Sarah Palin: Day Two

After having a day to absorb the Palin news, I find myself even more thrilled by this brilliant, brilliant choice. That's somewhat surprising to me, as usually this kind of thing fades with time. But the more I think about Sarah Palin as veep, the more I like it, especially because of the reactions it's generating from the opposition.

Here are my favorites:

1. "She's inexperienced! She's inexperienced! She's inexperienced!"

That's the battle cry of the Obama-ites who are frothing at the mouth, supposedly aghast due to the neophytism of McCain's second in command. "Boy, this takes away McCain's inexperience argument!" they hiss, pretending to be deeply concerned that such a political newcomer could be a heartbeat away from the presidency.

If you think about this for two seconds, it exposes just how intellectually bankrupt this argument is.

Experience matters, doesn't it, Obambites? So how, then, do you explain that your number one guy has less of it than McCain's number two? The Almighty Obama had been in the U.S. Senate for about a year before running for president full time. Prior to that, he'd been a state legislator and a "community organizer" - he's never had a lick of executive experience. Indeed, Sarah Palin is the only person on either ticket who's been a chief executive of anything. To paraphrase Jesse Jackson, Obama's never run anything but his mouth.

By throwing all their eggs in the experience basket, the Obama camp is forced to concede that experience matters, and pretty soon, someone's going to notice that the guy at the top of their ticket doesn't have any. In comparing Palin to Obama, Palin wins hands down. And when you realize that Palin is only auditioning for Apprentice Prez and Obama's the guy in charge, you suddenly discover which ticket has the dangerously thin resume.

2. "It's tokenism!"

Oh, gosh. You really want to go there, Obama? You really think that you'd be the Democratic nominee if your father were a white guy from Kentucky instead of Kenya and your name was Seymour Glutz?

This is just a variation on the inexperience argument, but it again highlights Obama's own weaknesses. And while there's no doubt her gender is generating excitement, it's not what's got the conservative base fired up. Had McCain tapped Kay Bailey Hutchison or Olympia Snowe, most of the GOP would be up in arms.

A few people have been stupid enough to compare this to the Harriet Myers pick, ignoring the fact that it was conservatives who forced Bush to withdraw a manifestly unqualified token candidate. Those same conservatives are embracing Palin wholeheartedly. The GOP just doesn't do tokenism the way the Democrats do - and have done with the Obama nomination.

3. "WE HATE HER!"

Go read the Huffington Post or the Daily Kos and see what the lefty consensus is. To say they're furious is to say that Michael Moore is somewhat portly. They can't contain their white-hot rage. They're all quick to say what a disaster this is for McCain and how it guarantees he'll lose, but they're just whistling past the graveyard. They also compare this to the Quayle pick, yet they're not responding the way they did to Quayle. They actually loved the Quayle pick; it allowed them to mock the GOP openly. Palin has more substance and grit; she's not as easy a target. They're not ridiculing her; they're just spitting at her.

They'd be far less exercised if McCain had really put his foot in it. Their fury is a sure sign that Beavis has finally done something right.