A Light(weight) Shade Of Palin

BooMan notes a number of national newspaper editorials (as well as those in Palin's home state of Alaska) have opinions this morning on McSame's VPILF ranging from polite shock to outright hostility. McCain's age just became the albatross around his neck.

I have a sampling of media reaction to the selection of Sarah Palin as John McCain's running mate. It starts with the reaction from Alaskan newspapers. They HATE the choice. Then it moves on to lower-48 papers, large and small. They also HATE it. In fact, I don't remember anything approaching this level of disdain for Dan Quayle. Dan Quayle ruined his reputation over time by his performance on the national stage. But, as a sitting U.S. Senator, he was accorded some initial respect. Sarah Palin is getting no respect. Or, to be more accurate, no one is pretending for one moment that she is qualified to be president of the United States or is accepting any of McCain's talking points as anything but rubbish. You can walk back a nomination to the Supreme Court, like Harriet Miers. But you can't walk back a vice-presidential pick. Just ask George McGovern.

Do check them out, especially the ones from Alaska:

Fairbanks Daily News-Miner (EDITORIAL): She has never publicly demonstrated the kind of interest, much less expertise, in federal issues and foreign affairs that should mark a candidate for the second-highest office in the land. Republicans rightfully have criticized the Democratic nominee, Sen. Barack Obama, for his lack of experience, but Palin is a neophyte in comparison; how will Republicans reconcile the criticism of Obama with the obligatory cheering for Palin?…Most people would acknowledge that, regardless of her charm and good intentions, Palin is not ready for the top job. McCain seems to have put his political interests ahead of the nation's when he created the possibility that she might fill it. It's clear that McCain picked Palin for reasons of image, not substance. LINK

Anchorage Daily News: "She's not prepared to be governor. How can she be prepared to be vice president or president? said [State Senate President Lyda Green, a Republican from Palin's hometown of Wasilla]. "Look at what she's done to this state. What would she do to the nation?" LINK

Fairbanks Daily News-Miner: Lately her reputation within the state has been bit by allegations of mixing political and family business, and by mistreating one of the state's premier marine mammals. Palin's catch-phrase of "openness and transparency" has been tarnished by revelations that staff members tried to have Palin's former brother-in-law fired from his job as an Alaska state trooper. Also, the governor of the only state with polar bears has adamantly opposed listing the animals as a threatened species, despite strong evidence that global warming has devastated their sea ice environment off Alaska's coast. Dermot Cole, a longtime columnist for Alaska's second largest newspaper, the Fairbanks Daily News-Miner, called McCain's choice of Palin "reckless" and questioned her credentials. "Sarah Palin's chief qualification for being elected governor was that she was not Frank Murkowski," Cole said of her enormously unpopular predecessor, who lost favor with Alaskans in part because of unpopular budget cuts. "She was not elected because she was a conservative. She was not elected because of her grasp of issues or because of her track record as the mayor of Wasilla." LINK

Juneau Empire (Kate Golden) "Some in Ketchikan react to nomination with concern, ire": In her acceptance speech as McCain's running mate Friday morning, Palin held up her opposition to the bridge from Ketchikan to Gravina - the "bridge to nowhere" - as an example of "the abuses of earmark spending."…When campaigning in Ketchikan in September 2006, Palin promised Ketchikan residents the bridge LINK

When's the last time you can honestly say a VP pick actually helped a Presidential candidate LOSE that VP's state? I think she's so bad she might help McSame lose Alaska!