Sarah Palin!

gdnp said:
Rather than debate her qualifications, perhaps someone who likes the pick could answer this: What is it that makes her a better choice than Kay Bailey Hutchison, Mitt Romney, Mike Huckibee, Joe Lieberman, or Tom Ridge?
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I don't really like the choice (right now) but I'm not ready to throw her under the bus and proclaim that she's a disaster like other people have. I think there were better choices for him like Hutchison or maybe even Jindal. Everyone else on that list was almost radioactive with a big target painted on them for the DNC to shoot at. The last thing McCain needs is another connection to Bush so Ridge is out. Huckabee was way too religious like I said before. Lieberman is an outcast basically. I think he wanted a combination of shock value, appeal to women voters, appeal to conservative base, and someone who wasn't a washington establishment person. I think he got some of it but like I said there were probably better choices. People just need to chill the **** out and lets see how things play out over the coming weeks.
 
not_so_new said:
I also think, while it sucks, it shows a mistake in judgement more than an overt attempt at dishonestly (which pretty much wraps up my feelings about McCain picking Palin as well).
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Whether it was a mistake in judgement (which I don't think it was, no one with 2 brain cells to rub together thought Stroger was a good choice. I have friends who are hard-core liberal Dems who actually voted for a Republican for the first time in their lives rather than vote for Stroger) or he still felt obliged to do the machine Dems bidding as payback for making him (more likely IMHO) it doesn't reflect well on him. He could have just sat out that race without endorsing anybody.

I think McCain chose Palin because she had a vagina, it was an attempt to get the pissed-off Hillary vote.
 
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Judgment....

Well, let's see... Palin's first act on a national stage was to identify the military unit in which her son serves, and the date and country to which that unit is deploying.

Beau Biden didn't even mention the reason why he won't be around in November.

Good job!
 
The Obama camp released a bizzare advert which appears to approve of Palin but reminds the viewers of McCain (With a female voice as the narration).

WildCat said:
I think McCain chose Palin because she had a vagina, it was an attempt to get the pissed-off Hillary vote.
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He presumably also chose her because it appeals to his 'maverick' image, an image that detaches him from an unpopular President. However, one can have too much maverick moments and simply begin to appear childish, picking someone he only met once before and thus toying with the serious matter of American Leadership.
 
senorpogo said:
Well, she has no political baggage (or little), she's easy on the eye, and she's a woman. She has the right credentials as far as the religious right does and that's a group McCain needs to win over.
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Are these really the qualities by which we should choose a vice president? She brings nothing of substance, nothing related to expected job performance? it's just that she looks good in a skirt and has fewer skeletons, based mostly on fewer time to accumulate them?

This is like choosing supreme court justices based on their lack of legal experience.

The more I think about it, Obama's was the courageous choice. He chose a person of substance despite a less than pristine past.

McCain chose a pretty face despite there being much better qualified alternatives, in a cynical attempt to blunt Obama's lead among women.

The early polls say this may be a miscalculation
 
This reminds me a little of when Bush tried to appoint his White House lawyer to the Supreme Court (Harriet somebody). We'll see if it has similar results. McCain 'decides' things a bit like Bush, but I'm not sure how far it goes. The 'gut feeling' decision style wins out over careful deliberations and vetting, but McCain is very clever, and this is his comfort zone.

Aside from the obvious surface characteristics (Alaska jokes that they have the coldest state and hottest Governor) a risk with Palin is that I don't see that her values have been strongly tested yet. People she will swear to represent and serve have not marched against her gates - yet. She could become a great President some day.

Importantly, she will get along well with McCain and temper some of his personality issues. He will think twice about getting in her face and being rude, and that is probably a good thing. And yes I can secretly hope that there will be a romantic scandal between them, but that's asking for too much. :)

I agree that this should squelch the 'inexperience' strategy. I suspect that McCain has not reasoned this choice out deeply, it is just his intuition. He works comfortably there but that does not mean he has thought through all the consequences.
 
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I think this shows he cares more about making a quick political point (if you can call it that) instead of thinking ahead for the good of his country.
 
Kopji said:
She could become a great President some day.
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She could become the worst president in history some day. There is little evidence to support either prediction

Importantly, she will get along well with McCain and temper some of his personality issues.
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And this is based on what? Someone else stated that he has only met her once. I have not seen any claims that they have any sort of personal relationship. I think it far more likely that he will use her to get elected and then send her off to attend funerals. She brings no particular expertise to the table that McCain could exploit.
 
gdnp said:
BA from Columbia, Law degree Magna cum laude from Harvard. Harvard law review. Harvard law review's first black president. Author. Law professor. Community organizer. Keynote speaker at 2004 Democratic convention. 18 million primary and caucus voters. Unprecedented fundraising ability. Several million new registered voters. Judgment. Leadership.

