Sarah Palin

[colddiesel]

On the face of it , a brilliant choice but she better not drop the ball. Makes Biden look very old hat, but we shall see

I wonder what Hillary thinks?

Is she as funny as Michael?

 

[Stella_Omega]

Let's see; She's anti-choice, wants to put creationism in the schools. She wants polar bears off the endangered species list so the oil companies can drill in their territory.

 

[colddiesel]

Let's see; She's anti-choice, wants to put creationism in the schools. She wants polar bears off the endangered species list so the oil companies can drill in their territory.

I presume she's there to capture the conservative and the disaffected Hillary votes. Will they care about her policy opinions however strange they might be?

 

[cantdog]

I presume she's there to capture the conservative and the disaffected Hillary votes. Will they care about her policy opinions however strange they might be?

I was not aware that 'anti-choice' and 'creationist' were conservative views. I thought conservatism was composed entirely of policy opinions, as well.

 

[DesertPirate]

Beat an incumbent Governor of her own party because she exposed his corruption.
Got a corrupt Attorney General removed.
Fighting corruption by the oil and gas industry in Alaska.
Returned windfall profits from oil prices to citizens of her state.
Fiscal conservative
Pro Life
NRA Life Member
Ran a commercial fishing company (could a lightweight do that?)
Mayor and then Governor

Sounds more qualified on Executive experience than Obama.

 

[rgraham666]

Well, the Shrub and Cheney had lots of 'business experience'.

Look where the U.S. is now.

 

[epiphany65]

She also has a son who's to be deployed in Iraq -- on Sept. 11th no less. So this should help blunt criticism of her stance on the war there.

 

[matriarch]

"Mrs Palin's electoral chances may be harmed by the fact that she was placed under investigation in Alaska by state lawmakers at the end of July.

She sacked a public safety commissioner and the allegation is that she removed him because he had not fired a state trooper who is Mrs Palin's former brother-in-law, and who is in a custody battle with her sister.

She says she has "nothing to hide" and is "cool" about the investigation. "

 

[Guest]

It is interesting that McCain had only met her once before.

Don't you think you'd want to know the person you plan to govern with?

Unless you don't intend to actually allow them to help govern, I suppose.

 

[DesertPirate]

It is interesting that McCain had only met her once before.

Don't you think you'd want to know the person you plan to govern with?

Unless you don't intend to actually allow them to help govern, I suppose.

Kennedy and Johnson hated each other, so what?

 

[DesertPirate]

Well, the Shrub and Cheney had lots of 'business experience'.

Look where the U.S. is now.

She was a Mayor and is a Governor, that is more executive level government experience than Obama!

The all maverick ticket while Obamas choice throws change right down the commode.

 

[voluptuary_manque]

It's certainly a more "change" choice than Biden who is an "old pol" from an entire family of the same. As Artie Shaw used to say, "Innnnnnnnnnnteresting!"

 

[Liar]

Ran a commercial fishing company (could a lightweight do that?)

Any halfwit can run a company. (Hell, I've done it.)

If she ran a commercial fishing boat, I'd be impressed.

 

[Kev H]

Here's a decent summary of what I've seen in parts from several analysts: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0808/12997.html

We'll soon see if this giant gamble pays off (and if Republicans will be able to boast that they can finagle a victory, no matter what).

 

[dr_mabeuse]

She's said to have foreign policy experience because Alaska is close to Russia. She's an energy expert because Alaska has so much oil.

It's no wonder they love her up there. She sends out the oil money largesse back to the citizens. They've been doing that in Alaska for years. She's never had to deal with a deficit in her life.

Do you want her deciding what to do about Iran? Is she going to bring Hamas and Israel together? Is this the visionary foreign policy we need to repair what was done over the past 8 years? You want a Creationist deciding science policy for the US? Energy policy?

Biden is going to smear her on bread and eat her up in the VP debate. There's no way she can be made ready for national service in a month. What the hell were they thinking? She's cute, but not that cute.

