Johnny’s Flying Circus - Starring Sarah Palin or ((Now for Something completely strange))
In one fell swoop, senator McCain has given up ownership to just about every tactic and strategy that the GOP had in their arsenal.
With Sen. McCain’s Pick of Governor Sarah Palin of Alaska, he has taken away the “experience” argument that would’ve been mildly effective in this time of über uncertainty on so many issues. Also, by getting not only an inexperienced running mate, but one who’s only experience has been on the small frozen stage of being Mayor in a small town for a brief time before moving on to the barely larger stage of governing a state with a population smaller than some of our large cities, McCain has ceded the talking point to Obama.
The “Are You Experienced“argument is still there, and still valid, but it cannot be used in the quick-n-easy sound bites that the public loves so much. Now this issue will have to be saved for the more lengthy discussion periods, such as the debates or Question and Answer press conferences. We know that there will be far too few of these types of informative sessions, from now until Election Day in November.
McCain has also added an unwelcome and unnecessary tie-in with the scandal plagued state of Alaska. Even If Gov. Palin is not directly linked to any scandal in Alaska, she will no doubt have to defend charges that she is. She will also have to defend the small scandals she has levied against her, dealing with the state troopers in Alaska.
This li’l political defect generally takes away the GOP strategy of tying Senator Obama with Joey Resco, and the Chicago housing scandal.
And last but not least, many are going to say selecting such an inexperienced woman, when for the past few weeks The entire GOP has been trying to foment division among Democratic women and their party, has a high probability of being seen as patronizing to women. They may be upset with Hillary not getting the VP slot, but they are not stupid.
It is the utterly asinine thought that says, since they are upset, we can put just any old woman in the VP slot and those Democratic women will come running to us. This FoxNews logic will be seen as very disingenuous and patronizing to many women.
This brings to mind that same tired GOP tactic that failed miserably when Obama on was running for the US Senate seat in Illinois. His opponent dropped out so the GOP “Brain Trust “said, let’s plug in any old black guy and we’ll keep the seat. That was all horrible, patronizing and ultimately failing strategy then, and it still is.
And playing on the emotionalism of having a downs syndrome baby is living on a very dangerous thin ledge that may win some points in the short run, but cannot be used for any sustained length of time.
All in all, this was a strange pick at best_ and an out-and-out bizarre pick in the minds of many political junkies out here.
But if it turns out that Johnny Python’s Flying Circus wins, then the ol’ maverick will prove once again smarter tougher and better than those of us who participate on the sidelines.
Gene Out !
August 30th, 2008 at 2:41 am
McCain/Palin the winning ticket for 08. Palin’s resume is miles ahead of Obama’s and she has proven herself to be a true reformer and has the record to prove it–not just oratory platitudes. Obama’s problems are just beginning. His connections to the radical left will do him in.
And man are you missing the point with regards to her having a Down’s Syndrome baby. She talks the talk and walks the walk of her pro-life convictions. She could have aborted her baby based on the prenatal testing and chose not to. Agree with her or not, she has proven her integrity.
August 30th, 2008 at 3:34 am
Hoads
Read this and tell my how picking Sarah Palin helps McCain with Hillary supporters?
More Hillary supporters going for McCain
Sixty-six percent of Clinton supporters, registered Democrats who want Clinton as the nominee, are now backing Obama. That’s down from 75 percent in the end of June. Twenty-seven percent of them now say they’ll support McCain, up from 16 percent in late June.
“The number of Clinton Democrats who say they would vote for McCain has gone up 11 points since June, enough to account for most although not all of the support McCain has gained in that time,” says Holland.
http://rightwingsparkle.blogspot.com/2008/08/more-hillary-supporters-going-for.html
McCain Ad Appeals to Clinton Supporters
FROM WSJ
http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2008/08/25/mccain-ad-appeals-to-clinton-supporters/?mod=googlenews_wsj
August 30th, 2008 at 3:38 am
FYI
The ticket: McCain-Palin
Politico- In one of the most shocking vice-presidential selections in political history, John McCain has tapped Sarah Palin, the 44-year-old first-term governor of Alaska, to be his running mate.
Praising her “strong principles, fighting spirit and deep compassion,” McCain told a noontime rally here that Palin —who only two years ago was mayor of Wasilla, Alaska — could help him take on the political status quo in Washington.
“She’s exactly who this country needs to help me fight the same old Washington politics of me first and country second,” McCain, 72 today, proclaimed to about 15,000 flag-waving onlookers who crowded into a college basketball arena here to see the surprise pick in person.
Palin, wearing a blue suit with an American flag pin and a Blue Star broach indicating a child in the military, accepted McCain’s offer with her husband, Todd, and four of her five children looking on.
Noting that the day fell almost 88 years to the day after American women gained the right to vote, Palin, becoming the first female Republican to run for vice president, won loud cheers from what was McCain’s largest rally yet by highlighting her gender.
Although Palin mentioned neither Barack Obama nor Joe Biden, she paid homage to Geraldine Ferraro , as well as to Hillary Rodham Clinton.
“It was rightly noted in Denver this week that Hillary left 18 million cracks in the highest, hardest glass ceiling in America,” Palin said. “But it turns out the women of America aren’t finished yet, and we can shatter that glass ceiling once and for all.”
