Continue to beat that dead horse, will ya?
Posted on 09/11/2008 3:03:21 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin is certainly one of the more interesting and controversial characters to emerge in the national political scene of late. Sen. John McCain's (R-Ariz.) selection of her to be his running mate was widely reported to be last-minute, a compromise choice when advisers and party insiders expressed concern over his preferred pick, independent Sen. Joseph Lieberman. The pick smacked of desperation, and it seems clear now that McCain's camp didn't have time to vet Palin in the way it might have liked.
But it may ultimately go down as a serendipitous oversight—and provide guidance to future candidates to eschew the overly risk-averse vetting process and be willing to take chances—to look outside the Beltway establishment for political talent. Palin wowed the GOP convention last week, may have united the party, and won begrudging praise from the very punditocracy and media elites she skewered in her speech.
If Palin helps McCain get elected, he'll of course have no regrets about having selected her. But it's worth wondering whether if McCain's campaign had vetted Palin more thoroughly, she'd have made the cut. I suspect not.
It's now been widely reported that McCain's biggest selling point on Palin—that she's been a trailblazer on pork-barrel spending, one of McCain's pet issues—was off-base. Palin did eventually oppose the infamous "Bridge to Nowhere," but only as of late last year, only after initially supporting it, and only after the two Alaska politicians most associated with the bridge—Republican Sen. Ted Stevens and Republican Rep. Don Young—were under federal investigation. Palin then still took the money for the bridge, she just diverted it to other projects. This was hardly political courage.
Over the course of her brief career, Palin has also had no qualms about working with Young and Stevens to procure federal dollars for local projects—at least until she was savvy enough to realize that public sentiment had turned sour on the process. Under Palin's stewardship, Alaska still leads the nation in per capita spending on federal pork projects, and under her tenure as mayor, the town of Wasilla raked in $26 million in federal earmarks.
Now, you could argue that a governor or mayor who's able to deftly game the earmark system to the advantage of her constituents is only doing what's expected of her. The problem, of course, is that McCain introduced Palin as a maverick reformer of the earmark process—someone who risked her career to fight waste and abuse and to take on Alaska's GOP establishment. That simply isn't true.
But perhaps Palin has learned from the experience. She is at least on the right side of the issue now. And as a libertarian, there's plenty I like about Palin. I don't agree with many of her culturally conservative positions, but she has for the most part declined to enshrine those views in public policy. Her lack of experience doesn't bother me much at all. Washington's in desperate need of fresh blood and fresh ideas, not the promotion of another five-term senator who's found a permanent home in the Beltway morass.
But what I like about Palin should bother McCain. Palin actually has staked out unorthodox positions on a number of interesting issues, and they're issues that McCain and the Republican base that has embraced her would probably find troubling. Palin's taken a lot of heat, for example, for her (relatively loose) ties with the Alaska Independence Party, an organization that favors a vote on whether the state should secede from the union. Palin has also been friendly with the state's Libertarian Party. Palin's willingness to engage pro-liberty, deeply anti-federal political organizations—even fringe ones—is refreshing. But it's wholly at odds with John McCain's "country first" nationalist fervor.
Palin was also one of just three governors in the country to issue a proclamation in support of "Jurors' Rights" day, an event sponsored by the Fully Informed Jury Association, which encourages the doctrine of jury nullification. Nullification is an idea abhorred by tough-on-crime conservatives.
Palin also comes from a state whose constitution has one of the strongest privacy provisions in the country. Alaska's traditional reverence for privacy and personal autonomy is reflected in a number of issues that would likely be at odds with the national Republican Party—or at least the Bush administration—including a rejection of the Real ID Act, and the de facto decriminalization of marijuana.
Palin supported both the Iraq War and the surge, but in the past she has said she also supports a defined "exit strategy," an approach explicitly rejected by McCain, who has said we may well be in Iraq for decades.
Palin's persona thus far seems to be more in the tradition of Alaska's frontier, individualistic conservatism than John McCain's Weekly Standard-style national greatness conservatism. It's a philosophy that's skeptical of government, instead of what Repubilcans stand for now, which is to embrace government, so long as Republicans are running it.
