The Palin pick: Analysis

I must begin by giving credit where credit is due. On August 25, 4 days before John McCain chose Alaska Governor Sarah Palin as his running mate, poster “Ted” predicted the Palin pick in a comment on my analysis of Senator Obama’s pick of Joe Biden:

“…Palin pizzazz, the primacy of oil drilling and the ticked off women/Hillary voters, does now portend a McCain/Palin checkmate on the Dems.”

 Nice call, Ted. Here’s what I had to say about Palin at that time:

“I see her in the same light as Bobby Jindal – great potential as a future candidate, but still too green for the national stage. I think selecting Palin would undercut McCain’s primary argument about trusting in the wisdom of experience – the idea of Palin assuming the Presidency should anything happen to McCain doesn’t fill one with confidence. That’s why I doubt she’ll be the pick. But she would bring at least some executive experience as well as an “outsider” image that would enhance McCain’s “maverick” image. Not to mention the obvious appeal as a female candidate to the legions of Hillary supporters. Hmmm…maybe you are on to something, but I think it would be a pick that is made for political purposes rather than with an eye toward good government, a criticism I can’t make of Obama’s pick of Biden. McCain’s whole career (at least according to him) is about choosing good government over political considerations. So in that sense, picking Palin would be a violation of McCain’s whole philosophy of public service.”

Despite my comments, I must admit that when word began to leak out that Palin was the pick, I found myself excited by the prospect: Finally a Republican on the ticket who can’t be dismissed as just another rich white guy! As I read more about her, I saw that there was a lot about Palin I hadn’t known, and I began to see some of the upside that McCain undoubtedly saw in choosing her. Unlike many of his other potential choices, she appeared to have the potential to accomplish both of McCain’s goals for a running mate. First, he needed to shore up his conservative base and get them excited and energized. Palin is a pro-life, gun-toting budget hawk who has received enthusiastic praise from both the evangelist community and the Club for Growth. Second, he wants to appeal to independent voters. Palin’s non-traditional background for a politician, her attractive but down-to-earth image, and yes, her gender could potentially do that.

As I’ve been digesting the reax over the long weekend, it seems that the chattering classes are divided: Everyone seems to either love the pick or hate the pick. That underscores the point that Palin is a bold but risky pick. If she handles herself well, she makes McCain look like the guy whose judgment you can rely on because (as with the military surge in Iraq) he sees what others don’t. However, if she falters, it might genuinely scare voters who wonder about McCain’s age and history of cancer.

One point that I haven’t heard discussed very much is that the GOP is fielding an all-Western ticket. This is pretty rare, although if you count Texas as Western you could call the Bush-Cheney tickets all-Western. Until the later decades of the 20th century, the West simply didn’t have enough votes to support such a ticket. Now, however, we look at the map and see that in 2008 states like New Mexico, Nevada, and Colorado will decide the outcome of the election. Voters in these states are different from those in the east. For example, they may support alternative energy, but in the meantime they still need to be able to afford gas for their cars because they live at least half an hour from everything and don’t have subways and buses that go everywhere. They may want to preserve the environment, but not if it means more federal land takeovers in a region where the federal government already controls most of the land. Who is going to relate better to these voters – McCain and Palin, who live among them, or Obama and Biden, who live among the eastern elites? The Denver Post’s David Harsanyi says, “…in contrast to any national candidate in recent memory, Palin is the one that exudes the economic and cultural sensibilities of a geniune Western-style libertarian.” (http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2008/09/the_libertarian_case_for_palin.html)

At the very least, McCain’s surprise pick has succeeded in capturing the spotlight. No one is talking about Obama’s speech or the Democratic Convention anymore. The media and voters are focusing more closely on the GOP convention than they might otherwise have done, with Palin’s acceptance speech likely to draw much better viewing than the typical VP nominee’s speech.

