West Wing creator Aaron Sorkin today gave Sarah Palin
both barrels over her US TV reality show, accusing the contender for
the 2012 Republican presidential nomination of shooting an animal "for
political gain".

Sorkin, writer of the recent Facebook movie The Social Network, also accused the Fox News
contributor of making a "snuff film" after the latest episode of
Sarah's Palin's Alaska featured the politician going hunting with her
father and shooting a caribou.

He described Palin as "deranged", a
"witless bully" and a "phony pioneer girl". He also said The Learning
Channel, the US cable network, "should be ashamed of itself" for
broadcasting her "truly awful reality show".

Sorkin was responding
to a post on Palin's Facebook page in which the former governor of
Alaska reacted to criticism of Sunday's episode by accusing her
detractors of hypocrisy: "Unless you've never worn leather shoes, sat
upon a leather chair or eaten meat, save your condemnation."

"I
eat meat, chicken and fish, have shoes and furniture made of leather ...
I'm able to make a distinction between you and me without feeling the
least bit hypocritical," Sorkin wrote in an incendiary comment piece posted on the Huffington Post website early today.

"I
don't watch snuff films and you make them. You weren't killing that
animal for food or shelter or even fashion, you were killing it for fun.
You enjoy killing animals," he added.

"And you didn't just do it
for fun and you didn't just do it for money. That was the first moose
[sic] ever murdered for political gain. You knew there'd be a protest
from Peta and you knew that would be an opportunity to hate on some
people, you witless bully. What a uniter you'd be – bringing the right
together with the far right."

Sorkin said he could not make a
distinction between what Palin got paid to do in her show and "what
Michael Vick went to prison for doing". Vick is an American football
player convicted three years ago on dog-fighting charges.