Palin began to tell the crowd and the stunned political class watching on TV about her unlikely rise from small-town Alaska to the national stage, with flourishes that could never be made up.
First, she noted that today happens to be her 20th wedding anniversary.
“I had promised Todd a little surprise for the anniversary present and hopefully he knows that I did deliver,’ she quipped to laughs and applause.
Her husband and high school sweetheart, she said, is a lifelong commercial fisherman who works in the oil fields on Alaska’s North Slope and is a member of the US Steel Workers in addition to a world champion snowmobile rider.
A mother of five, Palin pointed out that their oldest couldn’t be present.
“On September 11th of last year, our son enlisted in the United States Army,” she shared, sparking a deafening ovation and chants of “USA.” “He now serves in an infantry brigade, and September 11th, he will deploy to Iraq in the service of his country.”
In selecting Palin, McCain counters the historic nature of Barack Obama’s candidacy. She’s young —three years younger than Obama — and she’s a woman, the first to land a spot on a major-party ticket since Walter Mondale picked Ferraro 24 years ago.
Disheartened Clinton supporters who were thinking about crossing over to vote for McCain may now have one more reason to do so.
Voters on the right will like Palin’s conservative credentials: She’s opposed to both abortion rights and gay marriage, supports increased domestic drilling for oil, is a lifelong member of the National Rifle Association and has a son in the U.S. Army.
But voters worried about Obama’s relative lack of experience — a central theme of both the Clinton and McCain campaigns — will have new cause for concern about the Republican alternative.
Obama spokesman Bill Burton seized immediately on the experience issue, saying McCain has put “the former mayor of a town of 9,000 with zero foreign policy experience a heartbeat away from the presidency.”
Jim Jordan, a veteran Democratic strategist, told Politico, “After his attacks on Obama’s readiness for the job, it’ll be amusing to hear a 71-year-old with a history of health problems justify this decision.”
A Democratic operative unaffiliated with the Obama campaign dismissed Palin as “Geraldine Quayle.”
A former high school basketball star and beauty queen, Palin has limited experience in elected office: She served for four years as a member of the Wasilla City Council and four more years as the mayor of Wasilla, and she hasn’t yet completed her second full year as governor of Alaska.
Joe Biden, by contrast, has spent more than three decades in the U.S. Senate. He may be a formidable opponent in their Oct. 2 vice presidential debate in St. Louis; on the other hand, his aggressive approach may not play as well against a young woman — even one who grew up hunting and fishing in Alaska — as it would have against someone such as Mitt Romney.
In choosing an outsider like Palin, McCain has bolstered his case that he — not Obama — is the real agent of change. Democratic Reps. Adam Schiff of California and Dennis Moore of Kansas, at the Denver airport when they heard rumors that McCain would choose Palin, admitted that they didn’t even know how to pronounce Palin’s name.
But in her short political career, Palin has become known — at least in Alaska — as a reformer. Long before the ethical problems of the Alaska GOP were front-page news in Washington, she was working to clean up the state’s government and her own party.
Slideshow
Reflections on Sarah Palin
As a member of Alaska’s Oil and Gas Conservation Commission, Palin pushed an investigation that ultimately led the state’s GOP party chairman to resign from the commission. Earlier this month, she endorsed Lt. Gov. Sean Parnell, who is still waiting to hear whether he has defeated ethically challenged Rep. Don Young in the House race’s GOP primary on Tuesday.
Last September, she called on Republican Sen. Ted Stevens to give a fuller accounting of his relationship with the oil-field services company Veco. But in the wake of Stevens’ indictment in July, Palin declined to call immediately for his resignation, saying it would be “premature” to do so until she learned more about the case against him.
Palin herself has been the subject of a probe involving the firing of her former brother in law, a state trooper who was fighting over child custody with Palin’s sister. According to the Anchorage Daily News, Alaska Public Safety Commissioner Walt Monegan has said he felt pressure from the governor’s office to fire the trooper. A Palin aide reportedly raised the governor’s concerns about the trooper in a phone call with Monegan; Palin has put the aide on leave pending a legislative investigation.
“Now we can talk about Ted Stevens and Don Young and Republican corruption every day,” said a Democratic strategist. “That’s great for us.”
Asked earlier this month whether the investigation would have any effect on her chances of becoming McCain’s running mate, Palin told MSNBC’s Larry Kudlow: “Well, it shouldn’t disqualify me from anything, including progressing the state’s agenda here towards more energy production so we can contribute more to the U.S. Nor should it dissuade any kind of agenda progress in any arena because, again, I haven’t done anything wrong. And through an investigation of our lawmakers who are kind of looking at me as a target, we invite those questions so that we can truthfully answer the questions.”
In a blog post on the National Review’s web site this morning, Kudlow said he’d be “thrilled” if Palin were the pick. “She’s a strong pro-life, supply-side, drill-drill-drill ethics reformer who has worked hard to change the Ted Stevens culture-of-corruption problem in Alaska,” he said. “A cheap-shot Democratic legislative investigation of Palin appeared to slow her momentum down a few weeks ago. But John McCain would electrify everyone if this choice pans out.”
Stevens’ former chief of staff Mitch Rose called McCain’s selection of Palin “a fantastic choice.”
“She’s down to earth, a hunter and fisherman, really connects well with the people of Alaska,” Rose said.
Rose noted that Palin’s approval ratings in Alaska are “sky high,” over 80 percent in some polls.
