A Christian Liberal is NOT an oxymoron.

Posted by XT on August 29th, 2008 in Campaign News

So John McCain has picked Gov. Sarah Palin to round out his ticket. Already she is showing herself to be bearing baggage.

First, she is under investigation:

Gov. Sarah Palin, a rising young GOP star mentioned as a possible running mate for John McCain, could see her clean-hands reputation damaged by a growing furor over whether she tried to get her former brother-in-law fired as a state trooper.

Of course, Gov. Palin didn’t just say, “Fire him!” a la Saturday Night Massacre. Nope, it was more circumspect:

Attorney General Talis Colberg’s conducted an investigation and found that 14 members of the Palin administration – including Colberg himself – made calls to Department of Public Safety officials about Wooten.

Folks up north (and in Miami, for some reason) are calling it Troopergate:

In the phone call, which was recorded by troopers, as they do routinely, aide Frank Bailey told the trooper lieutenant that Palin and her husband wanted to know why Wooten still has a job.

“Todd and Sarah are scratching their heads, ‘Why on earth hasn’t this, why is this guy still representing the department?’ He’s a horrible recruiting tool, you know,” Bailey told Lt. Rodney Dial.

Then, there’s the environmentalist problem of blocking protection for polar bears.

Then there’s her defense of Ted Stevens that borders on using public pressure to close a federal investigation (though she did stop the Bridge to Nowhere).

If John McCain’s campaign is going to be based on his judgment, this pick calls it into question big time.

Then there’s the question of why Palin was picked but such prominent women such as Olympia Snowe, Susan Collins, Kay Bailey Hutchison, and Elizabeth Dole apparently weren’t even vetted. Each of those women bring some real credentials to the ticket. Much more than Palin. Each of them has a history of independent actions and, to varying degrees, working with Democrats.

But Palin is younger and prettier and, having not been in the fishbowl of DC, much more likely to need to lean heavily on McCain for guidance in any number of matters. She’s less likely to go against the guy giving her a big break. She’s window dressing.

The thing is this: VP’s are usually not much of a reason for voting for the President. But, for very different reasons, both McCain’s and Obama’s VPs are more likely than others to have to fill the remainder of a term. I like that McCain was willing to bring a woman onto the ticket and picked a relatively unknown person to fill out his ticket. I’d just like to think that the person one heartbeat from the Oval Office was there for some additional reasons.

Technorati Tags: John McCain, Sarah Palin

Sphere: Related Content