Other VPs didn’t field dress moose

Letter to the editor
Published: September 11, 2008

Editor:

One thing’s for sure, Sarah Palin will be the most watched vice-presidential candidate in memory. “Sarah Palin” gets more Google hits than either Obama or McCain. Of course not all those searchers are fans of hers.

Part of the interest is simply because she is so new to the national scene and so different from our usual VP fodder. I don’t recall Dan Quayle or Al Gore field dressing any moose.

Many right wing voters were skeptical of McCain’s conservative credentials. Most are now on board, in part because his age and past health problems make her ascension a very real possibility.

But Palin supporters know that she comes with some risks. She got her first passport last year. I’ve not heard she’s even spent much time in the lower 48. I assume she now has a full-time geography tutor trying to gaffe-proof her.

It appears to be a Republican game plan to try to turn any criticism of her record as attacks on her by the left wing media. Hopefully issues related to her family will fade but she still has to come clean about things like her attempts to paint herself as a reformer by saying she killed the “bridge to nowhere” when actually she was only too happy to take the fed money and only killed the project after Congress said Alaska had to pay for most of it.

Then there was her video welcome to the Alaskan Independence Party’s April Convention. The group’s goal is to split Alaska off from the U.S. She told them to “keep up the good work.”

But her biggest negative may be that she undermines the McCain campaign’s effort to paint Barack Obama as inexperienced.

But it will make a more closely watched race if that is possible.

Robert Legge
Etlan