“She’s really kind of the new face of the party,” Rose added.
Known as “Sarah Barracuda” when she played on her high school’s state championship team, Palin competed in the Miss Alaska contest before graduating from the University of Idaho. She worked for her husband’s fishing business and, sometimes, as a TV sports reporter, then entered politics by winning a seat on the Wasilla City Council in 1992.
She went on to become the city’s mayor, then sought the GOP nomination for lieutenant governor in 2002. She lost, but Gov. Frank Murkowski appointed her to the Oil and Conservation Commission.
By 2005, Murkowski was in ethical trouble, and Palin decided to make a run for the governor’s office. She won, beating former Democratic Gov. Tony Knowles 48 percent to 41 percent. As governor, she has pushed hard for a natural gas pipeline in Alaska — work that will fit well within the GOP’s focus on energy issues.
As rumors swirled about McCain’s pick this morning, Nick Ayers, executive director of the Republican Governors Association, pointed to Palin’s experience in energy policy and her strong pro-life views in saying that she would be a “very popular” pick among Republican governors.
As the Anchorage Daily News reported, at the time, Palin sent an e-mail to friends and family in which she said: “… Trig will be a joy. You will have to trust me on this.” The paper said Palin wrote the e-mail in the voice of God and signed it, “Trig’s Creator: Your Heavenly Father.”
Palin’s husband, Todd, took a leave from his job as a production operator at BP-run facility after she was elected governor. He is one-quarter Yu’pik Eskimo. In an interview with The Associated Press last May, he said that he and the then-Sarah Heath eloped in 1988 because they couldn’t afford a wedding.
“We had a bad fishing year that year, so we didn’t have any money,” he said. “So we decided to spend 35 bucks and go down to the courthouse.”
August 30th, 2008 at 3:40 am
FYI
The story behind the Palin surprise
POLITICO-John McCain on Friday announced a running mate whom he met only six months ago and with whom he spoke just once on the phone about the position before offering it in person earlier this week.
McCain’s first encounter with Sarah Palin came at a Washington meeting of the National Governors Association in February, according to a campaign-provided reconstruction of how the little-known Alaska governor was thrust into the national spotlight. The two discussed the position by phone on Sunday before McCain invited Palin and her husband to Arizona to formally make the offer. McCain, joined by his wife, Cindy, did just that Thursday morning at their home near Sedona, Ariz.
By picking somebody he and most Americans barely know — an out-of-the-blue decision that sent shock waves of disbelief through the political world and still has jaws agape — McCain has taken a considerable gamble.
The choice is historic, yes. Palin becomes only the second woman to run on a major-party ticket and the first Republican woman to do so. But it’s also fraught with risks.
Palin, 44, is less than two years removed from being mayor of Wasilla, Alaska; has no military or foreign policy experience in a time of grave international threat; and has never even appeared a single time on “Meet the Press,” let alone been scrutinized by a voracious and around-the-clock modern media beast.
The coverage will be intense, relentless and, should she falter, harsh.
Yet Palin, a self-styled “hockey mom,” seems to represent compromise and promise as much as she does danger and risk.
Torn between selecting a transformational running mate and a conventional No. 2, McCain, as he has done so many times in his political career, went his own way.
McCain and his good friend and colleague Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), were tempted by the third member of their tight-knit trio, Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman (I-Conn.). Picking a Democrat-turned-independent, the idea went, would underscore McCain’s anti-establishment credentials in a year in which voters are fed up with Washington
But as a former Democrat who supports abortion rights and holds a host of other conventional liberal positions, Lieberman would have spurred a revolt among conservatives already wary of the maverick-inclined McCain.
McCain also could have tapped a safer choice — Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty was widely thought to be the chosen one in the final day of speculation — and not risked much of anything.
Instead, he gambled on an outsider sure to draw waves of skepticism but one whom, politically, his own party base could live with.
Palin, say some GOP strategists, brings considerable strengths to the ticket: She’s from just about as far from the Beltway as possible, ran and won as a reformer in a state that was aching for one, is acceptable to the party’s right wing, and has a fascinating yet familiar life story of success and achievement that embodies the American Dream.
“It reinforces in real time McCain’s greatest brand: reform,” said former Republican strategist Mary Matalin. “And it epitomizes ‘shares your values.’”
“I feel a tingle up my spine,” she crowed, praising the McCain campaign’s secret-keeping and boffo execution here today.
And then there are Palin’s two most visible traits.
“We’re a party that desperately needs women and desperately needs young people,” noted Ed Rollins, a longtime Republican consultant. And the 44-year-old Palin brings both of those qualities.
But McCain’s risk is just that — and Palin’s downside is considerable. Already, some Republicans are fretting that the GOP nominee might have made a colossal mistake by picking a running mate who is a complete unknown and who has not a minute of experience under the unforgiving glare of the national and international spotlight.
In a conference call with allies of the campaign, one participant raised questions about her unknown foreign policy views, according to a GOP source on the call.
McCain adviser Matt McDonald sought to allay these concerns by citing her experience dealing with international trade issues and even her travel overseas and her eldest son’s Army service.
“But the bottom line is, she doesn’t have a whole lot of experience. She just doesn’t,” said the source on the call, who said he had mixed feelings about the selection.
And, this person noted, beyond her own inexperience, Palin’s youth may ultimately pose as much peril as opportunity.
