Politics Ahead: Palin

On the web the reaction to McCain's pick of Sarah Palin was negative, to say the least.

                                                      

An alarming amount of it seems to boil down to geographical elitism. Palin is the Governor of Alaska, of course, and Alaska is a good distance from both New York and Los Angeles. Heck, Alaska is so far away that the folks in 'flyover country' safely scoff at its importance to the realm.

But here's a nifty fact. As a tactical decision an Alaskan VP candidate is no better or worse than one from Delaware. Both are states with a mere three electoral votes and both are solidly in hand for their respective parties. In broad terms, neither pick was a bold move to secure a battleground.

The difference, of course, is that Obama felt compelled to play it safe with Biden while McCain used his 'maverick' card to shake up the game.

Palin isn't an 'unknown'. I've heard of her before from a friend of mine up in Alaska, and if you've paid attention to such things her name's come up before when discussing the future of the party.

She is shy on (elected) political experience, which would seem to negate many of the common attacks that can be leveled at Obama. But it's a double edged sword. Attack her inexperience to any great degree and you risk opening yourself to the same debate. A bald man can't ridicule another's hair without the lack of his own being called into question; I think it would take an imaginative amount of double-talk to convince America that Palin's inexperience is bad while Obama's is okeedokee.

Is she a 'hail mary' to entice Clinton voters to crossover? Bleh. Stop and think for a moment. In 1984 when Ferraro was chosen America was abuzz at the thought of a female VP. In 2008 Palin's gender was an afterthought in the media. That's progress, people, and I don't believe for a second the GOP mistook this for 1960 and thought Palin would bring in the ladies in droves just because she had a womb.

No, she was chosen to counteract McCain's perceived liberal slant. Let the Democrats ridicule or scoff at her appeal to conservatives - they aren't the intended audience. The woman is great looking, superbly confident, a hunter and gun rights advocate, married to a blue-collar fisherman and the mother of five.

Not only is she pro-life but she practices what she preaches, carrying her youngest to term knowing the baby had Downs Syndrome. [shame on the Dems who spread rumours the baby wasn't hers. Nice ethics there. Obama's correct in saying whoever might have spread the lie should be fired on the spot]. The news yesterday that her 17 year old daughter was pregnant will only increase Palin's appeal. Need proof? I just googled the news and found this on CNN:

Before, they were excited about her, with the Down syndrome baby," conservative, anti-tax activist Grover Norquist said. "But now with this, they are over the moon. It reinforces the fact that this family lives its pro-life values."

 This seems to fluster the hell out of my liberal friends who find it hypocritcal and evidence of a flawed philosophy. I disagree vehomently, but in the end, who cares? Liberal democrats are not the target audience here, and they need not concern themselves in the matter.

Lastly, win or lose Palin's nomination (knock on wood) brings a viable, charasmatic young face to the attention of the GOP faithful. With luck, the world was just introduced to the next generation of GOP leaders. In other words, this may be a stategic move that echoes across the next decade.

We'll see.

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I'm not going to spend much time on it, but I think the Democratic Convention was a bust.

I don't care how pretty their speeches were, two nights devoted to the Clinton's was too much. No way they are truly behind Obama. A) they actually, personally, like McCain and agree with many of his politics, hence conservative skepticism of McCain B) the venom for Obama did not disappear magically from Bill's mind overnight and c) if Obama wins, HRC is out of action for eight years minimum. The speeches were a political neccessity to secure DNC support in the future, nothing more - and oratory skills be damned, I think that came through.

Then everyone and their mother treaded lightly on attacking McCain, and when they did they prefaced it by honoring his patriotism, his POW experience and his dignity. Well, fiddledeedoo, if you like him so much why shouldn't I vote for him? They should have had their fangs bared the whole time.

Lastly, the Temple of Obama set, complete with a stadium crowd, was much more than a lame blogger barb. Honest to God, I've heard people, good sane decently educated people, jokingly reference the Book of Revelation and the warnings about the Anti-Christ. Again, they were joking, but the adoration has obviously crossed the line. Bring him back down to earth or risk the election; people may spend a lot of time worshipping their gods, but to my knowledge they've never bothered voting for one.

Partisan bias? Go take a look at the polls that show no typical-post convention bump for Obama. Some of that was the (underrated) choice of Palin, but even then it wouldn't have happened if the DNC had done their job right.

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It was a good and noble idea to delay the GOP convention with Gustav lurking in the Gulf. Bully for them for making the call that screwed up 18 months of planning. And as I said in the first ever post on this blog, F Michael Moore. What an a**.

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I saw a bit of Herbert Hoover's speech at the 1960 GOP convention today on CSpan. I like Hoover and think he got a bum rap in history (his work post WWI, organizing food donations for millions of starving people, was worthy of respect even if he'd never been elected to office).

Still, what a boring and lifeless speech. It would never, ever fly in this day and age.