Salman Rushdie: Sarah Palin is 'a joke'

LONDON (AFP) — British author Salman Rushdie branded US vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin as a "joke" Sunday and said naming her as Republican John McCain's running mate was a "colossal misjudgement".

Rushdie, a vocal supporter of Democratic White House candidate Barack Obama, told Ireland's TV3 channel that Palin was extreme and incompetent.

"I think she's a joke. I mean I always thought, she's a bad joke," he said. "But I always thought it was a colossal misjudgement of McCain's to appoint her as his running mate because she's not even borderline competent and what we know about her, or increasingly what we are beginning to know about her, is how very, very, very far to the right she is." Read more>