“I wonder if her youth will accentuate [McCain’s] age over time in a bad way,” this source said.
Another Republican, echoing the private thoughts of some strategists in the party, was less restrained, suggesting the Palin pick damaged one of McCain’s most valued attributes and wouldn’t help him beyond the party base.
“It hurts the experience edge, and the hard abortion stuff scares moderate swing voters,” said this GOP insider. “It will appeal to some Bubbas, but that’s not enough.”
It’s the first of these issues that Obama’s campaign and Democrats are seizing upon.
In what appears to be a coordinated attack, many top Democrats have savaged McCain for picking somebody who, less than two years ago, was a small-town mayor, to be next in line for the most powerful job in the world.
“Is this really who the Republican Party wants to be one heartbeat away from the presidency?” Rep. Rahm Emanuel (D-Ill.) asked, making sure to note that McCain turned 72 on Friday.
Indeed, Palin has emboldened Democrats to more frontally go after the longtime Arizona senator for his age, an issue on the minds of many voters with regard to McCain, according to polls.
“After his attacks on Obama’s readiness for the job, it’ll be amusing to hear a 72-year-old with a history of health problems justify this decision,” said Jim Jordan, a veteran Democratic strategist. “She’s a talent, but that’s the end of the experience message from John McCain.”
McCain plainly wanted a pick that dazzled and would be sure to shake up the race. But his out-of-the-box selection seems to dance on the razor’s edge, with disaster a distinct possibility.
Even Rollins, who praised the move, acknowledged it could be a catastrophe.
“The risk is that she just craters somewhere out there on the way,” he said. “She’s just never been in this kind of environment before.”
Another Republican cited a line from “This Is Spinal Tap”: “There is a fine line between clever and stupid.”
In the next 67 days, we’ll learn which side the Palin selection falls on.
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August 30th, 2008 at 3:57 am
FROM NRO
Palin
The longer I think about it, the less well this selection sits with me. And I increasingly doubt that it will prove good politics. The Palin choice looks cynical. The wires are showing.
John McCain wanted a woman: good.
He wanted to keep conservatives and pro-lifers happy: naturally.
He wanted someone who looked young and dynamic: smart.
And he discovered that he could not reconcile all these imperatives with the stated goal of finding a running mate qualified to assume the duties of the presidency “on day one.”
Sarah Palin may well have concealed inner reservoirs of greatness. I hope so! But I’d guess that John McCain does not have a much better sense of who she is, what she believes, and the extent of her abilities than my enthusiastic friends over at the Corner. It’s a wild gamble, undertaken by our oldest ever first-time candidate for president in hopes of changing the board of this election campaign. Maybe it will work. But maybe (and at least as likely) it will reinforce a theme that I’d be pounding home if I were the Obama campaign: that it’s John McCain for all his white hair who represents the risky choice, while it is Barack Obama who offers cautious, steady, predictable governance.
Here’s I fear the worst harm that may be done by this selection. The McCain campaign’s slogan is “country first.” It’s a good slogan, and it aptly describes John McCain, one of the most self-sacrificing, gallant, and honorable men ever to seek the presidency.
But question: If it were your decision, and you were putting your country first, would you put an untested small-town mayor a heartbeat away from the presidency?
August 30th, 2008 at 4:04 am
FYI
Watchdog groups give Palin mixed reviews
THEHILL-Washington watchdog groups have mixed reviews for John McCain’s choice of Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin as his running mate.
Washington’s leading budget watchdog group, Taxpayers for Common Sense (TCS), applauded the choice, saying it demonstrated McCain’s commitment to spending reform.
Left-leaning Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), however, called the pick risky. They noted Palin is under investigation for her alleged involvement in the dismissal of an Alaska public safety official. The investigation centers on whether Palin was involved in firing the official for not dismissing her sister’s former husband, a state trooper, after their messy divorce.
TCS, which is non-partisan and will not back either candidate in the race for the White House, for years has called for major reforms of Congress’s earmarking process and hammered Alaska GOP members of Congress for championing the now-notorious “bridge to nowhere.” The bridge became a national symbol of pork-barrel spending.
“The fact that the bridge to nowhere came up in her acceptance speech has shown that reform is going to a major theme in McCain’s campaign,” said Taxpayers for Common Sense’s Steve Ellis. “She killed the bridge to nowhere and certainly has shaken up the establishment in Alaska. Her selection shows that Sen. McCain is serious about talking about spending and earmarks as an issue and is going to run on a reform platform.
The $398 million bridge would have connected Ketchikan, on one island in southeastern Alaska, to its airport on another nearby island.
Palin rejected the money and directed the state transportation department to find a more “fiscally responsible” alternative.
She also encouraged her lieutenant governor, Sean Parnell, to launch a GOP primary challenge of Rep. Don Young (Alaska), who has served as the state’s lone House representative for 35 years. The primary took place earlier
this week and Young is up just 150 votes over Parnell.
CREW’s Melanie Sloan said the jury literally is still out on whether Palin is a committed reformer, considering the investigation into her role in the firing of the official is ongoing.
“It’s very possible that her entire reputation as a reformer will be undercut if it’s found that there’s anything to these allegations that she abused her office,” Sloan said. “That could be a very big problem for John McCain. If you have a reputation as a reformer, you are not the person who can afford to screw up.”
