McCain has to ask Palin to resign. Before this week's debate with Biden. Given this time of financial crisis, Romney is the perfect choice, and this would be very acceptable with many conservatives. I have no doubt that the Democrats would love to slap at Romney's flip-flops and sound bites against McCain during the primary, but I think Biden with his paying-high-taxes-is-patriotic, FDR-on-TV-from-the-White-House-during-the-1929-crash, Hillary-would-have-been-the-better-choice, not-clearing-his-AIG-position-with-Obama gaffes would open the Obama campaign for effective counterattack.
Palin Could Use Troopergate As a Reason to Withdraw
It's important for Palin to fall on her own knife so as to minimize the political damage to McCain's perceived judgment in picking her. I would suggest the original reason why I thought McCain wouldn't pick her in a post weeks ago--"Troopergate". She has been stunningly inarticulate on explaining her rationale for dismissing the Commissioner for Public Safety. I had to read blogs out of Alaska to learn that he had tried to workaroud budget cuts to his department, even though several dozen trooper positions were unfilled, by going to the Alaska legislature. That's just blatant insubordination in a position which serves at the pleasure of the governor. She doesn't have to give reasons. I don't even know why she felt compelled to offer him a different post. The guy has chutzpah for even suggesting it was all about this rogue trooper, former brother-in-law to Palin, whom had threatened to take Palin down and shoot her dad. But when the findings on the trooper showed 4 material violations of policy or even the law against the trooper in question, I mean, how many violations does it take to get an Alaskan trooper fired? Maybe the reason the CPS didn't take action is because he didn't like Palin and this was just a passive-aggressive tactic. I think I read for 4 material violations, he got 5 days suspension, and he appealed that and got it reduced to 3 days. Are you kidding me? Did they pad their hands with feathers before slapping his wrist? A law officer threatens the lives of his former in-laws? Tell me--if this guy came after them, and they called in, who would be assigned to defend them--his drinking buddies on the force?
I understand the Democrats going after Palin on Troopergate--it's just hardball politics. Do we need to remind America that Democratic Representative Jefferson of New Orleans was caught keeping dirty money in his freezer--and he's once again running for reelection after the original allegations were made? But all this drama over Todd Palin refusing the subpoena over phone calls to DPS over this trooper whom had made threats against his wife? So what if it's true? The former Commissioner has already said he was never ordered by Palin to fire the trooper or else. He just felt he was being pressured. (Maybe the trooper made subsequent threats to the Palins and Heaths in retaliation for their complaints?) Let me get in straight--the law saying the CPS serves at the pleasure of the government doesn't apply if the governor's family has ever filed a complaint? Do they lose their rights to protection because the governor has a right to fire and hire? I think the burden of proof clearly rests with the accuser, he's already admitted he can't substantiate a connection between his termination and complaints about the trooper.
What's seriously irregular is the Democratic head of the Alaskan legislature hinting an October surprise on Troopergate. He's an Obama supporter. What do you think he means by a surprise? An exoneration for Governor Palin? There's only one thing this could mean--the committee will rule in favor of the complainant. We know any such finding would be tainted. Now some people would argue--but the legislature is headed by Republicans: wouldn't it be against the best interests of the Republicans in the legislature to go up against an 80% approval rating GOP governor? Well, keep in mind Palin took no prisoners on her way to the top--she cast to the curbside the former state party chairman, the state attorney general, and the incumbent governor... She went up against the legacy GOP establishment, many of whom still serve in the legislature and resent , and I suspect a lot of them resent what this upstart reformer did to their friends and party and see this as a way to tarnish Palin's squeaky clean image.
The last thing the national campaign needs is this crisis hanging over the campaign. I think she should say, "Hey, guys. I thought this Troopergate thing is turning into a political crisis which the campaign doesn't need heading down the stretch, and there's a lot of stuff pending in Alaska, like finding a new CPS. I also find that the constant travel is taking more of a toll on my family than I originally realized. For these reasons, I wish to resign from the ticket and thank John McCain for offering me the opportunity to serve."
Why I Think Palin Must Go
-- Limited Access to the Press
First, I think the McCain campaign realized at some point Sarah Palin was not ready for prime time by limiting access. This didn't make sense to me, because she seemed remarkably articulate in her initial speech after his announced selection and in the Vice Presidential acceptance address. I know that the press would start playing gotcha type games, and the campaign knew it. But it seemed so clear that they were restricting access, it raised a red flag--not just with the liberal press. I thought at first they wanted to shield her from having to respond to all these personal attacks. In addition, I thought that the Hannity interview with Palin went fairly well, and I thought Hannity had conducted a far wider scope of questions and not particularly what I would consider a softball interview where liberal interviewers would let Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama spend half their time Bush-bashing instead of providing substantive, constructive criticism.
But the problem with limiting access to Palin is that there's only one way for Palin to get more comfortable dealing with the press. Those allocated a rare interview will try to score a coup. I remember getting a couple of ABC News breaking alerts based on the first Charlie Gibson interview.
