With the gossipy attacks on Sarah Palin spreading, people have asked:cui bono? Who benefits from tearing down Palin at the end of this campaign?  Some have speculated that Mitt Romney benefits in 2012 from having Palin sidelined, and that aides from his campaign that worked for John McCain might be behind the attacks.  Not so, says Katie Connolly of Newsweek, where most of those attacks got reported:

Mike Galanos, CNN: Katie, a report I read, help me out here on this one, Im not sure if you heard this, there was some Romney aides that now came into the McCain campaign and it was the Romney aides that began spreading the dirt about Sarah Palin and basically in a fight already to see who is going to lead the party in the future. Any truth to that?

Katie Connolly, Newsweek: Absolutely not. Not from what I know. I think that’s completely false.

The Romney explanation didn’t make that much sense anyway.  When Romney attacked, he did so above board.  Mike Huckabee got incensed not because of a whispering campaign but because Romney threw punches in negative ads on television.

Which still leave us with the question — cui bono? No one that has the long-term interests of the party in mind, certainly.