If it weren’t for the investigation, Sloan said Palin’s reform message would be untarnished.
“She’s done some impressive things,” Sloan said. “She’s not exactly the same old business as usual. She’s not part of the Corrupt Bastards’ Club.”
According to FBI search warrants executed against several Republican Alaska state legislators, the Corrupt Bastards Club was the nickname 11 legislators (including the son of indicted Alaskan GOP Sen. Ted Stevens) used to jokingly refer to themselves.
Stevens offered a resounding endorsement of Palin on Friday.
August 30th, 2008 at 4:19 am
FYI
Pick Of Palin Sets Up Battle For Female Voters
NPR-On his 72nd birthday, John McCain gave the nation a surprise, choosing a 44-year-old running mate whose biggest job so far has been to serve as governor of Alaska for two years.
But the relatively unknown Sarah Palin has a reputation that is a good fit with McCain’s. She is a social conservative and known as a government reformer who has bucked her own party.
McCain called her a “trailblazer” who rejects “wasteful pork-barrel spending.”
“She’s fearless,” he said. “Exactly the type of leader I want at my side and the type of leadership we will bring to Washington.”
Palin is only the second woman picked for a spot on a major-party ticket. In 1984, Democrat Walter Mondale chose former New York Congresswoman Geraldine Ferraro as his running mate. They lost to Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush.
McCain’s choice means that the 2008 presidential race most likely will produce a historic result: the first African-American president or the first female vice president.
Beauty Queen, Hockey Mom
Palin was elected in 2006 over former Alaska Gov. Tony Knowles. Before that she had been a member of the City Council and then mayor in the town of Wasilla, where she was known for being friendly to business and cutting property taxes. She also tried to root out corruption as the head of the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission.
Born in Idaho, Palin was raised in Alaska. She attended the University of Idaho and then returned home to marry her high school sweetheart, Todd Palin. She’s telegenic — no surprise, since she was once a contestant in the Miss Alaska beauty pageant. But she’s now a self-described hockey mom with five children. The eldest is in the Army and about to deploy to Iraq. She gave birth to her youngest in April, a boy with Down syndrome.
Obama Campaign Reacts
While the McCain campaign has hammered Democratic nominee Barack Obama as inexperienced, the Obama campaign says that the pick of Palin takes the experience issue off the table.
“Today, John McCain put the former mayor of a town of 9,000 with zero foreign policy experience a heartbeat away from the presidency,” Obama campaign spokesman Bill Burton said in a prepared statement. “Governor Palin shares John McCain’s commitment to overturning Roe v. Wade, the agenda of Big Oil and continuing George Bush’s failed economic policies …”
Taking a softer approach, Barack Obama and Joe Biden sent their congratulations to Palin and her family, adding: “It is yet another encouraging sign that old barriers are falling in our politics … Gov. Palin is an admirable person and will add a compelling new voice to this campaign.”
What Palin Brings To The Ticket
Palin has appeal for both economic and social conservatives. She opposes abortion rights and same-sex marriage, and she’s a lifelong member of the National Rifle Association.
For all those reasons, Mathew Staver, dean of the law school at Liberty University (which was founded by the Rev. Jerry Falwell), called the selection of Palin “absolutely brilliant” and said that Palin “will connect with values voters.”
Palin is also a strong advocate of oil and gas drilling and backs a project to build a pipeline that would send Alaskan natural gas to the lower 48 states. So McCain can say he has a running mate who is already working on making the United States less dependent on foreign oil. Palin also supports drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, which McCain does not.
And Palin’s biggest asset may be attracting female voters. When McCain presented her Friday at a rally in Dayton, Palin noted that the 88th anniversary of women’s suffrage was observed earlier in the week. She also paid tribute to Ferraro.
The McCain campaign has been actively courting women who supported Hillary Clinton during the primaries. So Palin saved her highest praise for Clinton for putting “18 million cracks” in the glass ceiling — one for each of the votes Clinton won in the primaries (and a phrase heard often at the Democratic convention earlier in the week).
Palin added: “Women in America aren’t finished yet and we can shatter that glass ceiling once and for all.”
A Hint Of Scandal?
When McCain introduced Palin, he described her as “squeaky clean.” She is under investigation, however, to determine if she used undue influence in trying to fire a state trooper. He happened to be going through a messy divorce from her sister at the time.
Analysts Weigh In
“It was certainly a surprising pick,” says Dan Schnur, who served as McCain’s communications director during the Arizona senator’s 2000 presidential campaign.
It’s the sort of pick, he says, that you would expect when a candidate is “behind 10 or 15 points in the polls.”
But with McCain and Obama running neck and neck, most analysts would anticipate a safer choice. “So it seems the senator and his advisers aren’t as confident” as they might be, Schnur says.
Chris Lehane, a Democratic consultant who worked in Bill Clinton’s White House, compares the pick to “an Internet stock gamble — very high-risk and (potentially) very high-reward.”
It could pay off, he says, if the race is very close and white, working-class women who supported Clinton in the primaries are drawn to Palin.
But the Palin pick “undermines the central thesis of the McCain campaign,” says Lehane — that Barack Obama is not ready to be president — by “putting someone a heartbeat away from the presidency … who has been in office less time than McCain was in a POW cell.”