What's important is "straight talk"--don't bluff or say something which contradicts what McCain is saying. Be informed but don't talk beyond your level of confidence.
-- Repeating a Debunked Line
"Thanks, but no thanks to that Bridge to Nowhere". In fact, the Alaska legislature spent most of the $233M on other projects, as per Congress' explicit waiver, and the Bridge cost estimate had risen to $400M. She did kill the bridge, but original earmark was spent on other Alaska infrastructure, not returned to the US taxpayer (which Congress never required). I believe that Sarah Palin was left with about $70M for the bridge.
The worst part, from my standpoint, is the fact that Palin, in fact, favored the Gravina Island Bridge while she was running for governor (although she did raise alternatives later in the campaign). For Sarah Palin to repeat the line after the press revealed she had originally supported the bridge just shows bad judgment.
-- Her "Miss South Carolina" Moment
The fact that Sarah Palin once participated in beauty pageants (primarily for scholarship money) is coincidental. I'm making reference here to the 2007 Miss Teen USA pageant where Miss South Carolina (Lauren Caitlin Upton), when asked to explain why 20% of Americans can't find the US on maps, she mentioned people in the US without maps and education in the US, South Africa should help Iraq and the Asian countries, i.e., a rambling, convoluted mess.
So during the Katie Couric interview, Katie asked about a key problem that, in fact, led McCain to put his campaign on freeze:
COURIC: Why isn't it better, Governor Palin, to spend $700 billion helping middle-class familieswho are struggling with health care, housing, gas and groceries; allow them to spend more and put more money into the economy instead of helping these big financial institutions that played a role in creating this mess?PALIN: That's why I say I, like every American I'm speaking with, were ill about this position that we have been put in where it is the taxpayers looking to bail out. But ultimately, what the bailout does is help those who are concerned about the healthcare reform that is needed to help shore up our economy, helping the—it's got to be all about job creation, too, shoring up our economy and putting it back on the right track. So healthcare reform and reducing taxes and reining in spending has got to accompany tax reductions and tax relief for Americans. And trade, we've gotto see trade as opportunity, not as a competitive, scary thing. But one in five jobs being created in the trade sector today, we've got to look at that as more opportunity. All those things under the umbrella of job creation. This bailout is a part of that.
This is embarrassing. The bailout is part of job creation? Thousands of jobs have been lost on Wall Street--jobs that perhaps will never come back. It's possible that stabilizing the financial crisis may set the conditions for economic stabilization and growth.
Katie is suggesting a zero-sum game between the bailout and new government spending. We are spending money (according to Katie) to pick up the pieces of bad business decisions instead of spending them on government programs. Sarah is picking up on pieces of McCain's pro-growth strategy and economic policies, but she needed to acknowledge that liquidity in the market used to finance business operations (including payroll) and consumer purchases. This could lead to bank runs, massive layoffs, possibly resulting in a global depression... What Sarah needed to say is that the $700B is in illiquid mortgages which are assets, and we may be able in the long run to sell off these properties at a profit to the taxpayer. But banks need to recapitalize in order to lend money to businesses and individuals. The probable implications is that the Democrats would probably have to scale back new spending plans, given Obama's tax plan, and assuming a recession, we can probably expect that federal revenues may drop and we may need to cut interest rates and increase tax cuts.
But Palin is coming across as too close to those Saturday Night Live skits parodying Sarah Palin as an executive bimbo. I somewhat suspect if you said the word 'derivative' to her, she would say that's something in that math course she never took, and if you said 'swap', she would think you're talking about a flea market. I saw another sound bite where someone asked her about the bailout and she started talking about meeting a mother with a son overseas.
You have to be fully literate and engaged about current affairs; what's clear is that the McCain camp is not drilling her to ensure she's giving coherent responses. You have to know the policies of your opposition.
-- Other Examples
The most glaring example is Charlie Gibson's terse question asking her evaluation of the Bush Doctrine (i.e., right to preemptive/preventive action in fighting terrorism, including state sponsors of terrorism, or other threats to America). Now the Bush Doctrine has a number of nuances; e.g., at the beginning of his second term, he spoke about spreading democracy to defeat terrorism. But given vociferous attacks on America's isolation, lack of support in other countries, etc., by the Democrats, how could the McCain camp not prep her on the so-called Bush Doctrine, not to mention how McCain's foreign policy differs from Bush's. That was really what the question wanted to flesh out.
Summary
Sarah Palin is painfully unprepared and inarticulate on basic concepts. She should not be caught off-guard by discussion of basic concepts in global economic problems or McCain's policy differences with Bush and Obama. Is it just a matter of nerves? I agree that her drops in popularity are largely due to smears by the Dems. But now there's this concern if something would happen to McCain, a lot of people worry about whether she is up to the job. I think McCain should dump Palin for Romney, but McCain will probably stick with Palin, and we'll all be waiting to see what happens at her debate. Sometimes Biden has a habit of overplaying his hand. If she has another Couric moment, though, in front of a nationwide audience, it could cause McCain problems as they question his judgment in the Palin selection.
