McCain's campaign is all show

As a woman in politics who has had to build a business in a very male-dominated profession I think I at least get a pass on judging a woman candidate. And to me much of the analysis of John McCain's choice of Sarah Palin has minimized the most important point.

John McCain had nearly six full months to interview, vet, reinterview, dissect, debate, road-test, focus group, poll, walk-around-with and select his running mate.

Six months.

While the Democrats kept slugging it out during the primaries, McCain sewed up his nomination March 4. The only big decision he had left was his Vice President.

Yet, with the luxury of all that time, he appears to have pulled Sarah Palin out of thin air at the last minute. Why? What does this say about the decision-making of a man we could make our next President? What does it say about his way of handling incredibly important and significant events?

Here's what can we learn from it. If the news reports are to be believed - he wanted to go with someone else. Yet his gut wasn't good enough - I guess someone else's was. That's something I want to see in the White House Situation Room.

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Next, he went with "a woman" for reasons that any woman should find offensive. McCain didn't choose Palin because of the ground-breaking nature of the selection. He didn't choose Palin because the quality of the choice was so far superior to anyone else that it could answer any and all criticism.

And having had only one brief meeting, he certainly could not have chosen her because he was so comfortable with this individual after spending significant months with this person that regardless of gender he just had to have her on the ticket.

He went with Sarah Palin for the crassest of political reasons. A woman, any woman. A distraction, any distraction.

How many times during the past few months (coincidently when the Obama campaign was gaining ground on one subject or another) was there a leak of "Vice Presidential" news from the McCain campaign? Think back - was it three or four different times? Yet now we find out - shock of shocks - that this was just a manipulation of the media. There was no Vice Presidential news at all since he only selected Palin within the last week.

In truth, there isn't anything the least bit "maverick" or "unique" about McCain's decision to choose Sarah Palin. I had thought for weeks that he'd pick a woman - I just didn't know which one. And quite frankly, it feels like the McCain campaign didn't really care much which one.

They foolishly believed women would fall all over themselves just for the symbolism of his move. They foolishly believed a young unproven woman would escape criticism and create a problem for Democrats. As my sister asked me, "Did they really think women are that stupid?"

Now the best they can do is blame the "left-leaning media" for asking hard questions about Palin - questions McCain had six months to ask himself -- and about the poor decision-making process that brought us to this unfortunate place.

All the Palin choice did was prove what most Americans already suspected. That McCain's campaign is all show. That McCain will stoop to whatever he needs to do to win. That there's nothing - nothing - including the Vice Presidency that is too important to sacrifice if it takes the subject off of the positive change the Democrats are offering.

Why now would anyone believe that in the White House, with the magnitude of difficult decisions this 72 year old man will face, that he will do anything like the reasoned, thoughtful appropriate thing? Why should anyone believe that John McCain won't allow his latest in a long list of political advisors (and just how many campaign consultants has he run through since he reinvented himself after the Keating savings and loan scandal?) to make these incredibly important decisions for him.

If I had a client who botched as crucial a decision as this, they'd be out the door in a heartbeat. The same heartbeat it apparently took John McCain to seize on Sarah Palin. The same heartbeat he wants to put her away from our presidency. The Palin pick is reason enough for all of us to show John McCain the door.

Comments

[pearware]

It's interesting how desperate you folks are to trash this nomination. I've been reading about Palin for several months and was not at all surprised that he picked her. She is a good fit and a great choice, good enough to completely turn the attention from Obama's speech back to McCain. You really must be worried.

[Df7702]

dead on !

[jefflz]

McCain has made a mockery out of the electoral process by choosing Palin. She is not qualified to be a heartbeat away from the presidency. and McCain is counting on the Rove spin doctors to create an acceptable image. The fact is we hardly know her and what we know is disturbing. She is a creationist, anti-environment, denier of global warming, pro-gun, hard core evangelical who fired a city librarian for resisting censorship. She is a double-talker who fought for huge earmarks for her tiny town. She appointed a man convicted of sexual harassment to be in charge of Public Security. She is a hypocrite who attacked Hillary as a whiner and now wants to ride Clinton"s coat tails. McCain is not putting his "Country First"-her candidacy has derailed the electoral process since accepting or rejecting her has become the election itself.. He has changed the election into a three ring circus and there is no excuse for this mockery.

[emr3857]

good article. i think McSame was desperate too. "desperate people do desperate things"