Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin released a written and videotaped statement this morning via Facebook regarding the shootings in Tucson this past weekend. It's already being picked over for its dubious logic and -- some might say -- unfortunate word choices, but for me there was one passage that immediately stood out:

No one should be deterred from speaking up and speaking out in peaceful dissent, and we certainly must not be deterred by those who embrace evil and call it good. And we will not be stopped from celebrating the greatness of our country and our foundational freedoms by those who mock its greatness by being intolerant of differing opinion and seeking to muzzle dissent with shrill cries of imagined insults.

The “shrill cries of imagined insults”... Sort of like this?

The point Barack Obama was making today is that John McCain is not about change. Rather he and running mate Sarah Palin are about more of the same - no matter how they package it.

“You can put lipstick on a pig, but it's still a pig,” Obama said. “You can wrap an old fish in a piece of paper called 'change,' it's still going to stink.”

The McCain team is saying that's mockery gone too far. They say Obama called Palin a pig - drawing a parallel to Palin's well-used remark that the difference between a hockey mom and a pit bull is lipstick.

“It's clear to me -- as I'm sure it will be to fair-minded Republicans, Democrats and independents across the country -- that Senator Obama owes Governor Palin an apology,” said former Massachusetts Governor Jane Swift, the chair of the newly formed “Palin truth squad.”