There's a Reason It's Called "Gambling"

Man, your internet goes out off for twenty hours and things go crazy.

This afternoon, I checked out the news only to find that Palin had become embroiled in even more scandals than when I went to bed last night. She’s lawyered up on the trooper firing scandal, she was once a member of an Alaskan secessionist party, the media finally picked up on her (and Alaska in general’s) love of earmarks. That’s a hefty dose of problems for one news cycle.

TPM is discussing whether or not Palin will be seeing the door a la Eagleton. I think this is wildly unlikely. It’s just too late in the season for McCain to pick someone else. He’s made a mavericky gamble and he’s going to have to ride it out. Eagleton was offered the VP slot on July 1st, and withdrew on August 1st. McCain waited until after Obama made his pick, and for obvious reasons, Obama waited to make his pick. This obviously shows weakness on McCain’s part – he is in a reactive mode. The NY Times reports that McCain was ready to go for Lieberman and Ridge, but the people from the base in the know were set to go out of their minds. So, he did the next logical thing – he picked a woman beloved of the base, about whom he knew almost nothing. So far, it seems to have worked out really well for him.

I know what you all are thinking: how is this bad for Obama? After all, everything is good news for McCain. The only downside I can see is that there’s so much coming out all at once, it will be hard for people to absorb it all. They’re likely to simply throw their hands up at it all. How will the stories play?

Palin’s daughter: Like Obama and a lot of other bloggers, I tend to think this kinda stuff has no real relevance to politics, so let’s just drop it entirely. Obama did well in his statement, and I hope his surrogates stay away from it.

Troopergate: Like DP, I think this is an important story. What I’m not sure about, though, is how well it will play over all. The issues are somewhat muddied by the fact that her ex-brother-in-law does, in fact, seem like a real sleaze ball. It certainly seems like she’s abusing her powers, but the optics of it are a bit off.

Alaskan Independence: I think this one is a bit more interesting. It has pretty much everything a Democrat could love in a scandal and nothing to dislike. It has a GOP vice presidential nominee participating with a group that’s committed to having a vote for succession. I think this one is a winner.

And finally, of course, there’s the earmark thing. I think this is the single biggest problem with Sarah Palin. Palin comes from an incredibly corrupt political culture. It’s telling that, by Alaskan standards, she’s considered a reformer. She lied about the Bridge to Nowhere in her very first speech on the national stage. “Thanks, but no thanks” doesn’t mean, “Thanks, but I’m going to keep the money for other stuff.” She was involved in actively lobbying congress for more earmarks, and she had a close relationship with earmark king, Sen. Ted Stevens. I think this is and the Alaskan Independence are the issues the Democrats really need to push. The rest of it, while certainly important, is a distraction.