How McCain's Palin Pick Makes 'Age' Issue Number One

McCain's choice was motivated by the fact that 'age' had already become an issue and he hoped to blunt it. If McCain had chosen well, it might have been unfair to ask: what if the old codger should die in office? Now, it is irresponsible NOT to ask that question. McCain's Palin pick --focus group designed to blunt the criticism in the bud --has backfired. The campaign is now all about age.

A wise choice for McCain would have been someone with proven experience and moderate politics. Had McCain made such a choice, the 'age issue' would have been blunted, perhaps taken off the table entirely. Instead, McCain blundered before getting off the blocks, a first bad decision that may be chalked up to age and the age issue.

What kind of 'President' would the extremist Palin become? A Palin presidency is simply unthinkable. Certainly --she would never have risen to prominence so quickly were not McCain concerned about age. Instead of putting the issue to rest, he has put it on the front burner.

As an extremist, Palin makes Goldwater look moderate. She is a denier of global warming, a doctrinaire opponent of a women's pro-creative rights, a proponent of enforced teaching of creationism. McCain's death could hasten a new dark age.

Let's look at the record of the person who might very well be put in the position of leading the United States of America.

• She was elected Alaska's governor a little over a year and a half ago. Her previous office was mayor of Wasilla, a small town outside Anchorage. She has no foreign policy experience.


• Palin is strongly anti-choice, opposing abortion even in the case of rape or incest.


• She supported right-wing extremist Pat Buchanan for president in 2000.


• Palin thinks creationism (theology --NOT science) should be taught in public schools


• She's doesn't think humans are the cause of climate change.


• She's solidly in line with John McCain's "Big Oil first" energy policy. She's pushed hard for more oil drilling and says renewables won't be ready for years. She also sued the Bush administration for listing polar bears as an endangered species—she was worried it would interfere with more oil drilling in Alaska.


• How closely did John McCain vet this choice? He met Sarah Palin once at a meeting. They spoke a second time, last Sunday, when he called her about being vice-president. Then he offered her the position. [h/t Ron Foster]
  

Some quick notes about the issues involved should a right wing extremist assume the nation's highest office upon the death of senile President.

Neither creationism nor 'intelligent design' is science. Both are slick PR approved versions of 'religious' theology'. Constitutionally, folk can teach their children anything they want --at home! But the Constitutional separation of Church and State makes the teaching or propagation of 'religion' at tax payer expense unlawful. That is the standard that must also be applied to so-called 'Faith Based Initiatives'.

Like the evil hackers who try to 'sneak' malicious programs onto your computer, the axis of creationism/ID cloaked creationism to disguise their religious ideology, to make it appear to be science when in fact it was and remains religious dogma. It was hoped that as 'science', religious ideology could be taught stealthily in publicly financed schools at your expense. You would pick up the tab though you do not believe it.

Palin's big oil policies conform to the GOP party line. With Her assumption of the nation's highest office upon the death of an aging McCain, the big oil cabals will not merely retain but consolidate their ownership of the nation. They own her. Now --what does that make her?

At last, her extremist, anti-freedom, anti-people, anti-environment positions may expose her pro-hypocrisy agenda.

Sarah Palin's 17 y/o daughter Bristol is pregnant. Pass it on.

There is no truth to the rumor, however, that Palin's four month-old child with Down Syndrome is Bristol's daughter.

The McCain campaign is saying that McCain already knew about the blessed event before he made his running mate choice eight days ago. If that's true, then it seems to suggest that McCain really is as ethically blind as he proved during the Keating 5 scandal. But somehow, I doubt that McCain would've been in possession of information that intimate. According to John Cole at Balloon Juice, Camp McCain hasn't even begun vetting her, yet.

CNN reports that Palin's child with child will keep the baby and marry the father, as if making such a decision while still in high school bespeaks Christian family values. Naturally, the Palins are insisting on everybody respecting their privacy (Read: Don't write or speak about it).