 

[xssve]

It is interesting that McCain had only met her once before.

Don't you think you'd want to know the person you plan to govern with?

Unless you don't intend to actually allow them to help govern, I suppose.

McCain probably didn't have much to do with choosing her, these decisions are made at the party level among republicans, w/respect to marketing and/or political connections - G. Bush ran with Quayle, again, probably to try and pander to the youth vote, Cheney's image of steady maturity offset G.W. Bush's image of callow idiocy. This time they pretty much had to go with a younger, "hipper" woman with impeccable right wing credentials to compensate for McCain's "Old White Guy" image, and reel the female vote back in - there is a small but significant number of pro-choice republican women.

 

[dr_mabeuse]

She was a Mayor and is a Governor, that is more executive level government experience than Obama!

The all maverick ticket while Obamas choice throws change right down the commode.

Yeah. The vice-president is a powerful engine of change.

 

[dr_mabeuse]

McCain probably didn't have much to do with choosing her, these decisions are made at the party level among republicans, w/respect to marketing and/or political connections - G. Bush ran with Quayle, again, probably to try and pander to the youth vote, Cheney's image of steady maturity offset G.W. Bush's image of callow idiocy. This time they pretty much had to go with a younger, "hipper" woman with impeccable right wing credentials to compensate for McCain's "Old White Guy" image, and reel the female vote back in - there is a small but significant number of pro-choice republican women.

No, the word is that McCain pretty much chose her on his own. He really is a maverick in that regard.

 

[voluptuary_manque]

No, the word is that McCain pretty much chose her on his own. He really is a maverick in that regard.

That in itself speaks well for him, IMO. Still haven't made up my mind in spite of an inclination towards McCain.

 

[Angeline]

No, the word is that McCain pretty much chose her on his own. He really is a maverick in that regard.

I have trouble believing that McCain is able to choose his own clothes every morning, let alone this VP choice. And whoever or whatever committee of advisors chose her, the choice was strategical. Choosing a woman was really the only way to keep the repubs looking "in the game." However choosing a woman who supports issues that most women I've known are adamantly against seems a pretty poor strategic choice. Most women--certainly the ones who supported Hillary are not anti-choice, they're pro gun control, they're not for teaching creationism in our schools instead of evolution. Sure some women will like her, but not the typical Hillary supporter. To suggest, as many of the pundits have, that these PUMA Hillary supporters are hormonal harpies so unstable they'd make a 180 degree turn in what they've always campaigned for is, well, either very illogical or spin that the neo-cons would love to have the rest of us believe--to the point where maybe we don't even bother voting. Not gonna happen.

Oh. But I hear that Ralph Reed of the Christian Coalition and Rush Limbaugh love her, think she's a stellar choice. That says it all for me.

PS Hiya Doc!

 

[Stella_Omega]

I presume she's there to capture the conservative and the disaffected Hillary votes. Will they care about her policy opinions however strange they might be?

Yes, they will.

You are assuming that one woman can just plug in for another. I am not going to vote for one vagina just because I can't vote for another.

You are essentially saying that a woman's beliefs and qualifications, her education and her morals mean nothing. She's a woman, so we should be happy. That thinking is the greatest insult to women that I can remember in recent American politics.

 

[Guest]

Yes, they will.

You are assuming that one woman can just plug in for another. I am not going to vote for one vagina just because I can't vote for another.

You are essentially saying that a woman's beliefs and qualifications, her education and her morals mean nothing. She's a woman, so we should be happy. That thinking is the greatest insult to women that I can remember in recent American politics.

YES.

Thank you for putting my exact thoughts into solid words.

 

[xssve]

Yes, they will.

You are assuming that one woman can just plug in for another. I am not going to vote for one vagina just because I can't vote for another.

You are essentially saying that a woman's beliefs and qualifications, her education and her morals mean nothing. She's a woman, so we should be happy. That thinking is the greatest insult to women that I can remember in recent American politics.

"No one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American people".

