| Integrity
McCain's attacks on Obama's experience have gone on throughout the summer, but escalated dramatically just as Obama was demonstrating how hollow they were, by taking a trip to the Middle East and Europe, and conducting himself like a world leader would, highlighted by the fact that Iraq's President now embraced Obama's timetable for withdrawal of US troops, over McCain's vision of an indefinite occupation. Furthermore, his outdoor speech in Berlin before a massive crowd showed his clear potential to restore American's lost stature, moral authority and soft power, which the Bush Administration has virtually destroyed.
In true Orwellian fashion, Obama's clear demonstration of how vaccuous McCain's attacks were was countered by a ludicrously over-the-top on Obama's supposed "celebrity", which produced a dramatic tightening of the race. Of course there were long-standing racist undertones also involved in this attack, as well as more general rightwing populist appeals to cultural identity. But "lack of experience" was the overt banner beneath which all these more unsavory innuendos were marshaled. Obama's supposed "lack of experience" was the fig-leaf of legitimacy for out-and-out racism and character assassination. Without it, McCain had nothing to say--at least, nothing he could say without losing the support of independents and Democrats who still considered him a man of integrity, whose support was vital to him, if he was to win. So, the more McCain lied, the more important his "integrity" became.
But, of course, the real lynch-pin of these attacks was their bullying nature. If Obama would not stand up and defend himself against these attacks, he would be perceived as weak--like so many Democrats before him, but to do so effectively, he would have to confront a whole galaxy of rightwing assumptions, including the entirety of McCain's mystique. And somehow manage it without coming off as an "angry black man" or appearing to contradict his own pledge of civility and respect for his opponents.
This, of course, is precisely what Obama accomplished at the convention, with the assistance of the rest of the Democratic Party. Hence, the Palin announcement, as an act of desperation by McCain. But the Palin announcement undermines everything that went before it. It reveals two months of John McCain building his entire campaign on a lie. Clearly, McCain never considered lack of experience a crucial factor in presidential politics. If he did, he could have picked any number of Republican women as his running mate--Kay Bailey Hutcheson, Olympia Snowe, Christine Todd Whitman, and Condoleeza Rice, just for starters.
There is simply no way around it: McCain's campaign against Obama's lack of experience had no more integrity to it than Bush's campaign against Iraq as somehow responsible for 9/11. You simply cannot believe anything the man says.
Judgment
The Palin choice also undermines any claims about McCain's judgment. There were plenty of reasons to doubt McCain's judgment already, not least his reckless inflammation--if not instigation--of the Russian/Georgian confrontation. But the media has excused him over and over and over again every time his lack of judgment becomes evident.
Still, this time could be different, because it's so egregious and so easy to grasp. Millions of Americans have direct experience with hiring or promoting people--or else witnessing first-hand when its done properly or not. The scale of responsibility is surely quite different--but the principles are the same, and the enhanced responsibility is precisely the point that McCain's judgement seems to have totally ignored. It's not just that Palin lacks experience, thus undermining the past two months of his campaign, and destroying his credibility. She also brings a collection of scandals and questionable conduct.
While the most serious charges--abuse of office to settle a personal, familial score--have yet to be proved, it is already clear that she's been less than truthful and forthcoming. But that's not even what's most important, so far as McCain's judgment is concerned. If you're going to select a virtual unknown, then they had better be someone without even the appearance of scandal or controversy. Sarah Palin flunks this standard spectacularly. And hence, McCain's judgment fails spectacularly as well.
There are, at minimum, four different areas of concern, any one of which ought to have disqualified Palin, if McCain's judgment had been sound.
(1) Troopergate. Palin is under investigation by the state legislature for abusing the power of her office. ABC News explains:
Palin Could Be Deposed in Probe
Former State Official Claims He Was Pressured to Fire Gov.'s Former Brother-in-Law
By MARCUS BARAM
Aug. 29, 2008 --
Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, John McCain's surprise vice-presidential pick, is the subject of a legislative probe into claims that she abused her office by trying to get her former brother-in-law fired from his job as an Alaska state trooper.
Palin is likely to be deposed soon in the case, according to State Sen. Hollis French, who leads the state Senate's Legislative Counsel Committee.
French's committee unanimously authorized an investigation into the dismissal of the state's public safety commissioner, Walt Monegan, who claims he balked at pressure to remove Trooper Mike Wooten, who had an acrimonious divorce from Palin's sister.
The ethics complaint is here (PDF). Talking Points Memo has a timeline here, and a good overview of the story, with links, here.
The headline of the last story is quite telling, as a way of further underscoring McCain's questionable judgement in selecting Palin: "Palin Probe Could Mean Election-Eve Trouble for McCain". It begins thus:
It looks like John McCain's new running mate, Sarah Palin, could be hit with some decidedly negative PR at the worst possible time. The Alaska legislature's investigation of whether Governor Palin improperly fired a state employee is scheduled to wrap up and release its findings just days before the November election.
The firing is at the center of a scandal that has largely remained confined to the Alaska press, but is now likely to become a national story in the wake of Palin's selection -- one that could conceivably have an impact on the presidential race.
