“Dan Quayle in a pantsuit.”
That’s what I thought the minute I found out that Sarah Palin will be the Vice Presidential nominee on the Republican ticket with John McCain. She’s young, she has been Mayor of a small town, and is now a first term governor – not a tremendously impressive resume.
But she’s also a woman, shoots a gun, and is pro-life.
This is blatant pandering at its worst, and a huge mistake for John McCain. John McCain’s biggest problem happens to be his age. Pairing up with an attractive forty-something is not going to solve this problem. The fear he needed to allay was the ability of the VP to step in should he become incapacitated, and he didn’t do that.
Back in 1980 Ronald Reagan was going up against an incumbent president. He was also one of the oldest people to be running for president. He picked his biggest adversary in the primary, George Bush (the good one, not this bozo), who had a laundry list of credentials as well as some youthful vitality. I know this because I was working for George Bush at that time. A standard campaign move during the primary was to get Bush out jogging with supporters as a way to contrast his vitality with Ronnie’s age without being overt about it.
Yet McCain’s pick takes away the biggest club the Republicans had against Barack Obama, the issue of experience. Sarah Palin has less experience than Obama does. How can Republicans play on the “3 AM call” against Obama when this woman is more inexperienced than he is? Republicans handed over the biggest trump-card they had gainst him.
What will it be like when you take profoundly experienced Joe Biden and pit Sarah Palin up against him in a debate? How will the foreign policy section of that debate go? I am not aware of any instability in the Bering Straits, where her knowledge base would come in handy.
Red meat Republicans will love her, for she’s on the “right side” of a host of issues including gun control and abortion. So three cheers to “Maverick” John McCain for pandering to that segment of the Republican party. They were either staying home or voting for you, John, they were not going to bolt to Obama anyway.
Will Palin’s gender really be enough to get the cattier shoulder pad feminists to cross over to the dark side and vote for McCain? I have to believe these women have more sense than that, but I will, of course, be thrilled if they do not.
I was personally rooting for a Joe Lieberman pick as a way to shake things up. It would have essentially eschewed the politics of extremism that pervades our national discourse as congressional redistricting makes safer and safer seats filled by evermore strident politicians who do not accurately reflect the mood of the country. It would have marginalized both the extremes in one fell swoop and hopefully created a working majority built from the center outward, rather than from one flank or the other. Lieberman was this moderate Republican’s dream.
Instead the old “Maverick” pandered to the far right while also trying to pander to women and, in the process, he ceded his strongest case against Obama.
In an earlier column, I said a race between Obama and McCain would be about ten years: we wish Obama had ten more years of experience, and we wish that McCain had ten years less. This VP pick does nothing to allay concerns about McCain’s ten years, while nullifying in part any ability to call attention to Obama’s ten years.
I have not been this personally disappointed since George the Good lost to Bill Clinton in 1992. McCain blew it with this pick.
As a conservative/secular Republican, I think it’s premature to declare Sarah Palin a brilliant or catastrophic choice for VP.
At this point in the campaign, I think Governor Palin is the least pernicious choice McCain could have made for VP, given the fact that McCain himself is out of favor with the GOP diehards of the far-right and absolutely no one else in or out of the GOP feels any strong preference for McCain personally over Obama, given McCain’s age and obvious debility.
Right now, Governor Palin’s strongest and weakest cards are the same, namely, that she is still almost completely unknown.
She has the power to use her record as an outsider, a reformist, and a non-hypocritical social conservative to redefine the GOP away from the Bush-Cheney mafia.
But on the other hand, she has to prove to the rest of America that she’s not the Taliban of the North when it comes to social issues and that her admittedly limited, if stellar, executive record does not mean she can’t be a quick learner on foreign policy.
But she’s not Dan Quayle. As I recall the 1988 election, Dan Quayle was regarded as unqualified even by committed Republicans.
It has yet to shown that Governor Palin’s executive experience makes her unqualified to be VP. Her job now is to convince Americans that, by character and executive record, she is in fact well-equipped to become Commander-in-Chief if need be.
