Had he been running against Obama rather than McCain he would have stood a better-than-even chance of winning IMO.
> He wouldn’t have picked Palin, and wouldn’t have gotten my vote.
I wouldn’t have picked Palin, either. Even now I’m not so sure about her.
Beyond dispute, she is a talented administrator and she is beyond dispute popular in Alaska and beyond dispute she can make tough calls guided by a moral compass that is well-calibrated exactly to where it should be: True North. Beyond dispute she is intelligent. And beyond dispute she is everything a Conservative should be.
Beyond dispute she is young and attractive and beyond dispute she is articulate and beyond dispute she represents a segment in society that has been under-represented in the Oval Office. (These latter three points are all that Obama as going for him BTW).
So why aren’t I sure about her? Why not select her for POTUS or for VP?
That’s a tough one. I think what it comes down to is this: people polarize on Sarah Palin very easily: they either love her or hate her. They take extreme positions and they keep them.
She is also really easy to charicature and ridicule, through no fault of her own. So was Reagan.
Given the chance to vote for Sarah Palin, I would vote for her in a heartbeat. Given the chance to select your next POTUS or VP candidate, I’d take a look at the talent pool, see who else might be lurking in there. They tell me Bobby Jindal is pretty good, for instance...
The only reason McCain got my vote was because he chose Palin. I voted for her not him. I would have voted for Guiliani regardless of who he chose as VP.
Then again, I would have voted for anyone but Obama.
Unlike McCain, Guiliani doesn’t give a damn about the media or about how we’re viewed overseas.