Of course, John McCain is still at the top of the ticket. If he's elected, it will be his policies and philosophy that determine public policy, not Palin's. And there's the strong possibility that Palin's views will morph during a McCain administration to align more with his—indeed, on foreign policy that seems to have already happened.
But of all the aspiring politicians McCain could have boosted into the national spotlight of a presidential campaign, he could have done a lot worse than Palin. If she manages to hold on to her more individualist, limited-government instincts, she'd be a welcome force in a party that has generally abandoned its "leave-us-alone" constituency—thanks in no small part to the man at the top of the ticket. She's certainly a world away from Joe Lieberman, McCain's reported favored pick.
In short, John McCain may have actually made a good pick this month—in spite of himself.
Continue to beat that dead horse, will ya?
Agree with a lot of it (especially) if she stay true to her conservative individual self (not big-government Republican-AKA the “insiders” which is Party leadership). Don’t agree with his opposition to “social conservtism”. Libertarian and Social Conservative aren’t mutually exclusive (especially for those who understand the US Constitution and know the court prescedent).
Love her even more !!
I'm pretty sure they already have...
Yes, they need to build a Party that wins contested elections and actually governs.
Amen.
The Libertarian Party is out of touch with reality.
THIS libertarian is a proud barracuda-head!
“Who cares what loosertarians think?”
You can be critical of the article without insulting enthusiastic McCain/Palin supporters who are libertarians like myself. The great speeches by Republicans that drive the crowds wild are libertarian to the core.
I agree with you. I don’t think much of the LP. Boortz is a pretty good representative (his occasional un-friendly Christian comments aside) of my libertarian views.
There seems to be a (hugh) disconnect right now between libertarians, and Libertarians.
Libertarians, got hopelessly stuck, somewhere along the way.
They don’t get it. They don’t get national defense. They don’t get national interests. They’re too focused on dope, frankly they’re too much like liberals.
libertarians admire Republicans like Palin.
libertarians can’t imagine anything on earth more inspiring, than a woman who believes in rugged individualism,
who shoots. :)
She’s perfect. Ronald Reagan. But better!!
I agree completely. I’ve been disenchanted with the LP for years, but I am a firm believer in libertarianism and I think the GOP is the best hope we have for it. I have never been so excited about a political candidate in my life as I am about Sarah Palin. I’m registered independant now but I decided to register Republican after hearing Palin’s convention speech.
When I hear broad philisophical speeches by Republicans I think, that’s me. If they lived up to it we’d be in great shape! :)
There is one thing that doesn’t sit well with me about a lot of Republicans and that is the tendancy for Republican cheerleading. I’m an American and a conservative before a member of any political party. In fact the party couldn’t mean less to me except as a means to (strive for) an end: liberty.
OK, disgruntled former Hillary supporters have their movement: PUMAS.
I say, there are more of us, than anyone can imagine.
(probably more right here on FR, than a lot of regulars suspect)
We need a name. :)
Heh, that sounds good to me! We definately should have a name! :)
What in the world to call a political movement, which believes in freedom, America and standing up resolutely at every turn, for America’s interests?
“Free trade” conservatives couldn’t care less about American interests — they focus to a fault on the freedom part, to the detriment of country.
The LP likewise, really doesn’t get the fact we live in a dangerous world, and need to protect our interests.
George Bush represents an aspect of conservatism which understands the importance of defense — but with all due respect he’s out to lunch and then some, on the border.
Pat Buchanan drove a Mercedes for crying out loud, before someone called him on it.
There really doesn’t seem to be anyone (other than Palin) who gets it.
It’s a challenge. No question.
NEW FEDERALIST ?
I can’t take credit because I heard someone use it. But after all, as a political system, federalism is what embodies the principle of Local Control, Private Property, and Constitutional Rights based on Natural Law.
That’s my two cents.
One more thing.......The OLD FEDERALIST were the ones who supported the Constitution in the first place. Hard core libertarians like Patrick Henry opposed it. Then they went off the deep end with Adams and the various extreme measures like the Alien/Sedition Acts that led to the formation of the Democrat/Republicans of Jefferson.
Somethings brewing out there with Sarah. Who better represents local control, individual rights and national patriotism then Palin today ? Which is why I think she is getting traction.
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