Of Palin and Politics
I was cold-called today by the folks that run the Rasmussen Reports. I generally hang up on such calls, but today I was happy to participate in the political survey if only to register my voice of disaffection for both candidates of the major parties. (I was a supporter of Ron Paul and am likely to write in Ron Paul's name for President or vote for a third party candidate). The survey (among other items) asked a set of questions that gauged my general impression of the four Pres/VP nominees as well as my impression of the job performance of our current President using the following heirarchy: 1) very favorable, 2) slightly favorable, 3) slightly unfavorable, and 4) very unfavorable. I rated President Bush (as you might guess) using the "very unfavorable" selection. Sen. Obama, Sen. McCain, and Gov. Palin all received "slightly unfavorable" and Biden was given an equal share of disdain as President Bush received.

Much hay has been made lately of the Vice Presidential selections: Sen. Barack "The Change We Need" Obama selected Sen. Joe Biden (a 36-yr Washington insider); and Sen. John McCain selected the unknown Governor of Alaska, Governor Sarah Palin. The Palin pick is immediately interesting (to me) for the comparison to that of Sen. Obama's pick, Sen. Joe Biden. Sen. Biden detracts from all of Sen. Obama's strengths and adds little to Sen. Obama's so-called "weaknesses". For example, during the run up to the Iraq war in 2002, Sen. Biden was the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations committee. Biden was in a position to allow a real debate to be held on the rush to Iraq War, yet not a single "anti-war" voice was allowed to speak in those hearings. Of course (like so many others), Sen. Biden now regrets his vote in favor to authorize the use of US Armed Forces against Iraq - not because the Iraq War was wrong per se, but rather because the Executive Branch didn't do a great job with the implementation phase. Biden is certainly no Dick Cheney, but as one commentator put it... Biden is very "Cheney-esque" - in other words, business as usual.

Governor Palin on the other hand is pretty much a blank slate with regard to foreign policy matters. Many commentators (well, mainly bloggers) are making this molehill into quite a mountain; one has even suggested Palin will either resign or sabotage Sen. McCain's campaign in part because of this issue of inexperience. I remember another such governor with little to no foreign policy experience... he ran for the office of POTUS back in 2000 and has been our President ever since. Clearly inexperience in these matters is not that big of a deal to a large part of the US population.

The brilliance of the Gov. Palin pick (and it was a brilliant pick) is two-fold: 1) she complements Sen. McCain and fills in all the gaps and dispels many of the doubts the GOP base had with McCain, and 2) her pick sucked the air right out of Sen. Obama's sails heading out from the Democratic Convention and the media has been Palin-this, Palin-that ever since... the momentum shifted - big time - and the Democrats may be unable to regain it. Don't believe me? Check out the latest Rasmussen polls.

I read an article the other day on Daily Kos that basically said that Gov. Palin is "Bush in a skirt". Insulting? Yes. But actually - this is probably Gov. Palin's greatest asset. In a nation seeking "change" and "hope" who better to wave that banner than an ignorant, arrogant, (and perhaps angry) Governor hockey-mom with a grassroots-local-type of a appeal? This drama reminds me of articles I read back in 2000 during the primary leading up to then Gov. Bush's nomination. In one of the interviews with local small-town residents of some state (South Carolina I think), one such citizen responded to the reporter stating that he would be voting for Bush because *ahem* Bush once ran a Major League Baseball team and this citizen liked baseball. In other words, a lot of people - really, a lot - vote for someone that they can relate to, rather than someone that is the most capable person to lead the nation. It's a concept that the RNC understands all too well, but one that the DNC has never seemed to figure out. Exhibit A: President George W. Bush. Exhibit B: Two terms(!). QED.

Speaking of President Bush... he beat two opposing tickets that both featured two Democratic senators. Does the DNC (and really it must have been the DNC pulling the trigger on the Biden pick) honestly believe that another two-Senator ticket is going to be enough to get it done this time? With the Palin pick reaping dividends, I have my doubts... and I'm sure Sen. Obama is having doubts (about the Biden pick) as well.

So what does Gov. Palin bring to the table? She has single-handedly re-invigorated the GOP base that were always lukewarm to the "RINO" McCain. Furthermore, she strengthens Sen. McCain's bonafides with respect to energy policy... where McCain has a clear advantage. And what does Sen. Biden bring to the table? Not much really. However, he detracts significantly from Sen. Obama's reasonable foreign policy strengths. If you judge the presidential candidates by the choices they make rather than the promises they can easily break, then Sen. McCain makes a very strong case with his VP choice. Sen. Obama bombed with Biden.

So will (as a friend of mine suggests) Gov. Palin either resign or sabotage McCain's campaign? That would imply the Palin pick is incredibly bad... worse than Cheney (2000)? or Edwards (2004)? or even Dan Quayle (1988)? None of those three resigned and two of those three were winners, yet... all three of those are arguably much poorer picks than Gov. Palin (imho). Palin resign? The selection of Gov. Palin is not even the worst VP pick in 2008.

Mitt Romney and Mormonism
A few days ago a good friend of mine sent me a chain e-mail letter expressing concerns about how the press was unfairly treating Mitt Romney, a Republican presidential candidate, because Mr. Romney happens to be Mormon. Included in the letter was a link to an essay written by Orson Scott Card titled "Is Mitt Romney Serious?". Like most forwarded chain e-mail letters, I gave it a cursory scan and then dismissed the entire matter out of hand as just a bunch of Mormons exhibiting their persecution complex.

But then today, while browsing the opinion pieces at TownHall.com, I stumbled on what I can only describe as a "Mormon hit piece" written by Frank Pastore titled "Mitt Romney, Mormonism and the Presidency of the United States". Here are some lowlights:

Historically, our largely Christian country has chosen to elect Christian candidates (not that there have been many non-Christian candidates). In the last two presidential elections, church attendance was the most reliable indicator of voting preferences. It's no coincidence that the Democrats this time around are determined to appear more religious (i.e., more evangelical friendly) in order to win the White House. Yet, if appearing more religious in this majority-Christian nation is an electoral advantage, then being from a faith other than Christianity presents a new set of challenges. And therein lies the problem for the Romney campaign. [emphasis mine]

Yes, Mormons aren't Christians... blah blah blah. But Mr. Pastore doesn't stop there. While he is patronizing the Mormons on the one hand ("Mormons are among the finest people I've ever met"), he can't help but continue to cast our religion in the most negative light possible:

Yet many Mormons in recent years have taken to calling themselves Christians, and a growing number of Christians are willing to speak of Mormonism as something akin to another Christian denomination. But, Mormonism is not a Christian denomination, nor is it merely "a non-Christian religion." To be theologically precise, though perhaps politically incorrect, Mormonism is a cult of Christianity (www.apologeticsindex.org/c09a01.html) - a group that claims to Christian while denying one or more central doctrines of the Christian faith.

Wow. With friends like these, who needs enemies!

(Update Fri May 4 09:31:50 PDT 2007 // Pastore is still hammering away at Mormons in his recent column using a definition of "cult" as provided by evangelicals themselves, see his column dated April 28th, "Mormonism: Religion, Denomination, or Cult?". His defintion of "cult" essentially boils down to "those who don't agree with me" - which is nothing shy of soft bigotry.)