palin is about to discover the answer. There will be no one listening, Ms. Soon-to-be-ex-Governor, when your lips move on subjects of global importance.

It really does not matter why she quit or what she plans to do next. I believe Palin’s life as a national political candidate is over. Fini. Kaput.

Resignation, though, was not Palin’s biggest sin. Her gravest transgression was allowing her ego and ambition to blind her into believing she was ready to be vice president of the United States. When offered the opportunity, she should have gracefully declined.

Sen. John McCain was not going to win the presidential election anyway. He chose Palin as an interesting and sparkling trinket to dangle like jewelry from the neck of a presidential campaign that was flabby. She was a sideshow. Her choice by the McCain staff was an affront to women.

She was exploited for her gender and good looks. She made one – count ’em, one! – good speech at the GOP Convention.

Had Palin said “No” last summer, she would be a mystery now and could have parlayed her status as the obscure governor who turned down a vice-presidential offer into a possible run for the top job in 2012.

Not that a Palin resurgence is out of the question. There have been political comebacks before. The two most famous examples were staged by Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan. Both bounced back from election defeats to claim glory. They did it by being cagey and learning from their mistakes, applying that knowledge to emerge on top.

Palin has not displayed caginess and shows no signs of learning from her mistakes. She has as much chance of a comeback as Luzerne County has of clearing up its corruption scandal anytime soon.

As for Weymouth, well, let’s put it this way: If her family did not control The Washington Post she would be out on her ear, an ex-publisher without a job.

Remember what happened to poor old Howell Raines at The New York Times? His staff revolted and his publisher (also a controlling owner), Arthur Sulzberger Jr., buckled like cheap aluminum siding, firing Raines.

But Weymouth is still working because she has no inclination to fire herself, despite making a grievous error in judgment.

Not that her motivation was bad. Newspapers throughout the nation are seeking new revenue streams. That includes the paper in which you’re reading this.

And Weymouth’s plan to use her position as a way to charge folks for introducing them to powerful people and leaders is hardly new or unique. What is different here is that she actually tried to execute the idea, even adding her own haughty flair by calling the proposed events “salons.”

I briefly thought about asking NEPA residents to join me and my friends for breakfast at Tony’s on Wyoming Avenue in Kingston. It’s already a hot spot for deep and probing political discussions. And it has been a lauching pad for political careers … although some have soared while others have fried right there on the griddle.

Rick Santorum has been there. Hazleton Mayor Lou Barletta has been a diner. And recently, even GOP strategist and brain Karl Rove ate there.

My plan fell apart, however, when Tony’s owner, Jimmy (don’t ask me to explain that one), said there was no way he would allow me to call his place a “salon.” He may also have been offended that I wasn’t planning to charge anyone to dine with me, but merely suggest they pay for my breakfast.

Finally, I came to my senses and realized it would be difficult to call a place whose signature dish is “The Fat Bastard” omelet a “salon.”

Too bad Weymouth didn’t come to her senses sooner. Instead of stepping up and taking responsibility for this hare-brained scheme, she tried blaming virtually anyone and everyone who may have been within earshot of her office in recent weeks.

The facts as we know them are that Weymouth either concocted or agreed with a plan to invite lobbyists to dine in her home with reporters and editors and Obama administration folks.

First, the Post was charging for the privilege: $25,000 per dinner or $250,000 for a series of dinners. Second, anything discussed at the dinners would be “off the record.”

In addition to raising obvious questions about her ethics, Weymouth’s plan calls into question her newspaper’s objectivity. Considering the plan to include Obama administration people at the dinners, one has to wonder how Weymouth might respond to charges that the news media has a liberal agenda.

Also disconcerting is the hand Washington Post Editor Marcus Brauchli had in Weymouth’s grand scheme. In retrospect, Rupert Murdoch looks brighter than ever for dumping Brauchli as editor of The Wall Street Journal when he bought that publication.

In a scenario not unlike the spin campaigns that followed other scandals in the nation’s capital, Weymouth is falling all over herself trying to apologize and explain her actions. She told employees in a letter that she has asked the company attorney, Eric Lieberman, to “review recent events to make sure that our business processes are consistent with, and will not in any way compromise, our journalism.”

Please, someone stop this woman. Stop her before she writes something else as inane as this, also in her letter to employees:

“Simultaneously, I’ve asked Marcus and Milton Coleman to codify parameters for Post newsroom participation in live events.”

Before they measure the ethical dimensions of the newsroom, how about banning phrases such as “codify parameters?”

How about promising readers, advertisers and employees that you will ask all of your executives to begin using common sense when making decisions, Ms. Weymouth?

And, oh, while you’re at it, promise them this: News and opinion are never for sale at any price. Anyone trying to peddle or sell influence will be shot — after they are hanged.

Men make stupid decisions every day, but let’s face it: For better or worse they still have the upper hand. Pressure still exists for minorities, and I include women in that group, to be better than everyone else. Yet they still have to — rightly or wrongly — prove themselves.

Palin and Weymouth did otherwise last week. They set back the progress of others in their professions. Both need to leave the stage and return to the wilderness.

Richard L. Connor is CEO of the Wilkes-Barre, Pa., Publishing Co. and MaineToday Media, owner of newspapers in Portland, Augusta and Waterville, Maine. A newspaperman for 40 years, he has served on two Pulitzer Prize for Journalism nominating committees.

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