The eagerly anticipated national debut of Alaska Governor Sarah Palin as Senator John McCain’s Vice-President running mate did not disappoint. The ‘Hockey Mom’ in designer glasses or in her own vernacular, showing the distinction between a pit bull and a hockey mom was only that one of them wears lipstick, showed to a partisan crowd that the reputation may be well deserved. Her acceptance speech was laced with humor, toughness, competence, and Sarah Palin will be a force to be reckoned with on the political stage for some time to come. Some of her sharpest attacks were directed at Barack Obama, which is traditionally what candidates in those positions do by attacking the other Party’s Presidential nominee. The Republicans have touted Sarah Palin’s background on the Wasilla, Alaska City Council as well as becoming Mayor and eventually elected as the Governor of Alaska which has a territory 250 times the size of the State of Delaware. Sarah Palin’s experience and Executive responsibilities dwarf any of the other Presidential and Vice-Presidential candidates of either political party; eclipsing even those of Senator John McCain also.
Sarah was painfully effective in presenting the weakness of Barack’s scant political resume of Community Service Organizer to Illinois State Senator to United States Senator to President-Elect. She was correct to state that in the U.S. Senate Barack Obama passed no significant Legislation with his name on the Bill and that he only produced a couple of published memoirs worth noting. During the Democratic National Convention John McCain was lambasted by partisan Democratic speakers as voting with President George Bush at least 90% of the time, but can’t it also be said by the Republicans that Barack Obama voted with his own partisan Democrats 90% of the time, too. Perhaps the only noticeable hint of independence and working across the aisle was in his efforts to get a Senate Ethics Reform Bill passed into Law.
Sarah Palin has now publicly thrown down the gauntlet and accepted the challenge of National Political warfare and as Green Energy Advocate and former oilman and CEO of Mesa Petroleum, T. Boone Pickens one said, “If you want to play with the big boys, you have to learn how to block and tackle.” Sarah will undergo her “baptism of fire” including even more intense media scrutiny of her political career and answering reporters’ tough questions about her views on Immigration, Stem Cell Research, Roe vs. Wade, the Economy, Health Care, Gun Control, Torture (“Guantanamo detainees”), Social Security, The Budget Deficit, FISA, the Mortgage Crisis, The Global War on Terror, Israel and the Middle East (Saudi Arabia, Iran, Iraq, Syria), Nuclear Weapon proliferation, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Global Warming, North Korea, Russia, India, China, Pakistan, Afghanistan, and many other such complex issues.
To Barack Obama’s credit, at least he has had to endure a grueling and brutal eighteen month Primary, not to mention engaging in around 20 televised public debates as well as being the subject numerous relentless interviews, investigations, etc. Sarah Palin has criticized Barack Obama as being essentially nothing but all “flash” but without any real substance or in the politically-correct jargon, “he doesn’t have any realistic solutions.” Well, Sarah, the challenge for you is like the question that Hillary Clinton posed regarding Barack Obama during the Presidential Primaries, and that is, “Can he take a punch [to the chin]?” So Sarah, when the attack dogs are unleashed on you and start ripping away, don’t whine and complain about the biased Liberal Media or try to play the ‘victim’ or the equivalent of a political feminizing White Hockey Mom/White-working Women-with-a-Family against the Male-dominated World card because it won’t work.
Already there is a small and perhaps insignificant Ethics investigation amid questions as to whether Sarah Palin as Governor of Alaska used undue influence to fire the Public Safety Commissioner because he refused to terminate a State Trooper who was married to Sarah Palin’s sister while they were going through a bitter and nasty divorce. This is just the beginning of woes and although Sarah’s Star is shining very brightly in the Republican Heaven for the moment; however, in an instant all of this could change and suddenly her political future can be dashed down to ‘Hell’ faster than you can blink an eye.
Robert Randle
776 Commerce St. #B-11
Tacoma, WA 98402
September 4, 2008
pbks@hotmail.com