A final note on ‘experience’: In 2000, Donald Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney were thought to have some of the best resumes in Washington, and, among Democrats in 1960, LBJ had accrued nearly 15 years in Congress when he became VP. But both Rumsfeld, Cheney, and LBJ had already turned into consummate Washington insiders when they got their final turn at bat, and as a result, their final record in the Executive Branch was nightmarish. So ‘experience’ in Washington is not always the most reliable litmus test.
These are just some thoughts. Perhaps Sarah Palin will prove her naysayers wrong.
Full disclosure: After I posted my above comment on Global Comment, I went on to post on the blog “Feministe” a further comment on Sarah Palin’s candidacy that is not as sanguine as my initial comment on GC.
On “Feministe,” I discuss the possibility that Palin’s candidacy might be intended as a plausible cover for covert white racists to vote GOP despite their discomfort with McCain’s age and debility. This further dimension to Palin’s candidacy occurred to me after I had posted my GC comment and went on to read the initial Feministe thread about Palin’s candidacy.
On further reflection, I have to say that I do find it depressing that Palin’s candidacy might be intended as a cover to allow for the playing-out of white racist voting patterns.
Both Democrats and Republicans, if they are to remain honest about the 2008 election, need to admit that white racial anxiety will very likely be the deciding factor in this election. So commenters about Palin’s candidacy should consider how her candidacy will affect and might be meant to affect the playing-out of white racist voting patterns. That’s how I see it, anyway.
Lest we not forget. My friend made this to remind me how bad it could be.
http://www.redux.com/playlist/dan_quayle_in_retrospect
I read Geoff Woollacott from a neighboring exurb and rarely agree with him. I do today, but with this further characterization of Sarah Palin: she is not Dan Quayle in a pantsuit – she is the wedge issues in a dress. She was recklessly picked to appeal to some women as “the woman,” and to most of the folks in western Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Michigan, swing states with conservative electorates that McCain has to win. She is a movement conservative with a (big) gun and a toothpaste smile, whom McCain can’t possible know because he only met her once before he met her again to choose her. Her governorship was won in the wake of a hugely unpopular incumbent and her present popularity is fed by the present prosperity of Alaskans who are getting energy rebate checks. She believes in creationism and not in our human influence on global warming. The laundry list of her regressive policy beliefs and limited world view is too long for this comment. How can the putative leaders of the free world be McCain who can’t use the internet and Palin who doesn’t believe in science? What foreign policy credibility is grounded on George Bush’s voting record, a Vietnamese POW camp,and the Alaskan national guard?
I fear for my daughters, and yours.
The news of the out-of-wedlock pregnancy of Sarah Palin’s 17-year-old daughter Bristol effectively ends Sarah Palin’s candidacy and probably John McCain’s as well.
McCain’s decision to drag a pregnant, unwed teenager into the national spotlight reveals appalling judgment as well as incredible callousness toward the welfare of the very vulnerable teenage mother and her fetus, since McCain was aware of Bristol’s pregnancy at least by the time he offered Sarah Palin the VP slot. The same can be said about Sarah Palin’s judgment and sense of responsibility for Bristol’s welfare.
Last night, on National Review Online, before news of the pregnancy, Sarah Palin was being marketed to ultraconservatives as though she were a contestant on American Idol. In light of the already-known-but-concealed pregnancy, the selection and marketing of Sarah Palin to ultraconservatives was not only reckless but unbelievably shallow. It will or at least should cost McCain his standing among ultraconservatives, unless they can tolerate being deliberately deceived about the character of both McCain and Sarah Palin as revealed in their treatment of a pregnant, unwed teenager.
As I hear the delegates and other republicans answer questions about Sarah Palin I am amazed how they rally behind her as “real” person. One with the same family issues as the average American. I wonder if they would be as magnanimous if it were Barak Obama with a pg teen daughter. Would the religious right demonize his family as heathens with out of control children with no family values and moral compass? You bet your sweet bippy they would. I find myself resenting this choice of running mate because we must have this conversation. We are farther away from having issues debates then we were six months ago. This has been a terrible set back for the election process.
I must also mention that Gov Palin seems to have a problem with good judgment when it comes to separating family and job. I refer to the birth of her infant son. In third trimester of a high risk pregnancy she decides to take for a conference far from home, flying for hours which has its own set of problems to health. Her water breaks and instead of seeking medical attention, gives her planned speech and spends 12 more hours flying back to Alaska. As the mother of 4 I can say this is not a risk I would taken for the wellbeing of myself or my unborn child. This shows a person driven by ambition and not family values.
