Four Palin scenarios and how they're likely to play out.
With Sarah Palin imploding into incoherence on national television under the questioning of Katie Couric a sense of high drama is spreading. When radio talk show host Ed Schultz reported Friday that top advisers in the McCain campaign found Palin's performance in mock debates and press conferences "clueless", a sense of foreboding quickly made the rounds. Even reliable conservative Republicans such as Joe Scarborough have said that this would not work.
Four likely scenarios might unfold in the course of the next 10 days. Let's look at each and take measure of the possible consequences.
Scenario One. Palin calls a news conference on Tuesday to announce her resignation from the ticket to spend more time with her family. In this scenario Palin realizes just in time that she cannot stand 90 minutes on the stage and take a beating on national television in front of 60 million viewers.
The fallout from this scenario is devastating to the faltering McCain campaign. Significant segments of the Republican coalition will be devastated and will stay at home on election day. McCain's only viable response to this scenario is to select Mike Huckabee as her replacement. Only Huckabee would have a fighting chance to keep the Republican evangelical base on the reservation. However, even with Huckabee the fallout from a Palin resignation will be enough to pitch the presidential election into a solid landslide for Barack Obama.
From the point of view of high theater no scenario is more dramatic than scenario two. Its a drama in four acts with the third act played off stage. As the curtain rises on Act I Thursday night Palin proceeds to a meltdown on national television dwarfing anything seen in the Katie Couric interviews. In this act Joe Biden plays the part of Grandpa Walton, happy facing a grandfatherly charm and wit while allowing the moderator to assume the role of chief protagonist.
Act II opens Friday morning with cascading demands from conservative Republicans publicly calling for Palin's removal from the ticket. McCain, as is his nature, hunkers down for a fight. Mud balls fly like flies on a summer day. McCain battles like a wet chimpanzee for two days in a desperate effort to salvage something from his campaign. The brawl last for two days with echeloning demands for Palin to resign or McCain to remove her.
By Sunday the curtain rises on Act III with actors playing off stage and out of view of the audience. A committee of three Republican female senators, Kay Baily Hutchinson from Texas, Elizabeth Dole from North Carolina and Susan Collins from Maine agree to play the Babylonian Messenger and request an audience with McCain. McCain digs in and fights for another day before yielding and hearing the committee out. The message to McCain is clear and forceful--she's go to go. McCain finally capitulates on Tuesday.
McCain surrogates quickly carry the word to Palin--she's out. Its over. Thanks but no thanks to that candidate to nowhere. Huckabee will be the replacement.
As the curtain rises on Act IV Sarah Palin is standing at the podium to announce that she needs more time to spend with her family and therefore she is reluctantly resigning from the ticket.
The fallout from scenario two is harsher for McCain than scenario one. Much of the Republican base will blame him for throwing Palin under the bus and a significant number will stay home on election day. By 10:00PM Eastern on November 4 the scope of the Obama landslide victory is apparent to all with the possible exception of William Kristol, whose faculties of self delusion are near legendary.
Scenario three develops much as scenario two with exception that McCain doesn't throw Palin under the bus. McCain does what he does best--hunkers down and fights any and all comers for 32 days. Independents and moderate Republicans bolt the reservation in droves and deliver a landslide for Obama on November 4.
Scenario four is perhaps the most probable of them all. In this scenario Palin survives the debate with a noticeably mediocre performance almost meeting her low expectations. Polls indicate that Biden won the debate 66%-33%. Many independents bolt to the Obama camp and Obama wins the election by a clear majority on November 4.
Historians writing many years later are likely to record that McCain lost the election with the appointment of Sarah Palin as his vice presidential nominee. It was a classic McCain audible at the line of scrimmage with most of his own team not realizing he was throwing the ball to a receiver likely to fumble away whatever chance he had to win the game. Split second decisions are what make great fighter pilots, but lousy politicians.