I don't know if kid hockey leagues in Alaska are like kid baseball leagues in Atlanta, but maybe that's where Sarah Palin got her latest nutty idea: that everybody gets to play, and everybody's effort is valued equally, regardless of skill.
I think that's an admirable philosophy for kids learning to play sports together. But we should grow up from there and realize it doesn't apply to choosing Vice Presidents.
One of Sarah's memorable lines from today: She was asked about the media's criticism of her as McCain's VP choice. Said Palin, "Oh, I think they're just not used to someone coming in from the outside saying -- you know what? It's time that normal Joe six-pack American is finally represented in the position of vice presidency, and I think that that's kind of taken some people off guard, and they're out of sorts, and they're ticked off about it."
Right. Joe Six-pack has been under-represented in the Vice President's office for a long time. Now is the time to correct that discrimination.
I'll bet there haven't been any hockey mom/non-readers on the Supreme Court either. Forget law school. Let's put Sarah Palin on the Supreme Court, if Johnny B. doesn't get elected and bring her along for on-the-job-training to be President.
And while we're at it: perhaps it's time to open up the neurosurgery staff at Walter Reed to ordinary Americans. Let's put some everyday Americans in charge of brain surgery, let them take care of all those brain injured, multiple amputee, PTSD boys back from Iraq.
Let's hear it for diversity -- Joe Six-Packs arise !!!! Hockey Moms arise !!!! Claim your rightful places !!!! You can do anything you want to do !!!!!
Now, all scornful satire aside: I think she actually believes it.
Ralph
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This may really be her philosophy. I remember now that as governor she chose for her Attorney General a lawyer who had a very small practice in a small town, and no one in the department had ever heard of him.
How about a homeless person for Secretry of HUD?
The lengths that the left is going to discredit Palin is just amazing me.
Perhaps what Palin was getting at is that people are getting fed up with career politicians??!!
There is a reason the founding fathers placed very limited qualifications for President and other offices in the Constitution. They didn't intend that the only people qualified to be Pres. would be those how have never held a job other then that of elected official. Washington, Jefferson, Franklin, Hancock and other of my Masonic brothers are spinning in their graves over what politics have degraded into.
There is also no qualification that a member of the Supreme court have a degree in law or be part of any bar. Just that they understand the constitution. Heroes of the left, such as Alan Dershowitz, have suggested that the Supreme Court should be divided into half from the law profession and half from outside of the law profession to get back to the "common man" ideas that the constitution was founded on.
I hope you are correct that this and her appointment of an outside the political mainstream attorney general are really her philosophy. That would go along way to getting me to vote for her and McCain come November.
Jesse, there is a difference in what you and I are talking about. You are talking about requirements to be eligible to hold a certain office, and you're right on that.
What I'm talking about are suitability and knowledge to actually do the job well.
I agree that one doesn't and shouldn't have to have a law degree to be a Supreme Court justice. Some of the best in history haven't. But you should know something about the law and specifically the Constitution.
Palen seems to think that's not important. That's my point. She's certainly meets eligibility requirements to be president. No one is saying that she doesn't. But whether she is suitable and knowledgeable enough is the point at issue.
Further response to Jesse's points:
We don't disagree about bringing in people who are not part of the old establishment, people who will bring fresh ideas and approaches, and not be bound up in politics.
I just want them to be chosen because of their qualifications to do the job, not because of an "outsider" demographic.
Palin cleaned house and brought in new people as governor, but it's not clear that she chose on the basis of excellence.
One example: she chose for Commissioner of Agriculture (not sure that's the exact title) a woman who was a high school friend, who had experience only as a real estate agent, and who listed as a qualification to be in charge of issues relating to the farming and dairy industry -- that she had had a childhood love of cows.
That's what I was referring to, not to a broad philosophy of opening up government to outsiders.
You got to give Sarah credit. It was a goofy but creative answer - an Evangelical Joe-netta Six-Pack...
The lengths the left is going to to discredit Palin?
Are you serious? Haven't you been reading the right wing columnists?
Do we have to list them again? Do your research. The number of conservatives who are appalled by Palin's choice as VP is stunning. Even Dan Quayle had more supporters on the right. Even Laura Bush said she doesn't have the foreign policy needed to be VP.
The rightwing thinkers - and there are people on the right who can clearly think; I recognize that even though I disagree with them - have done far more to discredit Palin than anything anyone on the left.
Nobody has had to discredit Palin. She has discredited herself by being willfully ignorant, and content with that. It's one thing to bring in people from different backgrounds. I'm all for that. I was the first one in my family to finish a 4 year college program and it was difficult because I didn't fit into that culture, so I know how systems can discriminate on the basis of class.
But Palin revels in her ignorance of basic subjects that any candidate for President needs to understand. Read the transcripts. Her own words condemn her. She doesn't need anyone else to do it for her.
There isn't a single person who has posted to this blog who knows less than Palin on basic issues of policy and governance.
That is really sad.
Recent polls - only 47% of Republicans think Palin is qualified to be President.
She's not even convincing her own party.
To Ralph,
Your example about the Commissioner of Agriculture is a much more appropriate example of Palin making bad appointments that possibly show she is not suitable or knowledgeable enough to be the VP. However, that is not the example you gave and is also different then the topic you originally postulated.
In your original post, you attempted to make the point that because she described herself as being a "Joe six-pack" type, she did not contain the "skill" to be VP or on the supreme court. And I completely disagree with that point. In Mass, this is what we call the "elitist left".
I have said it many times already, but I am not a big supporter of her or McCain, just like them slightly better then the other guys. Or should I say, I dislike the Repub choice less then I dislike the Dems choice.
However an honest person has to admit that Palin's answer on this question, was a good one and probably resonates with people in middle America.
To Richard,
The minute I start taking my que on who is qualified to be president or VP from Laura Bush, shoot me.
Yes, there are many on the right who don't like Palin as the choice for VP. I for one wanted Romney. But they are not attacking her on the same basis as the left. Show me one right winger who is saying she is unfit because she is a mother of a young kid with special needs, because she wanted a state trooper fired who tazzered his 10-year old son, because she went to a small school in the midwest, because she wanted books removed from the library (an nonfactual accusation I might add), because she has a daughter who got knocked up, because she attended a church service where she was blessed by a Kenyan to be "free of witch craft", because she made rape victims pay for their own rape kits (another nonfactual accusation) or because of her "Joe six-pack" answer.
Her answers in the Couric interviews and other things she has said do seem to be discrediting items. In a couple of hours we will likely know for sure. But who knows, in the clips I have seen and heard of her in previous debates she has done well. And lets face it, she is not facing a MENSA member. Bidden is plenty stupid too. The telling a crippled guy to stand up, saying it was patriotic to pay more taxes, the FDR on TV at the start of the depression; these are not statements from a very smart person either.
Jesse, maybe I didn't spell out my original point literally enough for you. So I'll try to be more direct.
My original point was a response to Sarah Palin's implying that she was getting negative press simply because she is Joe Six-Pack.
I then set out to lampoon the idea that no qualifications are needed; we just need to get some ordinary Americans in government, including the VP's office.
That is a goal I applaud. Gov. Schweitzer of Montana and the new senator from, I think, North Dakota, both of whom have farming backgrounds, are good examples. But only because they both also have excellent qualifications for their offices.
I am opposed to Sarah Palin and the kind of appointments she seems likely to make, because they seem woefully unqualified. Not because they are "ordinary people."
I am equally opposed to putting people in public office who are elite, wealthy, and incompetent -- George Bush's favorite types, it seems.
Is that clear enough?
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