Hey Sharri. Don’t have much love for Governor Palin either. But just to set the record straight: I’m pretty sure it was her amniotic fluid leaking, her water didn’t break. Her doctor even gave her the go-ahead. She’s a high-powered woman in a high-powered position, and sometimes tough choices do have to be made by someone like that, but the fact that she had her doctor make sure the situation was under control actually speaks volumes to her family values. Let’s not cut her down for a perfectly rational decision.
My problem with the woman? Her plans for our country are terrible. It’s as simple as that. Abstinence-only education, for example, doesn’t work, that much should be clear to all of us this week.
I am atually less upset with the pick the more I look at it. I still do not like it based solely on the “what happens if this 72-year-old dies?” question which this does not answer, but I am beginning to see some value to it.
First off, she is likely to resonate with a lot of working mothers. Not the shoulder pad feminist pioneers, necessarily, but those who have come after and understand the stresses of juggling family and a high powered job.
Secondly, she and her husband/family are far more down to earth (dare I say middle class?) than any of the other three candidates on the top of the ticket. This could very well help bring the so-called Reagan Democrats back over to the fold.
Thirdly, the press drastically over reached going after this story about her daughter, and I think it will backfire on the democrats. Obama was a class act in repudiating the inquisition of this kid, and for that he has my utmost respect. I have a hard time not getting infuriated with this one sided nature of the way these kind of things get covered. There was nary a peep about Edwards for months, yet this girl, this innocent bystander to the process gets feasted upon. Perhaps it is the glee of seeing those with the moral piety proven fallible, but it is still unfair to this kid. If you wonder why we don’t see more qualified people step forward for public office, you need look no further than this kind of crap, frankly.
Fourth, the pick allows him to play up the reform/outsider/Maverick issue to a fare thee well. Apparently he figured citing Obama’s thin qualifications wasn’t going to work or else why would he have ceded it? This woman seems fearless in terms of taking on the entrenched establishment, which McCain likes to think he does as well. I personally think this goes back to him being thrown under the bus in the Keating Five scandal as a relatively junior senator and only republican in the mix, and he hasn’t forgotten it.
I still do not like this pick from a succession stand point. I am, however, coming to at least understand what I think were some of the justifications for the pick from the powers that be.
Here is a new thought, perhaps, about the relevance of Sarah Palin’s parenting, John McCain’s vetting, and the cyber realities around us. I’m a mother of a teenaged daughter and a preteen daughter and we live in the American suburbs. In other words, we live in the gale force winds of the American high school and middle school culture and their subcultures, which include social networking sites and their pervasive reality.
What struck me as the Bristol Palin story has unfolded, is how disconnected both the Palin parents and the McCain campaign are from the power and accountability of the internet. Levi Johnston’s MySpace page was only found and made private sometime in the last 24 hours. Before that happened, the world got a indelible peek at his self-image as ”unprintable” redneck and boy not wanting children, along with the pictures to prove it. Those include this putative fiancé holding a gun, holding a bottle of some kind of whiskey and two girls, a frontal shot of his middle finger, and a bonus picture of what appears to be Bristol Palin inclining her tongue at another teenaged girl. Here is the link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ci1ILC4mtCI
Aside from the unhelpful commentary and imagery should Levi Johnston ever be a guest or a grandson in the McCain White House, the fact that I could find that information this Tuesday morning on the internet speaks volumes about McCain’s poor vetting and thus reckless behavior in not choosing wisely and well and in informed fashion about the attendant truths that Sarah Palin portages, wedge issues in a dress, Alaskan Independence Party, questions about abuse of office, deceptive pronouncements about her support for the bridge to nowhere, lack of belief in evolutionary science and climate science, and all.
