Tapper reports in his Political Punch blog:

Hackers in London apparently affiliated with “Operation Payback” – a group of supporters of Julian Assange and Wikileaks – have tried to shut down SarahPac and have disrupted Sarah and Todd Palin’s personal credit card accounts.

“No wonder others are keeping silent about Assange’s antics,” Palin emailed. “This is what happens when you exercise the First Amendment and speak against his sick, un-American espionage efforts.”

Palin has criticized Wikileaks founder Assange, writing on Facebook that his “past posting of classified documents revealed the identity of more than 100 Afghan sources to the Taliban. Why was he not pursued with the same urgency we pursue al-Qaeda and Taliban leaders?…Assange is not a ‘journalist’ any more than the ‘editor’ of al-Qaeda’s new English-language magazine Inspire is a ‘journalist.’ He is an anti-American operative with blood on his hands.”

This is not the first time that Ms. Palin’s personal Internet accounts have been breached by a hackers as her email account was hacked into during the 2008 presidential election. Developing.

Way back in October of 2008, Newsweek took fire from Palin supporters for a cover photo that was not sexy enough. In a segment on Fox News, a Republican media consultant picked the extreme closeup apart, pointing out wrinkles, pores, and unwanted facial hair.

While Jezebel, among others, pointed out the falseness of the assertion that Obama magazine covers were retouched to make him look flawless, the title of the cover story was a dead giveaway: The Palin Problem. It doesn’t seem likely that they picked the photo for its artistic merit.

The biggest difference then, though, was that Palin herself wasn’t doing the complaining. The McCain campaign staff that she so thoroughly derides now apparently kept her from lashing out then, and wisely so. Getting worked up over a magazine cover, especially ones as relatively innocuous as these, doesn’t bespeak the toughness demanded of a leader.

Plus, Rachel Sklar has a point. When she posed for the sexy Runner’s World spread, she and the magazine had to know they were going to sell to a wider audience than just jogging enthusiasts. This doesn’t make Palin fair game, but it raises the bar for what she gets to call “sexist.”

As for Newsweek, their respective points might have been better served in each case by using less controversial cover photos, but would have arguably been seen by far fewer people. Maybe, in the future, they should stick with (real) pictures of Palin holding guns. Everyone seems to like those.

Late last night Palin posted a response to Newsweek‘s cover of her (our thoughts on that here), which hit stands after her interview with Oprah had been taped. Here’s what she had to say:

The choice of photo for the cover of this week’s Newsweek is unfortunate. When it comes to Sarah Palin, this “news” magazine has relished focusing on the irrelevant rather than the relevant. The Runner’s World magazine one-page profile for which this photo was taken was all about health and fitness – a subject to which I am devoted and which is critically important to this nation. The out-of-context Newsweek approach is sexist and oh-so-expected by now. If anyone can learn anything from it: it shows why you shouldn’t judge a book by its cover, gender, or color of skin. The media will do anything to draw attention – even if out of context.

You know what, she’s right. She is devoted to health and fitness — or as she told Oprah “sweat is my sanity” — and as Rachel Sklar noted yesterday during our liveblog Palin is a great example on physical fitness. Also, it’s hard to argue with the idea that this nation does need to exercise more. So there’s that. Next!

UPDATE: Jon Meacham responds to claims of sexism (via Politico)

“We chose the most interesting image available to us to illustrate the theme of the cover, which is what we always try to do. We apply the same test to photographs of any public figure, male or female: does the image convey what we are saying? That is a gender-neutral standard.”

So yes? Since the theme of the cover struck us as fairly marginalizing and sexist, than absolutely Newsweek chose the best picture with which to illustrate this point.