Not to keep harping on things, but hey it’s worth making sure I’ve got everything out of my system so I don’t interrupt actual news by talking about it on a daily basis.
So we know the following about Sarah Palin. She’s a creationist, against gay marriage, she denies global warming, she’s got a bunch of corruption scandals, whatever. That’s a matter of policy and the odds of McCain picking anyone that wasn’t terrifyingly conservative were actually pretty low. It’s not like anyone thought we’d get some flaming liberal who wants out of Iraq pronto and supports diplomatic relations with Iran.
That all misses the real meat of the issue. Barack Obama famously said that he wanted someone who could be president right off the bat. He wanted someone not just to complement his candidacy, but who could take over if something catastrophic happened and Obama died or was otherwise unable to complete his term. Even if you don’t like the guy, there’s no real reason to think he couldn’t take over even if Obama’s motorcade crashed into a wall and exploded on inauguration day.
What we damn sure know is that McCain didn’t think this way. He met Palin twice prior to selecting her, we’ve already pointed out her total lack of experience, and amazingly the McCain campaign is admitting it. Charlie Black recently said, that Palin is “going to learn national security at the foot of the master for the next four years, and most doctors think that he’ll be around at least that long.”
Did we catch that? They’re out and out admitting that she has to learn national security, and are banking on McCain living “at least” four more years. Not to mention, who are these “most” doctors? Are some saying he won’t? Holy crap.
The point is that McCain doesn’t know the woman, she’s got no experience and the campaign isn’t even pretending she does. McCain picked a running mate, someone to help him get elected. Apparently the plan is to have her sit by like an intern and just kinda “learn” until she gets the ins and outs of the job. They’re admitting she’s not ready and needs “on the job training”.
The real shame is that the pundits and talking heads are talking about how this was a great move. It was… for that day. It was a slick PR move, a nice play of the media, but that’s all. Purely political. I wonder what they think is going to happen if McCain wins.
McCain’s “strategy” is so laughably transparent, it’s almost surreal.
I can barely wait to see this race unfold over the next few months – I surely do hope Obama’s campaign grows some balls so they can properly exploit the dog-and-pony show the Right’s putting on.
I’m so very very glad Obama didn’t pick Hillary for VP – she’d be so much more effective as Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare.
Obama put his country first when he picked Biden, McCain put his campaign first