That I could find the preview of coming attractions about Levi Johnston and Bristol Palin reflects also on Sarah Palin the mother, governor, and prospective VP – showing her to me as a parent and legislator who has little idea or perhaps concern about her daughter’s companions and behavior. Out here in the suburbs, we learned a while ago and quickly that MySpace pages, in particular, were public forums for private behavior better kept controlled, absolutely discussed, and certainly not easily and proudly broadcast to all and sundry on line. We learned that quickly because of the dangers to our kids and the parenting obligations that go with conscious and responsible child-rearing in 2008. It is, indeed, about judgment whether or not your child or his or her friends show and tell on MySpace. That is a conversation any functional and engaged parent should have with his or her child now. It is one of today’s real time parenting basics – for those working mothers, those Reagan Democrats, and all classes of parents, middle and otherwise. Even the local police department runs an internet safety and awareness program here, sponsored by the school district.
John McCain does not use the internet. Apparently that generational divide defines his campaign as well, to all our present detriment. Apparently Sarah Palin was not paying enough attention as a parent to her daughter. Levi Johnston’s MySpace page and the photo montage on YouTube tell me quite a lot about Sarah Palin’s judgment, too. And all of it confirms again what a reckless person John McCain is.
Wow. Exurban eye that seems like a rather scathing indictment of a family based on the wanderings of their teenage child.
There’s also a school of thought apparently espoused by Obama himself that children should be off limits a bit in presidential campaigns. Neither Bristol Palin nor Levi Johnston is running for office anymore than Chelsea Clinton was running in 92 or 96, or Amy Carter in 76 and 80 and on and on and on.
Harry Truman wanted to punch someone in the nose for saying his daughter Margaret was a horrible piano player.
I hardly consider it progress to think we are now tearing apart essentially a child facing a very difficult time in her life while the candidate has to stand there and take it. Would that more Trumanesque responses took place over these incredible invasions of privacy.
Mr. Woollacott,
Sarah Palin’s parenting and John McCain’s vetting are the focus of my observations, which lead to the bottom- line conclusion of John McCain’s recklessness. I write about adult responsibility, both parental and potentially presidential, not the kids’. These teenagers hold the spotlight on the parents, and the ill-considered and uninformed gamble John McCain took with them. If issues the McCain campaign and Sarah Palin parade as part of the Republican party platform as well as their photo ops are off limits – what will Republicans take responsibility for?
Breast-beating characterizing legitimate questions about candidates’ judgment as attacks on children sounds a tinny rhythm and does a disservice to all parents who are trying to navigate their way through the shoals of their children’s upbringing. When right-to-life conservatives and the McCain campaign celebrate teen pregnancy and the aftermath as a family value, yet can’t decry the skyrocketing teen pregnancy rate in the US and the vivid failure of abstinence-only sex education – they put their candidates’ judgment and values in the spotlight. When John McCain chooses this running mate after one meeting before the meeting where he asked her to be the vice-president pick and possible next president of the country where my children live, I beg the right from conservatives to call foul where I see it. If that foul involves Sarah Palin’s parenting skills and judgment along with John McCain’s, so be it. The issue again, as she herself has made plain by all that she has brought to the table with her this week, Bristol Palin and her possible son-in-law included, is John McCain’s political negligence. That malfeasance and utter lack of responsibility is, in fact, the progress that is really in question, and I think Harry Truman would rather agree. In the legendary acceptance of responsibility, he told us himself that “the buck stops here.”
So, then, every parent of a child who winds up with an unwanted pregnancy is therefore a bad parent and their fitness for public office should also be called into question? I realize it is delicious when the family values crowd winds up showing their less than perfect human side, but at what cost? When do we finally lay off.
How is the pregnancy a function of a candidate’s judgment?
I realize it’s highly unlikely we’re going to agree on much, but I think there’s ample issues to take with this nomination without having to drag this girl into it. Hammer her for her OWN record. Nail her for her lack of experience. Throw out the usual rhetoric about abortion rights. Go after her for her creationism.
Go after McCain, as I did, for not answering the valid question about succession with this neophyte. Insinuate it was a sign of his impetuousness.
I mean, it’s not like you have to search long and hard to find reasons why to take partisan shots at this candidate and the presidential candidate. It really doesn’t have to require stooping to focusing on her 17 year old daughter.
Time will tell, but if the Daily Kos Kool Aid drinkers do not throttle back on the daughter as Obama himself has requested, I am willing to bet the “issue” of this girl will play to Palin’s advantage.
I’d rather just see the kid left out of it.