Schnur agrees that the McCain campaign has apparently decided to downplay the “lack of experience argument,” noting that Hillary Clinton tried it during the primaries without success.
August 30th, 2008 at 6:23 am
Hoads
I am not debating policy; I am just debating the logic. Palin was clear she is going after the 18 million women who noted for Hillary. Help me understand why you think a female democrat will vote for a pro-life woman with no exceptions and is for teaching creationism in the schools?
August 30th, 2008 at 8:10 am
John,
Read your post again. Palin is not advocating teaching creationism. She is supporting that creationism can be discussed in the classroom if the discussion is student initiated.
Palin will resonate with a wide variety of voters, not just women. She has proven herself to be a an ethics bulldog who has taken on her own party as well as corporations in Alaska. She is the quintessential “Supermom” and will be keen on parenting issues from baby through teenagers which might help her connect will a wide age range of mothers.
She is so impressive that I believe her competency and willingness to tackle government status quo will be enough to motivate some pro-choice women into supporting such a admirable woman.
August 30th, 2008 at 12:57 pm
“Palin’s resume is miles ahead of Obama’s and she has proven herself to be a true reformer and has the record to prove it–not just oratory platitudes”
Hoads, I live in Wasilla, Alaska. Palin used to be our Mayor. Our most recent claim to fame here in Wasilla is that we are getting a new Target store next month (oh hooray!).
Please do tell me how her resume is miles ahead of Obama.
August 30th, 2008 at 2:43 pm
Palin must have done something right as mayor of Wasilla to go on to become the the Ethics Commissioner of the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission and then onto become the state’s govenor.
Do elaborate on Obama’s accomplishments in public office or even as “community organizer”.
August 30th, 2008 at 4:14 pm
hoads
Why do you think Hillary supporters will support this ticket?
August 30th, 2008 at 4:31 pm
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2008/08/hillary_supporters_and_sarah_p.html
“Hillary supporters and Sarah Palin: a first indication
Clarice Feldman
A poster at JOM just posted this and I want to share it with you:
That hillaryclintonformum.com site is still closed to lurkers, and last time I was there I saw at least 400 comments, probably many more, 99% whooping and cheering Palin, promising to donate, volunteer, and vote Republican for the first time in their lives. There were several comments about Rice and Powell, excoriating the Dems for hypocricy for ever having accused Republicans of being racists and sexists, professing the realization that it’s the Dems that are the real bigots, etc., etc. Truly a sight to see.
Posted by: Extraneus”
And I think Palin is going to get a fair share of male and female independents who have been sitting on the fence.
August 30th, 2008 at 10:04 pm
Gee, hoads, you must really be in the loop.
I never even saw the story that says Gov. Palin had evidence from prenatal testing that her child would be born with Downs Syndrome.
Wow, you are really tuned in.
.
.
.
(Or, did you just make that up?)
August 30th, 2008 at 10:30 pm
I’m sayin’ that fending off attack by your opponent is a LOT different than advancing your issues. (((Scandals)))
Also, you blunt your own attack when ou can be accused of using the same tactics as your opponent. (((the Jimi Hendrix EXPERIENCE issue )))
Gene Out !!
August 31st, 2008 at 1:22 am
From Wikipedia
“…
After four years in New York City, Obama moved to Chicago to work as a community organizer for three years from June 1985 to May 1988 as director of the Developing Communities Project (DCP), a church-based community organization originally comprising eight Catholic parishes in Greater Roseland (Roseland, West Pullman, and Riverdale) on Chicago’s far South Side.[11][13] During his three years as the DCP’s director, its staff grew from 1 to 13 and its annual budget grew from $70,000 to $400,000, with accomplishments including helping set up a job training program, a college preparatory tutoring program, and a tenants’ rights organization in Altgeld Gardens.[14] Obama also worked as a consultant and instructor for the Gamaliel Foundation, a community organizing institute.[15] In mid-1988, he traveled for the first time to Europe for three weeks then Kenya for five weeks where he met many of his Kenyan relatives for the first time.[16]
Obama entered Harvard Law School in late 1988 and at the end of his first year was selected as an editor of the Harvard Law Review based on his grades and a writing competition.[17] In his second year he was elected president of the Law Review, a full-time volunteer position functioning as editor-in-chief and supervising the law review’s staff of 80 editors.[18] Obama’s election in February 1990 as the first black president of the Harvard Law Review was widely reported and followed by several long, detailed profiles.[18] He graduated with a Juris Doctor (J.D.) magna cum laude from Harvard in 1991 and returned to Chicago where he had worked as a summer associate at the law firms of Sidley & Austin in 1989 and Hopkins & Sutter in 1990.[17][19]
…”
He then went on to spend 7 years as a state legislator in Illinois, then on to become a U.S. senator.
He also came out on top after a very tough primary season with Clinton as an opponent.
He’s pulled himself from humble beginnings, and has fought his way to where he is today.
Palin “won” the VP slot because she fits the target demographics that the GOP is looking for. How nice. She herself benefitted from a 3-way primary race to become governor. Murkowski was extremely unpopular, and the other candidate was a relatively unknown businessman from Fairbanks. She did not win by a landslide.
As for Palin getting appointed to a commission. Big whoop! You know how many other political hacks get appointed to boards and commissions? A lot. In fact most commissioners are political hacks. You get appointed based on your party affiliation, not on your competency.