4 years in the Senate and 8 years in the Illinois legislature trumps 10 years of small town government and less than 2 running the 47th most populous state. Plus, Obama was vetted through an arduous primary process.
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Precisely.

Moreover, Obama has been running for the nomination/office for well over a year, and doing so against other Democrats (of course). Palin will be serving up her party's talking points for all of two months.
 
gdnp said:
Are these really the qualities by which we should choose a vice president? She brings nothing of substance, nothing related to expected job performance? it's just that she looks good in a skirt and has fewer skeletons, based mostly on fewer time to accumulate them?

This is like choosing supreme court justices based on their lack of legal experience.

The more I think about it, Obama's was the courageous choice. He chose a person of substance despite a less than pristine past.

McCain chose a pretty face despite there being much better qualified alternatives, in a cynical attempt to blunt Obama's lead among women.

The early polls say this may be a miscalculation
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Those are not good numbers for Mccain. And that poll was taken right out of the starting gate. They're treating her with kid-gloves now. That will end soon. Mccain better hope she's some kind of political phenom because the bloom will come off the rose as more and more people are made aware of her inexperience, ethical troubles, and rabid pro-life position (only 21% of people polled thought abortion should be illegal in cases of rape or incest http://pollingreport.com/abortion.htm).

All that, and Mccain has to abandon his best argument against Obama.
 
This troubles me:

Former House Speaker Gail Phillips, a Republican political leader who has clashed with Palin in the past, was shocked when she heard the news Friday morning with her husband, Walt.

"I said to Walt, 'This can't be happening, because his advance team didn't come to Alaska to check her out," Phillips said.
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Surely a good presidential candidate would exercise a great deal of due diligence in making his VP choice. Completely independently of Palin's qualification, McCain met with her once and his staff did not visit Alaska as part of the vetting process? Forget Palin, this speaks volumes about McCain's qualifications to be Prez. Do we want another bozo who is going to govern from his gut? Four more years, indeed.

ETA: After a couple minutes thought, I find I'm even more outraged. This displays a degree of carelessness that even I would not have imagined of McCain. WTF is too mild.
 
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Lisa Simpson said:
Another potential downside is that while she might attract working moms, stay-at-home moms are going to be put off by a woman who returned to work 3 days after giving birth to a disabled child.
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The story is Palin faked her pregnancy. The child belongs to Palin’s 16 year-old daughter. This explains why Gov. Palin returned to work early.

I guess you could call this scandal: Waterbreak.

http://www.gambling911.com/politics/sarah-palin-flew-more-3000-after-water-broke-082908.html
 
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SezMe said:
This troubles me:



Surely a good presidential candidate would exercise a great deal of due diligence in making his VP choice. Completely independently of Palin's qualification, McCain met with her once and his staff did not visit Alaska as part of the vetting process? Forget Palin, this speaks volumes about McCain's qualifications to be Prez. Do we want another bozo who is going to govern from his gut? Four more years, indeed.

ETA: After a couple minutes thought, I find I'm even more outraged. This displays a degree of carelessness that even I would not have imagined of McCain. WTF is too mild.
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I can think of only a couple of reasons he would not feel the need to check her out.
 
To no one's surprise I'm about to propose a conspiracy theory. McCain's team checks out Palin, finds she has a lot of negatives, but she represents conservative values, and of course she's a woman.

McCain picks her, perhaps convincing some women and disgruntled Hillary voters that McCain represents a new type of Republican. Bad stuff comes out about Palin. McCain has to pick someone else and goes with Romney, his first choice all along.

Just a frivolous hypothesis, but I'm with those who find it difficult to believe she was not properly vetted.
 
Cicero said:
About 5 million of the 18 million who voted for Hillary, whom Bill Clinton outrageously proclaimed at the convention as definitely voting for Obama, will most likely now vote McCain.
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Regnad Kcin said:
There you go again with your "proclaimed" inventions. I won't bother asking you to support it like last time ("Penn, Streisand have proclaimed 9/11 to be an inside job."). I just find it funny that you continue to contribute to a critical thinking forum. As if.
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Cicero said:
***"...Hillary told us in no uncertain terms that she'll do everything she can to elect Barack Obama. That makes two of us. Actually, that makes 18 million of us, because like Hillary I want all of you who supported her to vote for Barack Obama in November..."*** Willie Jefferson
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How refreshing. You actually backed up your statement with a quote.* Too bad it directly contradicts what you claim it says.

Judging by your posts, one would conclude it was a Sean Penn/Babs Streisand fan club forum. I'm thrilled you appreciate my contributions even though I am not a fan of your favorite Hollywood 911 "twoothers."
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You're about as fit to pass judgements and reach conclusions as Ms. Palin is to discourse on world affairs and matters of science.

*Care to retract your repeatedly unsupported lie that "Penn and Streisand proclaimed 9/11 to be an inside job?" No? What a surprise.
 
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