The single nastiest lede of the campaign was written by Kate Zernike in today’s New York Times:

Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska completed Day 2 of her foreign policy tutorials on Wednesday, meeting with the leaders of Georgia, Ukraine, Iraq, Pakistan and India and engaging in small talk about her looks and New York City.

Then, Zernike writes about Pakistan’s President Asif Ali Zardari fawning over Palin, as if impressing the leader of the most critical and fragile state in the War on Terror were a bad thing:

“You are even more gorgeous than you are on the (inaudible),” Mr. Zardari said.

“You are so nice,” Ms. Palin replied. “Thank you.”

“Now I know why the whole of America is crazy about you,” Mr. Zardari continued. At which point an aide told the two to shake hands.

At which point an aide told the two to shake hands. Get it? Sarah Palin is so unschooled in the ways of diplomacy, so backwoods, so unsocialized that she doesn’t even know how human beings greet each other when first meeting. As if she was about to Eskimo kiss the president of Pakistan. And it’s better, is it not, to have a vice president who needs to be told when to shake hands with foreign leaders, rather than a president who has to be told when not to. People say the McCain camp is showing signs of desperation, but slimy pieces like this demonstrate that Sarah Palin’s critics are simply starving.