To be fair to Palin, she alleges that her brother-in-law is violent and unstable, and its quite possible that he shouldn't be a law enforcement officer. This is generally a problem that Republicans are incapable of even seeing. But that does not excuse or explain the way she has tried to deal with this, nor does it excuse her false and misleading claims as the story has come to light. In a commentary in the Anchorage Daily News, "Palin can't seem to admit she erred", local talk show host Dan Fagan concludes:
But there is something in Sarah Palin's personality that prohibits her from saying, "I screwed up." She seems to obsess on something and will do almost anything to get her way.
The sad part of it is if she would at any point just come clean, Alaskans would forgive her. They love her.
But nobody likes someone who cannot admit when they are wrong.
Sarah Palin is a classic example of that.
Something in her "personality that prohibits her from saying, 'I screwed up.'" Well, that sure is a refreshing change of pace from Bush/Cheney, now isn't it?
Once again, the point of all this is not to demonize Palin. It's simply to point out that she's embroiled in a controversy that won't be resolved until the eve of the election, and she's already shown that she's not handling it well. If you're going to pick a virtual unkown to be your VP, then good judgment demands that they be free of any such controversies. Palin may very well put this behind her. But choosing her in the midst of such a controversy shows very poor judgment on McCain's part.
(2) Palin's record as mayor of Wasilla. It's not just that Palin was, until 18 months ago, the mayor of a small town. She also apparently left considerable problems in her wake, necessitating severe budget cuts. DKos diarist xgz lays out a harsh indictment in "Sarah Palin and Wasilla Sports Complex land deal", which begins:
Sarah Palin was mayor of Wasilla from 1996 to 2002. Her record during that time can tell us a lot about her. The biggest deal during her tenure is perhaps the construction of the sports complex that was built on someone else's land. She had to raise sales taxes to pay for it. The whole episode of incompetence, arrogance, and lack of respect for the law is exactly the style of governance that we've seen from Bush and co in the past seven years.
The $15 million multi-use indoor ice arena was supposed to be her legacy as the mayor. This was a very big deal for a city that had a budget of $3.9 million in 96 (increased to $5.8 million in 2002). Although the city subsidy has gone down from the initial $600k per year to about $125k per year, the sports complex still does not break even.
The biggest problem, however, was the process of how the land was acquired. The whole thing was handled with exceptional incompetence and arrogance, ultimately costing the city an extra $1.7 million in settlement and court cost for a piece of land that would have costed only $125k if they had handled it right from the beginning in 1998.
Whether xgz's assessment is accurate, I can't say. The supporting links seem to indicate that a more ambiguous conclusion might be justified. But one thing is clear: this was not a resounding success, and as mayor, Palin bears some responsibility. After all, it was her role as mayor that was her stepping-stone to becoming governor of Alaska. At the very least, this is the sort of background problem that you want to carefully examine in the vetting of a candidate. But McCain seems to have done nothing of the sort. (See the section "Management Style", below.)
(3) Flip-flopping on the "Bridge To Nowhere". Part of Palin's reputation as a reformer is the claim that she opposed Senator Stevens' pork-barrel "Bridge To Nowhere." Only TRN is reporting, not so much:
| Did Palin Really Fight The "Bridge To Nowhere"?
Republicans have been heavily touting Sarah Palin's reformist credentials, with her supposed opposition to Alaska's "Bridge to Nowhere" as Exhibit A. But how hard did she really fight the project? Not very, it seems. Here's what she told the Anchorage Daily News on October 22, 2006, during the race for the governor's seat (via Nexis):
5. Would you continue state funding for the proposed Knik Arm and Gravina Island bridges?
Yes. I would like to see Alaska's infrastructure projects built sooner rather than later. The window is now--while our congressional delegation is in a strong position to assist.
So she was very much for the bridge and insisted that Alaska had to act quickly--the party of Ted Stevens and Don Young might soon lose its majority, after all. By that point, the project was endangered for reasons that had nothing to do with Palin--the bridge had become a national laughingstock, Congress had stripped away the offending earmark, shifting the money back to the state's general fund, and future federal support seemed unlikely. True, after Palin was sworn into office that fall, her first budget didn't allocate any money for the bridge. But when the Daily News asked on December 16, 2006, if she now opposed the project, Palin demurred and said she was just trying to figure out where the bridge fit on the state's list of transportation priorities, given the lack of support from Congress. Finally, on September 19, 2007, she decided to redirect funds away from the project altogether with this sorry-sounding statement:
"Ketchikan desires a better way to reach the airport, but the $398 million bridge is not the answer," said Governor Palin. "Despite the work of our congressional delegation, we are about $329 million short of full funding for the bridge project, and it's clear that Congress has little interest in spending any more money on a bridge between Ketchikan and Gravina Island," Governor Palin added. "Much of the public's attitude toward Alaska bridges is based on inaccurate portrayals of the projects here. But we need to focus on what we can do, rather than fight over what has happened."
Maybe I've missed something, but it sure lookslike she was fine with the bridge in principle, never had a problem with the earmarks, bristled at all the mockery, and only gave up on the project when it was clear that federal support wasn't forthcoming. |
If TNR can come up with that in less than a day, shouldn't a man of sound judgment have known that Palin's "reformer" image was problematic, at best? And if he did know, but didn't care, how sound is his judgment then?
