Michelle Malkin made it quite clear that Dede Scozzafava was not a teabagger approved candidate. Scozzafava didn't lose because of dirty tricks, she lost because she suffered a head-on collision with the extremist, radical teabagging faction of the Republican Party.
So Sarah Palin, the prospective Republican candidate for president who thinks that Jonah Goldberg's book "Liberal Fascism" is a serious, weighty work of intellectual depth is now considered okay because she's sorta like to have a conversation with SecState Clinton? I'm not saying that's a bad thing, but that's awfully thin evidence on which to exonerate someone.
Oh, and BTW, it's spelled "vicious."