And how hard do you think it is to become mayor of a town like Wasilla? I worked with the wife of the mayor of Willow (the next town over). He’s an idiot. Would you like his phone number, just in case you need someone else to place in a national office?
August 31st, 2008 at 12:17 pm
Not sure why that last post showed up as anonymous?
August 31st, 2008 at 12:58 pm
FYI
Sarah Palin’s mother-in-law uncertain about how she’ll vote
BY NANCY DILLON
DAILY NEWS WEST COAST BUREAU CHIEF
WASILLA, Alaska - Sarah Palin’s hometown rallied around her as mayor - now Republicans wonder if the rest of America will warm up to the surprise pick from cold country.
Though her mother-in-law has doubts.
Faye Palin admitted she enjoys hearing Barack Obama speak, and still hasn’t decided which way she’ll vote.
“We don’t agree on everything. But I respect her passion,” she said. “Being pro-life is who Sarah is.”
Faye Palin said the governor never considered ending her recent pregnancy when genetic testing showed her son Trig, born in April, would have Down syndrome.
“There was no question,” she said. “She was going to have that baby.”
With a population of just 6,715, Wasilla is a fast-growing railroad town that got its start as a mail and supply hub linking the coastal towns of Seward and Knik to Alaska’s interior mining camps along the Iditarod dog sled trail.
Scores of reporters descended Saturday on the A-frame wood hunting lodge where Sarah Palin’s parents live amid hundreds of sets of trophy antlers and a taxidermy collection that includes a giant moose head and a full-grown mountain lion.
PHOTOS: SEE MORE OF SARAH PALIN
Faye Palin said the entire family was shocked by the news on Friday.
“I’m not sure what she brings to the ticket other than she’s a woman and a conservative. Well, she’s a better speaker than McCain,” Faye Palin said with a laugh. “People will say she hasn’t been on the national scene long enough. But I believe she’s a quick study.”
She said people doubted Sarah Palin when she ran for City Council, but that her daughter-in-law had a “singular focus.”
“She was out there with [then-young son] Track, pulling him around from house to house in a wagon,” she said.
Sarah Palin is well known as a former high school basketball star, cross-country runner, beauty queen, hockey mom, city council member and Wasilla’s mayor from 1996 to 2007.
“I think it’s great. She’s a hometown girl from Smallville, USA,” said Felix Bruno, 43, a masonry contractor who plowed her driveway. “She’s not afraid to speak her mind. She really dropped the hammer on the politicians fleecing Alaska.”
At the local Mat-Su Family Restaurant in downtown Wasilla, a Bible-study group that includes two ex-mayors from neighboring cities cheered her pick as McCain’s running mate.
“She’s an excellent social conservative, fiscal conservative and political conservative,” said Tom Baird, 68, a Vietnam veteran who sat with his Gideon Bible opened to 1Corinthians. “If she can energize the conservative base, it won’t matter if she gets the women’s vote.”
“This is a really nice person, and she’s disarming in that way,” said George Carte, 67, a retired geophysicist who was mayor of neighboring Palmer when Palin was mayor of Wasilla.
“I was very impressed with her as mayor,” said Carte. “She did some housecleaning with her department heads. She had to learn about the sewers, the libraries, public safety.”
But even with her impressive approval rating, Palin still has work to do even in her own hometown.
“I’m still leaning toward Obama. I think Sarah has been really good for our state, and it would be wonderful to see her in the White House, but she’s on the ticket with McCain, and I can’t vote for McCain,” said Eileen Moe, 33, a second grade teacher at Iditarod Elementary, which Palin’s kids attended.
“If it was her running for president, there’d be no question in my mind,” Moe said. “The Republicans right now are about big business and big oil. I don’t see Sarah as a staunch Republican in that way.”
Not everyone is convinced her experience as mayor and governor are enough for a vice president who would be next in line to the presidency.
“I wouldn’t say she’s qualified,” said Bill Gleason, 60, a contractor from nearby Big Lake. “I want someone with a little more experience. “
August 31st, 2008 at 1:00 pm
FYI
2 Top Alaska Newspapers Question Palin’s Fitness
HP-Since yesterday’s shocking arrival of Gov. Sarah Palin as John McCain’s running mate there has been the usual cable news and print blathering about the pick from those who know little about her. But what about the journalists close to home — in Alaska — who know her best and have followed her career for years?
For the past 24 hours, the pages and web sites of the two leading papers up there have raised all sorts of issues surrounding Palin, from her ethics problems to general lack of readiness for this big step up. Right now the top story on the Anchorage Daily News web site looks at new info in what it calls “troopergate” and opens: “Alaska’s former commissioner of public safety says Gov. Sarah Palin, John McCain’s pick to be vice president, personally talked him on two occasions about a state trooper who was locked in a bitter custody battle with the governor’s sister.
“In a phone conversation Friday night, Walt Monegan, who was Alaska’s top cop until Palin fired him July 11, told the Daily News that the governor also had e-mailed him two or three times about her ex-brother-in-law, Trooper Mike Wooten, though the e-mails didn’t mention Wooten by name. Monegan claims his refusal to fire Wooten was a major reason that Palin dismissed him. Wooten had been suspended for five days previously, based largely on complaints that Palin’s family had initiated before Palin was governor.”
