So John McCain picks Alaska Governor Sarah Palin as his Vice-Presidential nominee. I know nothing about her, so will suspend judgment. But she is a woman, which is fantastic. The U.S. will either have an African-American President or a female Vice-President, which is the kind of history that should have been made long ago; so kudos to McCain for his courage in making that choice.
Beyond that, there are just a few tidbits that seem to be trotted out in all the stories about Palin. She is very firmly pro-life. Unless you are a polar bear. She is in favor of domestic partnerships, although against gay marriage (which puts her in the official Democratic position). She’s been embroiled in some sort of scandal, although it’s always hard to tell at first glance how serious those things should be taken. Perhaps her signature issue, as far as national politics is concerned, is drilling for oil all over the place — she’s in favor.
One might wonder whether McCain undermines his message of the importance of experience by picking a 44-year old governor with no national experience at all. But one might wonder whether Obama undermined his message of bringing change to Washington by choosing a white male Washington lifer from the Northeast; so clearly the McCain camp thought this was worth the risk. We might learn terrible or wonderful things about her in the next few months, but for the moment this seems superficially like a more palatable pick than any of the bigger Republican names that had been floating around — clearly it was in McCain’s eyes. (Brad DeLong wonders whether a similar line of reasoning didn’t leave us with Dan Quayle twenty years ago.)
Update: I originally included a link to this YouTube video of Palin making Craig Ferguson an honorary citizen of Alaska, which I think speaks to her sense of humor. But it also involves Ferguson making jokes about her giving off a sexy librarian vibe, which is fine in the context of a late-night comedy show, but isn’t a fair first impression for a female candidate for a major national office. All sorts of jokes will doubtless be on their way, we might as well make some meager effort to start things off with more substantive considerations.
Update again: Because I don’t know anything about Palin, I’ve tried to be open-minded about the pick. But 24 hours later, the obvious first conclusion to which one is tempted to jump appears increasingly correct: this is a person who has no business being anywhere near a national ticket. Sufficient evidence for this conclusion comes from the words of her supporters, along the lines of: Sure, she’s woefully underqualified, but in all probability John McCain will live for at least another four years! And if he doesn’t, we’re sure she will have the good sense to resign.
I wonder how many times she has visited Iraq to get the facts on the ground?
Obama a. correctly predicted the consequences of the Iraq war and b. his time table is now virtually official policy of the Bush administration after six years of “no timetables”.
Kos has a fascinating, scary, and apparently well-documented story about Palin’s connection to the Alaskan Independence Party. Watch the video in which the vice-chairman of AIP talks about “the necessity of infiltrating the major national parties in order to further the goals of the AIP.”
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/9/1/4231/18477/878/581881
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/9/1/104413/1025/735/582024
“Sarah Palin also fired a school chum of hers, who was a top aide… APPARENTLY FOR DATING THE WRONG PERSON.
John Bitney, who was in band class with Sarah Palin in school (insert ‘one time, in band camp…’ jokes here), served as a top adviser to Palin. One day, his work Blackberry stopped working. He called the office to see what was up, and found out he was fired.
Why?
Because Bitney was dating the separated wife of one of Todd Palin’s friends. That made Todd Palin angry.
So, Todd, who was said to sit in on government meetings, and cc’d on official emails, apparently pressured Sarah Palin to can her old and trusted friend.
Again, as in the case with Troopergate and DairyGate and the Police Chief firing in Wasilla, no charge was made that Bitney wasn’t doing his job well. The official word was that he “left” for “personal reasons.”
The Matanuska Maid Story
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/8/31/133347/773/467/581251
“Since my last diary, I’ve gleaned many additional details concerning Sarah Palin’s corrupt, fiscally irresponsible, and almost comical mismanagement of the last days of a failing Alaskan state-owned dairy. What I’ve learned has confirmed my worst suspicions. Matanuska Maid is no longer a mystery to me: it’s a scandal that shreds forever the myth of Sarah Palin as a government reformer and fiscal conservative.”
Okay, so I never comment here. But I have to say it: Don’t feed the trolls. It’s sad that they’ve found you, and if you want them to go away you really do have to starve them out and/or engage in active deletion of their comments.
Good luck!
Palin’s official stance on climate change is that she doesn’t believe in man-made global warming. Great.
Well, global warming will do wonders for Alaska, make it a garden state and all. Of course, I hope someone checks out her links with the Alaskan Independence Party (a group of far, far right nutjobs who want to secede from America and be their own nation). She voted for Buchanan, so that tells you something as well.
Palin’s unmarried daughter is five months pregnant. A knocked-up teenager is not a tragedy or particularly surprising, but the news is hardly an argument for her mother’s stand against sex education in high school.
AM, don’t expect an answer from Kurt. He is in fact hopelessly wrong on this as so many other posts he’s made in this thread.
