Palin Veep Choice is a Brilliant Strategic Coup

Now Playing: Rick Wakeman's jam ("Gone But Not Forgotten," "Catherine Parr" and "Merlin the Magician,") from An Evening of Yes Music Plus by ABWHL

WOW! A mere matter of hours after Obama's attempted "big splash," nobody anywhere in media is talking about anything except McCain's choice of Sarah Palin as Veep candidate. Announcing it on the eve of the Labor Day holiday means the American population will be talking to each other about it all weekend, rather than being soaked with the customary Leftwing propaganda about it from the monolithic Leftwing "mainstream" media. The MSM as a single unit will certainly launch into full-blown attack mode against the McCain-Palin ticket for the duration of the election season, right after next week's saturation coverage of...Hurricane Gustav.

Love McCain or hate him (I pretty much despise him, for the record,) you have to admire the sheer brilliance of political strategy in this pick. If you're a Republican you've got to be completely jazzed at the fact that McCain has brought back a sense of razor-sharp political strategy to the GOP, something that's been gone for far too long. In one single stroke, McCain has absolutely buried the Democrat-Socialist Convention and news about it.

To say there is a lot to admire about Palin is a vast understatement - she's someone who's elevated "unconventional" and "overachiever" to near-freakish levels, and I'm not talking about her gender vis-à-vis the VP candidacy:

- Governor of Alaska, the only American state that borders on two foreign countries, maintaining approval ratings ranging from the upper 80s to mid-90s;

- a competent mother of five;

- an aggressive opponent of taxation, wasteful spending and corruption, with a rep as a whistleblower;

- an avid firearms proponent, NRA member and shooter;

- operator of a snowmobile/watercraft/ATV business, an adept snowmobiler and outdoorswoman;

- a hockey player, eh?, a champion basketballer and former beauty queen


From the standpoint of cross-partisan election season appeal:

- she's been a union member and has strong blue-collar roots;

- she will instantly appeal to the woman's vote and Clinton supporters angered at being snubbed by the DNC;

- she's spent more time with American troops in the Middle East than the Democrats' candidate for President would spend with American troops at a hospital in Germany - which means instant appeal in particular to "military moms," a powerful voting block.

- as a woman, her ascendance to the historic position of "first female Vice President in American history," though philosophically trivial, will steal a huge political prize from the Democrat-Socialist Party. If she goes on to the Presidency and wins that too...

- a woman as Vice President of the most powerful and benevolent nation on Earth will send a long-overdue message to foreign nations and, er, religions, that are steeped in often monstrous misogyny.

On the downside, Palin has raised taxes against the oil industry as Alaska Governor; she, like McCain, has drunk the Kool-Aid on "climate change," a.k.a. "weather"; she shows every sign of being firmly entrenched within the religious right, reportedly even to the point of advocating "creationism"; and though an indirect negative, McCain praises her commitment to "the common good" - an inherently circular concept - and that she's "fought oil companies."

[Earth to McCain: The very reason we're shoveling $4 a gallon into the bank accounts of OPEC and al Qaida, is that government has been "fighting oil companies" - instead of getting the hell out of the way and allowing them to produce.]

All in all the positives vastly outweigh the negatives, and the pick is indeed strategically brilliant.

Expect the "mainstream media" to focus almost exclusively on Hurricane Gustav in their every single broadcast, above-the-fold headline and article, for the duration of the coming week. For obvious reasons. So those of us who are interested in the Presidential campaign will have to stick with the 'Net.

Not a problem.
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