Air America and the rest behave as if the Palin selection was made by McCain and was fatuous. In fact, there is evidence that it was neither.
When a mooncalf like this wanders along, look for unusual precedents and weird outcomes. Here are a couple:
a.) Robert Novak, Rove's favorite mouthpiece for leaks, retired two weeks ago, but in a command performance cameo, emerged last weekend from his creepy cancer crypt, to print a column about high level Republican opposition to Joe Lieberman. That's odd. We thought we were done with the traitor Novak...
b.) Republican insiders leaked that Rove is opposed to the Lieberman nomination. That's odd; heretofore insiders haven't leaked like this in McCain's campaign.
Hypothesis is that McCain wanted to go with Lieberman. Rove, who still runs the show through Steve Schmidt, opposed the choice because Lieberman is too liberal, too Jewish, still reeks of Democrat, and is not a vassal to Rove and his power structure. Anyway, it would be too mavericky.
Rove gets heavy with McCain. McCain, who is getting an ongoing Cosmo makeover into a prototypical rightwing tool because he is such an inept campaigner, objects. McCain starts saying CRAZY stuff like he wouldn't rule out a pro-choice running mate. That must have been one hell of a fight! With no other choice, Rove takes it to the streets (Novak), and probably threatens to pull his funding and his machine. After all, Rove is all geared up to win elections for old style candidates, not McCain's "new politics."
Rove prevails and McCain is forced to nominate the skirt [irony intended, not an ironed skirt], whom he had never personally met. Had Rove not won this, the band would have moved on, particularly after Rove engineered the 2006 fiasco.
Low and behold, today James Dobson announces he can now vote for the McCain anti-Christ because of Sarah Pain.
That chit was worked out in advance. Others will follow.
Why did Rove do this? He probably figured out that in addition to the 30% of knuckledraggers who support Bush no matter how badly he bumbles and fumbles, he can add the racist vote, and all he needs is his old Al Qaeda, base, to put McCain over the top in just enough districts to get the election.
Palin is a caribou in the headlights. If McCain dies, or become (more) senile by the age of 75, the GOP will have another puppet in the White House at the top of the ticket, a continuation of today's situation.
Like a run-over rattler, you don't know if the Rove snake is dead, even if it is lying low in a Fox hole. Don't count it out. All the more reason for Congress to go after him in September in l'affaire Siegelman.