Transformation to Palin is a Fey accompli

Fey admitted that Palin has done things Fey has only dreamed about. "She was the 'barracuda' with high cheekbones who competed on the basketball team. I was an Arthur Treacher's deep-fried cod who, oh forget about it.

"Those who can, do. Those who can't, mock those who can," Fey said.

But now Fey says that she finally is comfortable enough in her own skin to be able to shed the skin of her past. For example, she says her success buoyed  her so that she wasn't completely devastated by losing the Emmy for best lead actress in a comedy series this year to the relatively unknown Toni Collette of United States of Tara.

"Can you be partially devastated? Come on, Bruce," said Fey, apparently not so comfortable that she doesn't have to take out the dagger against a mere blogger.

But still comfortable enough that her past is really behind her, and she's not the high school nerd or the 24-year-old virgin or the woman who "maxed out" at 5-4 1/2, 150 pounds (but had "that beautiful Rubenesque kind of beauty," according to her husband, according to nerve, according to maureen dowd's interview in Vanity Fair. Don't click here. I just told you all you need to know).

And now Fey says she feels she can really come out: as a Republican in 2012.

"Yes, I know I would joke that I couldn't vote for someone who I was as smart as. But I think what I really was saying was that I was afraid to admit that I've grown up. You know, you always want to think of the president as that big grown-up. There is a reason, after all, that most of our presidents have been tall guys. George Washington was 6 feet 2, and you're talking about an era in which the average colonial male (your original teabagger) was only 5-7," she said. "Barack Obama, by the way, is 6-2."

But he is appearing smaller and smaller each day, Fey said. "Maybe it's because he's on tv all the time. TV reduces things, brings them closer to you. Heck, I'm on tv. You need a president who keeps a little distance."

So how can Fey vote for Palin, who at about 5-5, is around the same height? "Because I'm grown up now," Fey said. "It's not about physical height. It's about emotional stature."

And Fey is worried about Obama's maturity. "I don't know. Yeah, he went to Harvard, but he doesn't seem to be smart enough to realize that you can't jam the cotton-swabbed stick of health care revolution down the throats of the American people. And at the same time the rest of the world loves him because he hasn't demanded anything of the rest of the world. He couldn't even get the Olympics in Chicago," she said.

What Obama is is cool. "It's why you can't really imitate him on SNL. Chevy Chase could have Gerald Ford doing pratfalls. Dan Aykroyd could mock Jimmy Carter's 'lust in his heart' for Phyllis Newman, Will Ferrell would just look at a mirror which reflected the cue cards so he could approximate Bush's dyslexia (not as funny as making fun of a blind governor, but still), but Obama is maddening. He's been called the post-American president (he transcends mere geographic boundaries) but worse, he's the post-television president. You can't imitate him.

"But Palin. Everyone can imitate her. Everyone's got the voice. Not only that, she is everywoman.  The career woman trying to juggle family. And she's everyman, too. She kills big things. Moose. She is the feminist Frankenstein monster. Look, what we've created. It lives.

"I don't like a lot of her views, but I know she's not going to give away the store to the Iranians or the Rooskis. And I'm scared enough as it is with NBC trying to go cut-rate with Leno, and network tv evaporating.  I don't need the nation to fall out from under me, too."

Fey says she'd hate to see the networks die. "Yes, HBO and Showtime are great. But there's something about being on the networks you grew up with. I guess by being on NBC I'm re-making my past," she said.

Fey said that she hopes to help keep NBC alive be creating more series. One that's in development is based on how and when she lost her virginity. The working title for the pilot is 24Pork.