(4) Palin's Buchananite Past. Sarah Palin is an appeal to the conservative base. But she is, apparently, so extreme that she's not even a part of the Republican base, despite holding office as a Republican. The Nation reports:
Sarah Palin, Buchananite
posted by Christopher Hayes on 08/29/2008 @ 2:38pm
Very quickly. Remember when Pat Buchanan ran a number of hard-right, fringe campaigns for president in the late 1980s, 1990s and 2000? Well, guess who was supporting him:
From an AP report in 1999:
"Pat Buchanan brought his conservative message of a smaller government and an America First foreign policy to Fairbanks and Wasilla on Friday as he continued a campaign swing through Alaska. Buchanan's strong message championing states rights resonated with the roughly 85 people gathered for an Interior Republican luncheon in Fairbanks. ... Among those sporting Buchanan buttons were Wasilla Mayor Sarah Palin and state Sen. Jerry Ward, R-Anchorage."
In fact, a very committed Buchananite Buchanan himself told me he was thrilled by the choice, saying as soon as I mentioned it: "It's great for the base. I'm pretty sure she's a Buchananite!"
People seem to be missing the fact that this is a classic, Rovian appease-the-base choice.
UPDATE: James Antle at the American Spectator rightly points out that while Buchanan considered a 1988 run for the presidency he didn't pursue it. My bad.
But Hayes seems to be missing the point that in 1999, Buchanan wasn't a candidate of the GOP base--he was trying to raid the base, running for the Reform Party nomination--which he eventually got. So Palin was out there beyond the fringe with him. Can you imagine if Obama had nominated an obscure governor who supported Ralph Nader in 1999? Can you imagine the questioning of his judgment that would lead to?
These are just four major concerns that have surfaced in the first day that Palin's selection was announced. It seems undeniable that McCain's judgement in selecting her as his running mate was deeply flawed, at best.
Temperament
But why was McCain's judgment flawed? The answer, quite simply, is his temperament. I presented so much background in the previous section, that I think it's best to keep this one short and sweet. Everyone knows that McCain is a hothead who'd be downright dangerous with his finger on the nuclear trigger. His early Navy history as an insubordinate screw-up is hardly the profile one wants for the highest office in the land. And Palin's selection fits perfectly into this pattern--a "screw you, I'm doing it my way" response when the going gets tough, that is long on bravado, and extremely short on common sense.
Management Style
As noted in my quick hit last night "McCain Barely Knew Palin", The Politico reports:
John McCain on Friday announced a running mate whom he met only six months ago and with whom he spoke just once on the phone about the position before offering it in person earlier this week.
McCain's first encounter with Sarah Palin came at a Washington meeting of the National Governors Association in February, according to a campaign-provided reconstruction of how the little-known Alaska governor was thrust into the national spotlight. The two discussed the position by phone on Sunday before McCain invited Palin and her husband to Arizona to formally make the offer. McCain, joined by his wife, Cindy, did just that Thursday morning at their home near Sedona, Ariz.
This dovetails with my surmise about McCain's temperament, and explains why McCain's vetting process didn't eliminate Palin by carefully looking at her potential liabilities, including each of the four areas covered above. In fact, one might even argue that McCain's shot-from-the-hip management style undercuts my argument about his bad judgment: he didn't ignore all those problems, one might argue, he didn't even know about them.
That's a great argument, don't you think?
Conclusion
I'd like to conclude by quoting another comment I wrote yesterday , anticipating the argument as I've fleshed it out here:
I Agree, But...
I think it's pretty obvious that the M$M is in rapid decay mode. What's happening with AP is good indicator of this. They are just diseased enough that they could spin this in an infinite number of different directions, and we really can't predict with any kind of certainty which way it will be.
What we do know is that new media--blogs, online video, etc.--has a fairly decent shot at having an impact here, and so the reality of Palin could well come out--at least enough to damage her fatally, which is probably only about 20-30%, tops.
But perhaps the soundest strategy is not to focus on Palin, but to focus on McCain. After all, he's just spent a couple of months insisting that Obama's lack of experience disqualified him. Now he's telling us, "not so much." This clearly shows that McCain's word means nothing, that he'll just say anything to get elected, and therefore nothing he says can be trusted. He's just Nixoned himself.
This is the message to pound home for the next week, along with the secondary message, "Well, is Palin actually any good? Does she have any sort of record at all? Oh, my! Look at this! Nearly bankrupted the city where she was mayor! That doesn't sound too good..." etc., etc., etc.
In short, don't lead with any of Palin's baggage, focus on McCain instead, but don't forget Palin's baggage, either. There is sooo much of it that it would be a big mistake to try and deliver it all at once.
One way or another, after the way they pulled of the convention last week, I've got a lot more confidence that the Obama campaign will find a way to deal with Polin. It probably won't be the way that I suggest here, but (a) that shouldn't stop others from pushing this approach, and (b) that really doesn't matter in the long run, as long as they deal with her effectively.
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