A reporter for the Anchorage daily, Gregg Erickson, even did an online chat with the Washington Post, in which he revealed that Palin’s approval rating in the state was not the much-touted 80%, but 65% and sinking — and that among journalists who followed her it might be in the “teens.” He added: “I have a hard time seeing how her qualifications stack up against the duties and responsibilities of being president…. I expect her to stick with simple truths. When asked about continued American troop presence in Iraq, she said she knows only one thing about that (I paraphrase): no one has attacked the American homeland since George Bush took the war to Iraq.”
His paper found a number of leading Republican officeholders in the state who mocked Palin’s qualifications. “She’s not prepared to be governor. How can she be prepared to be vice president or president?” said Lyda Green, the president of the State Senate, a Republican from Palin’s hometown of Wasilla. “Look at what she’s done to this state. What would she do to the nation?”
Another top Republican, John Harris, the speaker of the House, when asked about her qualifications for Veep, replied with this: “She’s old enough. She’s a U.S. citizen.”
Dermot Cole, a columnist for the Fairbanks paper, observed that he thinks highly of Palin as a person but “in no way does her year-and-a-half as governor of Alaska qualify her to be vice president or president of the United States.
“One of the strange things Friday was that so many commentators and politicians did not know how to pronounce her name and had no clue about what she has actually done in Alaska….I may be proven wrong, but the decision announced by McCain strikes me as reckless. She is not prepared to be the next president should something happen to McCain.”
UPDATE: On Sunday the top story on the Anchorage paper’s site carried the headline, “Palin touts stance on ‘Bridge to Nowhere,’ doesn’t note flip-flop.” The Fairbanks paper has an article and a column on the same theme.
From the Saturday editorial in the Daily News-Miner in Fairbanks:
Sen. John McCain’s selection of Gov. Sarah Palin as his vice presidential running mate was a stunning decision that should make Alaskans proud, even while we wonder about the actual merits of the choice…. Alaskans and Americans must ask, though, whether she should become vice president and, more importantly, be placed first in line to become president.
In fact, as the governor herself acknowledged in her acceptance speech, she never set out to be involved in public affairs. She has never publicly demonstrated the kind of interest, much less expertise, in federal issues and foreign affairs that should mark a candidate for the second-highest office in the land. Republicans rightfully have criticized the Democratic nominee, Sen. Barack Obama, for his lack of experience, but Palin is a neophyte in comparison; how will Republicans reconcile the criticism of Obama with the obligatory cheering for Palin?
Most people would acknowledge that, regardless of her charm and good intentions, Palin is not ready for the top job. McCain seems to have put his political interests ahead of the nation’s when he created the possibility that she might fill it.
And from the editorial in the Anchorage Daily News:
It’s stunning that someone with so little national and international experience might be heartbeat away from the presidency.
Gov. Palin is a classic Alaska story. She is an example of the opportunity our state offers to those with talent, initiative and determination…
McCain picked Palin despite a recent blemish on her ethically pure resume. While she was governor, members of her family and staff tried to get her ex-brother-in-law fired from the Alaska State Troopers. Her public safety commissioner would not do so; she forced him out, supposedly for other reasons. While she runs for vice-president, the Legislature has an investigator on the case.
For all those advantages, Palin joins the ticket with one huge weakness: She’s a total beginner on national and international issues.
Gov. Palin will have to spend the next two months convincing Americans that she’s ready to be a heartbeat away from the presidency….
August 31st, 2008 at 1:30 pm
hoads, I’m terribly sorry, you were correct.
Palin’s qualifications are quite impressive…
August 31st, 2008 at 5:40 pm
This is how I see the election. This reminds of the time when Bill Clinton beat Bush 1. We had a huge spending problem and Ross Perot did a great job educating the public about the issue. Had he not put such a scare in both parties we would have never seen reforms like PAY/GO had he not run. That is why I am supporting Bob Barr, I am hopping this will put a scare into both parties.
I heard all damage BS if Bill Clinton won and any objective person can not dispute he did a better job than Bush. This coming from someone he never voted for him and has been extremely critical of Clinton. Why do any of you think voting for the same BS will change anything? The GOP only changed when enough of us said enough is enough!
September 1st, 2008 at 12:33 am
Bill Clinton gave us 9/11. And “did a better job that Bush”? Hardly, Clinton was lucky to ride on the coattails of Reaganomics at the same time as the technological revolution. He won because of Perot and knew it. That’s why he tempered his platform and obliged to Republican sponsored welfare reform, that is–after he raised taxes after promising not to and also gutted the military. Clinton floated through his Presidency with a complicit media and left the country in a recession at the end of his terms which George Bush not only successfully combatted, but, also prevented another recession after 9/11.
September 1st, 2008 at 12:39 am
“Faye Palin said the governor never considered ending her recent pregnancy when genetic testing showed her son Trig, born in April, would have Down syndrome.
“There was no question,” she said. “She was going to have that baby.””
Did you catch that in post “18″ David O’ Rear?
September 1st, 2008 at 12:58 am
“which George Bush not only successfully combatted, but, also prevented another recession after 9/11.”
You’re nuts hoads.
Bush borrowed his way out of a recession. Plain and simple.
Anyone can create the illusion of wealth if they are given access to the national credit card.
September 1st, 2008 at 6:00 am
Captain is right Hoads!
“Bush borrowed his way out of a recession. Plain and simple.”
This is not conservative!