You know, like the GOP would've respected Chelsea Clinton's privacy if she'd gotten knocked up in her junior year of high school.

--Family Values

As Lloyd Bentsen famously chided Dan Quayle --"You are NO John Kennedy" --we might remind John McCain: "You are no Ronald Reagan":

Reagan at his age was much more graceful. McCain's shoulders are stiff and painful from years of North Vietnamese torture, and he doesn't deliver a speech that well.

At the instinctive level with the contrast between McCain the stove up old codger and Obama's lithe articulate just old enough youthfulness, it's no contest. The ideological pros and cons of the people McCain considered have been done to death. But how about this totally non-ideological analysis:

McCain/Lieberman--two old farts. Sure losers against Obama.

McCain/Romney-- no chemistry, makes McCain look old, Romney himself is classy but sort of a stiff.

McCain/Pawlenty-- another lose/lose proposition. Pawlenty points up McCain's age without bringing much pizazz.

--A different take on the Palin choice

The GOP is literally owned by big oil. The GOP, therefore, must be anti-environment, pro Iraq war, pro-Bush dictatorship. By picking Palin, McCain proves that he is anything but a 'maverick'. McCain is not his own man. McCain is hardly a 'straight-talker'; his words are vetted by the robber barons of big oil. McCain is just another GOP kiss up to the Military/Industrial establishment --the folk who bought you Viet Nam and Iraq. If you like George W. Bush, then vote for John McCain and get Bush's third term!

The Palin Choice is so bad that one is justified in asking if McCain is already showing signs of senility. Was he influenced by what he might think is a pretty face hiding an extremist, right wing mentality? This choice smacks of desperation. Reams of GOP propaganda in its wake have kept many a flack, many a paid liar employed. McCain has proven that he been bought and paid for by the folk who OWN the GOP. Maverick, my ass!

Essential reading:

American essayist Gore Vidal says that despite the US claim that it is making the world safer by perpetuating democracy, the country never had any democracy.

In an exclusive interview with Press Tv correspondent, Vidal said that the United States has never had democracy and the word never was used in the US constitution, Bill of Rights or the Declaration of Independence.

Vidal also said that America has fallen into the hands of a small group of people that only care about global dominance and making money from US tax payers by waging wars.

The renowned essayist made the analogy that the democratic national convention in Denver is symbolic of a falling empire and observed that the hyper expensive entertainment-based campaigns and the current state of the US as being overextended in multiple wars and no budget surplus to finance them, all bode ill for that nation's future.

Vidal noted that despite Obama's promise to deliver universal heath care, the heath industry would oppose his plan and insure he will not be able to deliver on his stated goal.

When asked about US policy toward Iran by the rival candidates, Vidal responded that McCain is a warmonger that will likely wage war on Iran.

Gore Vidal: US never had democracy

More about Palin from Democracy Now:

Max Blumenthal of The Nation reports: Last week, while the media focused almost obsessively on the DNC’s spectacle in Denver, the country’s most influential conservatives met quietly at a hotel in downtown Minneapolis to get to know Sarah Palin. The assembled were members of the Council for National Policy, an ultra-secretive cabal that networks wealthy right-wing donors together with top conservative operatives to plan long-term movement strategy.

--Report: Secretive Right-Wing Group Vetted McCain’s VP Candidate Sarah Palin

Additional resources:

• Amy Goodman Arrested by Fascists at the RNC
• Sarah Palin Lied About Her Visit to Ireland
• McCain Voted AGAINST all Katrina Aid
• Amy Goodman Arrested at RNC
• Right Wing Lunatic Fringe Loves Palin
• McCain's Palin Pick Proves His "Put My Country First" Hypocrisy
• Maker Her Whine
• Nazi link in 'plot to assassinate Obama'

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• Bush's Conspiracy to Create an American Police State: Part VII, The Government Denies 'Due Process of Law'
• Bush's Conspiracy to Create an American Police State Part VIII: Atrocities are justified with lies, myths or propaganda

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