Presidential Election '08

I haven't talked about this in a while because I really felt their wasn't much to say until the candidates made their V.P. picks, and boy was I right. By now everyone has heard that McCain has picked Sarah Palin of Alaska to be his V.P. and at first I was like, "how dumb, all he had to do was pick Romney or even Pawlenty and just run the ball into the end zone". Even Sophie had the same sentiment when I first talked to her. But then a funny thing happened when I made Sophie sit down and watch Hannity and Combs and CNN tonight, all they did was talk about Palin. Obama closed the Democratic Convention last night with a rousing speech on the 45th anniversary of Martin Luther King's "I have a dream speech", and like the guy or hate the guy you have to admit it was an historic night. He was the first minority candidate to ever except a major party nomination. I thought the content of the speech was lack luster and filled with lofty goals that will never be attained, but given the opportunity I definitely would have tried to get in to see history in the making. What John McCain did today though turned out to be brilliant. After 38 million people watched the speech last night all the news networks were talking about McCain and Palin. If McCain had picked Romney there would have been about 10 minutes of coverage, but it has been a non-stop barrage since the announcement. And now no one is discussing the Obama speech and moment from last night. So after watching coverage on the first day and after knocking Obama from the spotlight, I have to give John McCain an A+ on the first day for his selection for V.P., which was historic in its own right. Amazing, that is all I can say right now. I didn't think it was smart at first, and it could very well turn out that she can't handle the media spotlight and the whole thing blows up in McCain's face, but after looking at what it did today, it was a great choice. Well talk more about the race after the RNC this week.

Quick pros and cons for the VP's. Biden - energizes the white male demographic that so many people take for granted, lots of political experience (though mostly as a Senator), in-line with current democratic base. cons - he's not Hillary and doesn't guarantee a voter block, he doesn't put any major battle ground states in place, and no real executive experience.
Palin - energizes the female base of the Republicans and non committed conservatives (Sophie is even getting excited, she said if I didn't vote for McCain/Palin I was sexist. Note: Palin did finish second in the Miss Alaska beauty pageant, not sure what year.), she's a mom, has executive experience in the largest land mass state in the U.S., has a son in the service. cons - younger than Obama and has less experience in formal gov't at state/federal level (although Obama has spent the last two years running for president), unknown candidate who hasn't been put under the media microscope, little to none foreign policy experience, no major battle ground states put in play.

It will be interesting to see how this plays out. I am going to find out what the major differences are between this election and the one in 1984 when Geraldine Ferraro was the first ever female V.P. candidate. I know they got crushed in a landslide against Reagan, but that was when Reagan was up for re-election, this time there is no incumbent.