--H.L. Menken

The republicans place a great deal of faith in the short attention spans of the American people.

 

[Stella_Omega]

YES.

Thank you for putting my exact thoughts into solid words.

I confess, I'm pulling words from another forum. I've been stuttering and sputtering ever since the announcement...

The republicans place a great deal of faith in the short attention spans of the American people.

Fully justified faith at that!

 

[trysail]

"No one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American people".

--H.L. Menken

St. Henry's quip actually reads:
"No one in this world, so far as I know — and I have researched the records for years, and employed agents to help me — has ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the great masses of the plain people. Nor has anyone ever lost public office thereby."

[This Mencken quote originally appeared in an article entitled "Notes On Journalism" printed in the September 19, 1926 issue of "The Chicago Tribune". It can be found also on page 121 of his essay, "A Gang of Pecksniffs".]

Sources:
http://www.mencken.org/
http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Mencken,_H._L.
http://www.mencken.org/text/txt001/elliott.leo.1998.mencken-01.htm

The Cult of Hope

by H.L. Mencken From Prejudices: Second Series, 1920, pp. 211-218

Of all the sentimental errors that reign and rage in this incomparable Republic, the worst is that which confuses the function of criticism, whether aesthetic, political or social, with the function of reform. Almost invariably it takes the form of a protest: “The fellow condemns without offering anything better. Why tear down without building up?” So snivel the sweet ones: so wags the national tongue. The messianic delusion becomes a sort of universal murrain. It is impossible to get an audience for an idea that is not "constructive"—i.e., that is not glib, and uplifting, and full of hope, and hence capable of tickling the emotions by leaping the intermediate barrier of intelligence.

In this protest and demand, of course, there is nothing but the babbling of men who mistake their feelings for thoughts. The truth is that criticism, if it were confined to the proposing of alternative schemes, would quickly cease to have any force or utility at all, for in the overwhelming majority of instances no alternative scheme of any intelligibility is imaginable, and the whole object of the critical process is to demonstrate it. The poet, if the victim is a poet, is simply one as bare of gifts as a herring is of fur: no conceivable suggestion will ever make him write actual poetry. And the plan of reform, in politics, sociology or what not, is simply beyond the pale of reason; no change in it or improvement of it will ever make it acheive the impossible. Here, precisely, is what is the matter with most of the notions that go floating about the country, particularly in the field of governmental reform. The trouble with them is not only that they won’t and don’t work; the trouble with them, more importantly, is that the thing they propose to accomplish is intrinsically, or at all events most probably, beyond accomplishment. That is to say, the problem they are ostensibly designed to solve is a problem that is insoluble. To tackle them with a proof of that insolubility, or even with a colorable argument of it, is sound criticism; to tackle them with another solution that is quite as bad, or even worse, is to pick the pocket of one knocked down by an automobile.

Unluckily, it is difficult for the American mind to grasp the concept of insolubility. Thousands of poor dolts keep on trying to square the circle; other thousands keep pegging away at perpetual motion. The number of persons so afflicted is far greater than the records of the Patent Office show, for beyond the circle of frankly insane enterprise there lie circles of more and more plausible enterprise, and finally we come to a circle which embraces the great majority of human beings. These are the optimists and chronic hopers of the world, the believers in men, ideas and things. It is the settled habit of such folk to give ear to whatever is comforting; it is their settled faith that whatever is desirable will come to pass. A caressing confidence—but one, unfortunately, that is not borne out by human experience. The fact is that some of the things that men and women have desired most ardently for thousands of years are not nearer realization today than they were in the time of Rameses, and that there is not the slightest reason for believing that they will lose their coyness on any near tomorrow. Plans for hurrying them on have been tried since the beginning; plans for forcing them overnight are in copious and antagonistic operation today; and yet they continue to hold off and elude us, and the chances are that they will keep on holding off and eluding us until the angels get tired of the show, and the whole earth is set off like a gigantic bomb, or drowned, like a sick cat, between two buckets...