Across the pond in Britain, the Telegraph’s John O’Sullivan says “Palin seems to be one of those extraordinary, ordinary people that America throws up at irregular intervals. She combines conservative views with highly unconventional drive and ability. Her appointment has injected real excitement into the Republican campaign.“

(http://www.telegraph.co.uk/core/Content/displayPrintable.jhtml;jsessionid=YEMTQCJYFTWRTQFIQMFSFF4AVCBQ0IV0?xml=/opinion/2008/09/02/do0205.xml&site=15&page=0)

David Brooks in the New York Times actually has a pretty good take on Palin’s pros and cons:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/02/opinion/02brooks.html?ref=opinion

For myself, I guess I still feel I need to see and hear more of Palin before I can decide if this is a good or bad pick. Unlike a Joe Biden, who has years of public record, a lesser-known candidate deserves, I think, a chance to show what they are made of. Certainly Barack Obama has been getting that chance. Palin will have the opportunity to give the speech of her life before a friendly audience at the convention. Then she will have to prove she can go toe-to-toe with Joe Biden in the Vice-Presidential debate. I will reserve my full judgment until I see how she handles those challenges.

The ugly face of political protest

I am appalled at the criminal behavior going on in St. Paul, Minnesota under the guise of protesting the Republican National Convention. As with any protest event, the majority of protesters are doing what they are supposed to – giving speeches, holding signs, signing and dancing and peacefully expressing their dissent. However, there is a darker side to these protests that ranges from disrupting traffic and blocking access to public facilities, to acts of vandalism and violence. Look at the photos and ask yourself if the people with their heads and faces covered remind you more of gang members than of political protesters:

http://www.nypost.com/photos/galleries/news/nationalnews/pp_20080902_rnc_protest/photo05.htm

If what they are doing is so noble, why are they too cowardly to show their faces? Hippies since the days of Henry David Thoreau have been willing to be arrested and imprisoned in support of their causes, but these thugs would rather destroy property, injure people and then run away like the cowards they are. How can you use violence to protest a war?

When fanatic lunatics bomb abortion clinics, the right wing must disavow and condemn it. I am waiting for the left wing to disavow and condemn these bullies and thugs.

http://www.twincities.com/rnc/ci_10356224?nclick_check=1

Sunspots and climate change

For the first time in a century, there were no sunspots observed for the entire month of August. This is significant because the sun has been in an active period for the last several decades – roughly the same period of time in which the effects of “global warming” have been observed.

With climatologists starting to agree that for the last couple of years the earth has actually been cooling, it is time to start paying more attention to the impact of solar activity on earth’s climate. While the interaction between the sun’s radiation and our climate is complex and not fully understood, we do know that the last “mini-ice age” in the 1600s, which had a dramatic affect on agriculture and human population, coincided with a long period of very low sunspot activity.

None of this is to suggest that climate change is solely a function of solar activity or that carbon emissions from human activities are not a factor. Rather, it reminds us what sober scientists have been telling us all along – the earth’s climate is an incredibly complex system with many different factors affecting it. The earth has undergone dramatic warming and cooling periods long before man began to burn carbon in significant amounts. Contray to what Al Gore’s propagandists would have us believe, there is no scientific basis for the conclusion that man’s activities are the primary driving force behind climate change, or that these activities have somehow “upset the balance” of the earth’s ability to regulate its climate beyond repair. Keep in mind that just thirty years ago, the same scientists who are now telling us that the sky is falling on global warming were shrieking that the earth was headed for a new ice age. (Conclusion: Unstable people will always find something to be unstable about and should not be taken too seriously just because they happen to be highly educated.)

Given the uncertainty of the science, at what point should we start to wonder whether those who advocate massive government regulations to restrict carbon emissions might possibly have other motives besides climate altruism? Could it be that some of these people were already heavily invested in alternative energy technology research and might stand to benefit financially from any fossil fuel panic they were able to stir up?

 http://www.dailytech.com/Sun+Makes+History+First+Spotless+Month+in+a+Century/article12823.htm