Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin cheerfully advising a well-wisher Sept. 5 in Cedarburg, Wis., “If you touch me, this guy here will blow your head off.”
In the wake of the Democrats’ and Republicans’ national conventions, we have officially entered the final phase of Silly Season; the home stretch of the general election.
And silly it is!
John McCain deftly announced his VP pick the day after the Dem convention ended, sparing us from the media slobberfest that surely would’ve ensued. He even recorded an ad graciously congratulating Obama for his acceptance speech, which happened to fall on the 45th anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I have a dream” speech. McCain’s maneuver also thrust the nation’s hottest … ERRRR, most qualified governor, Alaska’s Sarah Palin, into the national spotlight.
The Dems responded by congratulating McCain on choosing a woman to get one step closer to the White House than the Dems’ own semifinalist, Hillary Clinton. … Oh wait, no they didn’t. Actually, they lambasted and lampooned and have been every bit as dismissive and condescending as one would expect liberal elitists to be. Obama has intentionally mispronounced her small hometown of which she was mayor. Women have decried the choice for assuming that Hillary-backers would vote for her just because Hillary was out. Not to be left out of the liberal hatefest of Palin, Dr. Laura even chimed in about how Palin has no business running for office until her children are adults. So where are the feminists? They’re calling leftist talk radio and echoing the National Organization for Women, which not only doesn’t defend Palin for being a woman balancing a career and a family, but chastises her for being Pro Life.
McCain wasn’t my first choice for Republican president, and as far as my list of VP possibles, I didn’t have Palin on top. *snicker* But she was on my list, right there with Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal. I felt both could be great candidates in ’12 or ’16 and could have benefited from more time in their respective states.
If McCain was going to choose a Religious Right conservative, then why not Mike Huckabee? He was a governor and is a pastor, garnered a fair amount of votes as the last Republican standing in the primaries, is a fine speaker and smooth debater, and he’s funny. This is important because it makes him a frequent talk-show guest and makes him likable; important for a Republican these days.
Anyway, they’re not the cards I wanted, but it’s what I’ve been dealt, so the whole game comes down to one futures bet; federal and Supreme Court judges. There are other issues, such as the war on terror, which I believe McCain would prosecute more adeptly than would Obama, but I’m hearing the next president could appoint three SC Justices, and those are appointments that could affect the next 30 years.
Bring on the debates!
Presidential:
Sept. 26 in Oxford, Miss.; foreign policy, nat’l security; Jim Lehrer moderating
Oct. 7 in Nashville, Tenn.; town-hall meeting; Tom Brokaw moderating
Oct. 15 in Hempstead, N.Y.; domestic, economic policy; Bob Schieffer moderating
VP debate:
Oct. 2 in St. Louis; Gwen Ifill moderating
Sports for the Clumsy 