Look, any small town mayor who wins a governorship unexpectedly has got serious political chops. The liberal blogosphere needs to realize this. And to stop bashing her because she hunts and shoots. Can’t think of a better way to piss off voters in the West and South, where hunting and shooting is a way of life. (The implied subtext of such an attack, of course, is that she’s redneck and thus of a lower class, a swell way to have the Right slime her attackers with charges of elitism. Like there’s something wrong with being redneck or that rednecks are always right wing.)
Hit her on the issues and on her extremism. Forget the other stuff, and understand that she is a highly capable politician.
And McCain an extraordinarily cynical one.
She’s not only a capable politician, she’s arguably the second-most-qualified person in the race to lead this country (Biden being first). That’s not saying much. I was reviewing the candidates’ experience last night. McCain, Palin, and Obama have little resembling foreign policy experience. (Obama served a whopping three years on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and one of those was spent running for President.) Worse, only one of the four has ever run a government at any level or managed a budget– and that’s Palin. The rest, so far as I can see, have never even served on a budget or finance committee. Not one of the four has any background in economics (and it shows).
Just for comparison, consider Bill Richardson’s resume: educated both in America and abroad, Kennedy School of Government, State Department under Henry Kissinger, 14 years in the Senate where he served on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Secretary of Energy, Ambassador to the UN, Special Envoy for the OAS, Governor of New Mexico, negotiated directly with Saddam Hussein for the release of hostages… That’s a resume! And he’s not alone, there are many American leaders with those kinds of qualifications. But apparently most don’t want the job.
Which means that whoever gets elected is poorly equipped to handle the mess left over from the last poorly-qualified administration. My God, what are we doing?
Palin was also described by a former Republican senator as being a “cocky wacko”
Obama was characterized by a sitting Democratic Senator as “elitist and out of touch.” Everyone’s got an opinion.