McCain picks Sarah Palin for VP
Nobody saw this one coming. The conventional wisdom had Romney on the ticket as McCain's veep. Alaska governor Sarah Palin is an inspired choice. Her introductory speech was brilliant, folksy and powerful. Her immediate appeal to the legions of disaffected Hillary supporters is obvious. She knows it too; her line about 18 million cracks in the glass ceiling was sheer genius.

The Obama camp's petulant first salvo will almost certainly backfire. Calling her "the former mayor of a town of 9,000 with zero foreign policy experience" completely ignores her accomplishments as a governor. And her mayoral successes are nothing to sneeze at either; she ran on a pledge to lower property taxes, and she lowered property taxes. If only the Democrats in New Jersey who keep promising to lower our property taxes would actually deliver too. (Caldwell Mayor Susan Gartland would do well to investigate how Sarah Palin managed to reduce her town's taxes. Instead Mayor Gartland and her Democratic cronies on the township council raised our taxes 10 percent this year.)

"Zero foreign policy experience"? Isn't that why Joe Biden is on the Democratic ticket, because Obama has absolutely no foreign policy experience? Are they really trying to make an issue out of which team is better on foreign policy?

Palin's conservative credentials are rock solid. She's pro-life, a "mom's mom" with 5 children, and unafraid of taking on entrenched politicians. Her dismissal of Ted Stevens and Don Young's "bridge to nowhere" is just the kind of anti-pork thinking we need in Washington. She cleaned house in Alaska by putting corrupt political hacks where they belong -- in jail. Her oldest son is about to deploy to Iraq; she knows the pride and the nagging worry that go with being the mother of a soldier.

The American public will certainly want to get to know more about Sarah Palin. Next week's Republican convention will be the perfect opportunity. There will undoubtedly be keen interest in John McCain and Sarah Palin's four days in the spotlight. I'm looking forward to her debate with Joe Biden too.

The presidential race just got a lot more interesting.

Posted at 19:00 by Chris   [/election]   | | | Email | del.icio.us | Digg | Stumble It! | Reddit | Link