The Palin Pick
One downside to waking up at around 3 PM EST is that the first two waves of the Palin blogcycle have already crashed past me. So I’ll just add a few thoughts.
One. From McCain, we always hear we’re living in such scary times. We have the “transcendent” threat of terrorism, “first…serious crisis internationally since the end of the Cold War” in Georgia, a resurgent China, proliferating Iran and so on and so forth. McCain – wrongly in my opinion – has convinced most Americans that he’s probably qualified at the base level for the job. Palin, the two year governor of a state with a population smaller than Austin, Texas and a legislature that’s only in session 90 days? (also, a state that doesn’t require much governing because of the welfare checks everyone gets) I mean, really, she’s the person you want a heartbeat away in such dangerous times? It shows that either A. McCain doesn’t take his own rhetoric seriously or B. McCain is totally unaware of the fact that the Vice President actually does stuff after the election. If we were really living in such transcendent times on the foreign policy front, McCain would have picked someone else.
Two. Will it get the disaffected Hillary supporters? I think McCain was probably going to get some portion of the HIllary voters, and Palin will probably only guarantee their split.
Three. How does the Obama campaign respond? I think this opens the door/demands they do two things. The first is finally start going after McCain on age. McCain is a 72 year old man with a history of cancer. There’s a nontrivial chance he’ll die in his first term in office. That means Sarah Palin is president.
Um, that means Sarah Palin is president. Is this a possibility anyone – especially Sarah Palin – considered until today? The other issue this opens up for Obama is the fact that John McCain is a pro-life zealot. You don’t get all the symbolic coolness of a female vice president while appointing judges that would overturn Roe v Wade. Nuh uh.
In the short term, however, I can’t help but think that this pick will work (ie, give McCain a bounce going into the convention). Palin is, in many ways, the opposite of McCain. She’s young, energetic and female where he’s old, craggy and male. Because of her thin political record in a state that doesn’t require much politicking, there really isn’t anything on her. There’s no set narrative against her, or old gaffes to bring up. We’ll see how this plays out, but I think in the long term, it reflects some desperation on McCain’s part, and a lack of seriousness about actually governing.
I guess I should direct you to more positive takes on the picks. Here’s Douthat and Noah Millman.
One final note: are we ready to have a first spouse with a mustache? The history of great men in the last 70 or so years has been one of clean faces. The only “great men” with facial hair have either been terrorists or totalitarian dictators (Hitler, Stalin, Osama, Saddam). So is Mr. Palin that, a totalitarian dictator terrorist? Or just an incredibly sleezy looking dude? I understand that as first-man of a 9,000 person hamlet or a 600,000 petro-state, it doesn’t really matter that he looks like a 1976-vintage middle reliever, but on the national stage? That could well be a deal breaker.
