I volunteered for McCain on my own dime Solely due to palin. I spent a lot of money traveling to help out because i knew thugbama would be a death knell to this nation. you have no idea the sick feeling I had in my stomach the day after the election, all of which panned out, but way worse.
Well, I voted for McCain too, I just didn’t see any other reasonable way around it. And like you, a good part of that was due to Sarah Palin.
I actually have a connection to McCain, however small. He was, for several months back in 1975 into 1976, my Commanding Officer. He was the commanding officer of VA-174 which was a training squadron. Of course, at the time I knew who he was and what he was all about even if not many others did not at the time. Being a military brat and living overseas, I knew a lot of those POWs by name, we wore the metal bracelets and all those kinds of things.
I admit that it took me some time to come to grips with the negative aspects of McCain with respect to his personal and political attitudes. It wasn’t that I couldn’t intellectually see them, it was just that emotionally I couldn’t bring it to myself to attach them to him. It was a kid thing, but we idolized all of those guys.
Funny, hadn’t really thought of that aspect much for a long time, but we used to do goofy things that kids used to do playing Army and such, and I can remember one time being “captured” by a friend on the other side, and I remember saying something to the effect of “Okay, I’ll be Commander Denton, and you have to be the North Vietnamese guard…”