Sarah Palin's selection by McCain to be his running mate says volumes about McCain and his leadership style. It was the biggest decision of his presidential campaign, and he clearly decided to go for broke with a high-risk, high-reward bet. It's no coincidence that McCain has a gambling problem in his personal life. The decision was reckless and cynical in numerous ways, and immediately makes apparent that John McCain is completely unfit to lead the nation. It's not exaggeration to say that McCain has placed the country that he loves so much in grave peril. The Sarah Palin pick is strictly aimed at helping him win an election rather than help him govern. Do you honestly think that a President McCain would ever call up Palin on the phone if Russia invades Ukraine? "Um, Sarah...this terrible thing happened...what's your advice on how we should proceed...uh, no, we can't challenge Russia to a hockey puck shoot-out to settle this one..." She is unprepared to govern, and yet she might be called upon to do so if anything were to happen to McCain.
I've seen Palin speak three times: at the announcement of her selection on the day after the DNC; her nasty and untruthful speech at the RNC; and her sloppy first interview as running mate with Charlie Gibson of ABC News. In all three cases I was impressed by her poise, her speaking skills, and her aw-shucks all-American demeanor. I was equally flabbergasted by her ability to lie with a straight face, her complete ignorance of important issues, and her willingness to make vicious and false attacks against Obama and his record.
Palin has Zero (0) foreign policy credentials. She did not know what the Bush Doctrine was. She thinks that being in charge of an oil-producing state counts as national security experience. She believes that the fact that you can see Russia across the Bering Strait from a remote Alaskan island qualifies her to understand the complexities of diplomacy with our newly belligerent ex-nemesis. Bumbling McCain spokesman Tucker Bounds brought up her foreign policy resume of...being the head of the Alaska National Guard. And true to her NRA ties, she believes it is OK for the United States to shoot first, and ask questions later if we think another nation may pose a threat to us.
None of this should come as a surprise from a woman who does not believe that global warming is caused by humans, does not believe in evolution, had no interest in traveling anywhere until politics forced her to, believes schools should only teach sexual abstinence but not the benefits of safe sex or contraception, that the Iraq War is a task from God, and who tried to have books banned from the library, and supports an Alaskan group that honestly thinks it has a chance of seceding from the Union. Obviously, education and knowledge are not very high on Sarah Palin's priority list. How ironic that McCain's hopes of winning now partly hinge on his advisers' ability to help Palin cram for the final exam: 50 more days of campaigning till election day, including a debate with Joe Biden. So far they have failed in their tutorial abilities, as Palin flunked through the pre-test by Gibson, largely attempting to evade all of the important questions.
Palin's calls for reforming Washington are as laughable as her perfection of the art of saying absolutely nothing at all. Case in point: her answer to Charlie's question of what exactly she would change from Bush's tenure while in Washington: "putting government on the side of the people"- which also happened to be her foreign policy plan. Taking on the old boys in a state with a population of less than 700,000, while accepting millions of dollars of pork does not qualify anybody for the # 2 job on the planet on a reform ticket. One has to understand the previous President's major foreign policy doctrine before it can be reformed. However, Sarah Palin herself does not bother me so much. She may be a proud redneck who likes to shoot 40 moose at a time while perched high up on a helicopter for kicks, a cowardly pretense of "sport" where your opponent can't even see you- quite a fair fight indeed, and quite telling about her personality and how she would fight in a political campaign. But she is very much a part of the American fabric, the type of person that at times breaks through in the lower levels of local or state politics, but would never have the opportunity to cause danger on a national or international stage as the majority of voters realize what a radical this person is. This has been largely neutralized thanks to tokenism: the fact that the unqualified party is a woman automatically gives her an edge with women voters, just as we must recognize that no male with Palin's anemic resume would be offered the job. I hope hockey moms across America get this. My mom was a hockey mom too who bought this right defenseman the skates and helmet and pads that led to a city league championship, and she gets it.
Much more worrisome than anything else in the Sarah Palin circus is what the selection says about McCain's decision-making. He did not perform the most basic due diligence before making such a momentous decision. She was clearly not vetted very well, so his campaign was caught like moose in the headlights as many details of Palin's personal and public life became public thanks to the media. There is no need to go into all the troublesome details of Palin's short career, as they have been widely publicized. It will suffice to say that it was a rash decision and at 72, McCain will not change his style toward actual deliberation on important issues as opposed to trusting yet another wild whim on his craps-table view of the universe.
If Sarah Palin's itchy trigger finger is ever placed on the nuclear button bestowed upon her by God one day, do not be surprised to see a world that has indeed changed- for the worse. America deserves whoever it votes for in November.