I googled the entire quote and found that it’s not actually a quote from Palin. It was from a commenter on a blog who supports McCain/Palin and thinks that having a rabidly anti-choice president and vice president is OK because somehow magically it’ll all work out. Yeah. Right.
Apparently, Palin even rejects proper sex education (source: her Bio on Wikipedia) and promotes that middle-age minded abstinence program which actually seems to *foster* teen pregnancy, let alone STDs – hence the 17 y.o. pregnant daughter (poor thing).
That’s what you get for trusting 2000 year old superstitious beliefs to run a 21st century world. Or a desert religion to run Alaska, for that matter.
One of the things i love about the way Rove runs a campaign is best exampled by this pregnancy announcement. Palin is named VP candidate, various stories appear challenging the birth of the Down-syndrome child Trig (it seems more likely that the child is that of a 16 yr old Bristol given a large collection of circumstantial evidence). Rove minions denounce the stories (no official declaration by Palin, McSame or other leadership) in blogs and on Fox, then raise this story today about Bristol’s (2nd?) pregnancy. They (GOP/Rove cadre) claim this was necessary to rebut the lies of the first grandchild story. But at no point, so far, have any of them official denied the parentage of Trig. It is beyond denial of denial, but rather ad hominem attacks on bloggers while releasing this new story about a real pregnancy. How very clever to add a “planned” pregnancy to the campaign mix as a means of distracting negative publicity.
The claim that Sarah Palin isn’t Trig’s mother is false. Bristol Palin is currently five months pregnant, and Trig was born in April; you do the math. Even if it were true, it’s not the kind of thing we should be trafficking in, okay?
Re: Palin’s membership in the AIP
New GOP convention slogan
“Country or Alaska First” (your choice)
e.
Troy, #92
He is the Answerer,
What can be answer’d he answers. and what cannot be answer’d he shows
how it can not be answer’d
How can you say that Palin “balances career and family”. Anytime you leave your 4 month old for your own selfish career ambitions is horrible parenting especially since her downs syndrome baby needs stability to thrive. Her stupid stance on abstinence only education is exactly why she now has a pregnant 17 yr old. If being a parent too early isn’t bad enough lets compound the problem by being married tpo early. A vote for McCain/Palin is a vote against a womans right to choose (even in extreme situations like rape and incest). A vote against equal pay for woman and a vote to setback womankind 40yrs. No woman in her right mind should even consider this anything but pandering to female voters. John McCain doesn’t believe in affirmative action until it benefits him.
John F. Kennedy, Jr. was born just a few weeks after his father was elected to the presidency, but how come we don’t criticize JFK for his selfish career decisions?
Trust me guys, there are good reasons to go after politicians (policy stances come to mind, such as her stance on abortion), but their own personal decisions in parenting or the drama involving their children are not. Let it go.
Ed Brayton researches the Founding Father quotes from a Christian Heritage Proclamation issued by Palin last year.
Eagle Forum Alaska asked gubernatorial candidates in 2006 about various issues. Sarah Palin provided responses. She does not support sex education other than abstinence-only. She does not support abortion except with “a doctor’s determination that the mother’s life would end if the pregnancy continued.” That means no exception for rape, no exception for genetic abnormalities, no exception for non-lethal threats to the mother’s health. And you can judge Palin’s knowledge of history from her respone on the Pledge of Allegiance:
Q. Are you offended by the phrase “Under God” in the Pledge of Allegiance? Why or why not?
Palin: Not on your life. If it was good enough for the founding fathers, its good enough for me and I’ll fight in defense of our Pledge of Allegiance.
Considering Palin’s stance on sex education and abortion, I don’t think the GOP is going to get many Hillary supporters crossing over.
The sources that you linked in the second update reference sources that tend to be more liberal. I haven’t found any “supporters” making those comments. Some of the sources are The American Prospect, The Washington Monthly, Noah Millman (who states that Cheney was worst VP, Gore was best VP) all seem to be predominantly left-leaning.
Ultimately, when you get down to it … if actions speak louder than words, McCain has one-upped Obama..
Obama talked “change and bipartisanship” and picked a life-long member of the Senate, who has a history of alienating other members of congress. McCain is a self-appointed “maverick” who selected a woman VP with fewer ties to Washington than Obama.
Jason-
“While Mccain cant think for himself and relies on cue cards or a teleprompter to say anything intelligent.”
Are you serious? Look at Obama? Without his script, he is a bumbling idiot.
Not that he isn’t one WITH his script…..
obama should “one-up” Mccain and nominate a fetus to the supreme court.
anon-
what the hell is that supposed to mean?
Bri-
you are very sensitive.
actually it was directed at the one-upper @120
who thinks its a contest to nominate the person with
the least experience.
also a fetus on the supreme court would have useful
insights into roe v wade
i see the onion already beat me to it, as in
most of my jokes.
http://www.theonion.com/content/node/40512