In retrospect, maybe McCain did vet the selection of Palin as his Vice Presidential nominee. And one thing is for sure: he made this year's election into a big circus, instead of an election that is based on Issues as Obama would have wanted. Obama must have been appalled at this turn of event and had to warn his supporters to "Back Off" (*Cough Dailykos Cough*).
I'm just repeating what many people have said here, but I just want to get it off my chest once and for all.
Of course, many of us took the bait and engaged in an endless effort to dig something out of Palin. And of course, if I were to point fingers to anyone, I would need to point it to myself first. But isn't it natural? She seemed so easy a target! 18 months of governorship of Alaska? ex-Mayor of an 8,000 population town? It all seemed like red meat and we're a bunch of hungry piranhas unable to contain themselves. We want to believe that McCain is an idiot. I STILL think that he's grossly incompetent. But we underestimate the enemy at our own peril. And we focus so much energy on non-issues to OUR candidate's dismay.
Remember, Obama wanted this election to become issue based, and a choice between the Changes he's seeking and McCain's policies. Instead, we saw a gazillion diaries on Palin's seemingly bizarre stories. Now, many of them are legitimate questions on her stances and some may be usable for attacks if we were akin to Karl Rove. But many were bordering on loony theories and an imagined qualities of governor Palin's policy thoughts.
Regarding loony theories, I'm not to claim that I'm without blame since circumstantial evidence could lead one to theories about conspiracies. But, again, it does not serve our candidate and it doesn't talk about issues. We can endlessly talk about her desires to secede Alaska from the US. We can endlessly talk about her daughter (BACK OFF!). But what media will take the story? Are we willing to risk making a narrative that Obama's supporters are a crazy fringe group bent on conspiracy theories for a story that might or might not have legs? Have we genuinely bought Obama's promise of change from politics as usual? Or do we insists that fire should be fought with fire, even if we stoop to their level.
And as for governor Palin's inexperience and our imagination on her policy thoughts, we truly underestimate her to our own peril.
Now, this is her thought on energy. We may disagree with her, but many would agree with her - that before new energy alternative arrives, the need for more oil is real. In our biased minds, we want to think that she's not smart with her "drill drill drill" comments. I want to believe that too but when I saw this clip, I concluded that she's smart and knows what she's talking about. In this clip, she appears to be moderate, articulate, and smart. In fact, I think that she's much brighter and articulate in ways that McCain could only dream of. We can insist to the contrary, but that only lowers the expectation from her. In fact, we still don't know if she has developed any thoughts on the myriads of issues on governing the United States. She may or may not have thoughts on Russian-Georgian conflict, or the subprime mortgage, or the leeves in New Orleans, or Colorado river's water distribution. However, if we insist that she's just an empty head that is relatively good looking, any semi-coherent babbling that she gave in interviews and the debate will make her seem like a policy expert. And we must not forget how the media could create narratives.
That we should stick to the issues I think is obvious to all of us. We must also respect her as who she is: a nominee for the vice-president's office. No matter what, she was chosen by the majority of Alaskans to become their governor. Even if all evidences show that McCain didn't vet her properly, we better assume that he did. It would be better for us to assume that she has a well developed thought on all issues and respond to her position on them (if any). Better for us to expect her giving a thoughtful arguments on her positions instead of lowering our expectations on her. And most importantly, we should treat stories about her children or other non-issue related stories like radiation. We need to resist the urge to dwell on them (note to self: heed it well!). They're mostly crap, and we shouldn't circle on them like giddy flies.
Follow Obama's lead. Respect her even if you don't think it's due. We've helped making this year's election into a circus, let's make it back into a proper issue-based election as our candidate wants it to be.
PS: I will not be a hypocrite and will admit now that I will read any new breaking freak story about Palin. But I promise from now to keep my idle speculations to myself and not fuel any of them. Many will disagree with me but I hope I made my case clear.