Rereading your comment, you are correct. I was skipping by too quickly.
Still, since you went ahead and decided to compare Palin to Reagan, I am astonished - since you are clearly an intelligent individual.
Reagan led a state of 20 million people with a varied economy that was the world’s 6th largest a diverse population and huge budgetary issues. Palin ran a town of 5000 and then a state of 600,000. The state pumps its money from the ground and from the federal government and sends it citizens a check.
Reagan was involved in politics and had thought deeply about them for decades. Palin thought the Russians were flying Sorties over Alaska.
For me, Palin is to be more appropriate compared to W. Bush then to Reagan. The tendency of the GOP to move from a party with an intellectual base to one of trying to only appeal to fans of professional wrestling is incredibly distressing. There are not bumper sticker answers to every problem.
McCain’s choice of this woman and Drill Baby Drill caused me to look at a 3rd party as America’s only hope.
What the hell ? Are you not tired of paying 3 or 4 bucks for a gallon of gasoline ?
How is “drill baby drill” a bad thing ?
Sarah Palin is smart. and she will prove the doubters wrong.
When did the Russians cease testing our Alaskan borders with aircraft?
It was not revealed until much later about the depth of Reagan’s thought. At the time the criticism of Reagan indicated that the bulk of our “intellectuals” thought he was a very shallow thinker, a cowboy movie star who could hardly match wits with their like. One rock idiot called him “Ronald Raygun” and many of that idiotic ilk picked up on it and there were many other epithets. When he made Norman Mailer look like what he was they were completely caught by surprise.
We really don’t know much about Sarah Palin but it is easy to tell that she is neither stupid nor unlearned as one would expect from a descendent of Baltic Jews, who were among the most intelligent and accomplished peoples in history.
As for Alaska: strategically it has been since World War Ii extremely important and its vast resources have made it a major player with our allies in the Far East as well as with the Russians who have never ceased their attempts to encroach upon it and us. Nor is it an easy state to govern because of its size and the diversity of its population and ecology. I don’t recall that there was any long term foe continually seeking to encroach upon California much less take over some of its land.