McCain’s choice

One thing’s for sure about John McCain’s choice of Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska as his vice-presidential running mate: It will shake things up, at least for a while. The real test of its wisdom will come after the surprise and excitement have worn off and voters have time to think about the implications.
In one important respect, McCain’s choosing Palin was not a risk at all, or even a bold departure. She is an ideal candidate to shore up McCain’s credentials with the Republican Party’s right-wing conservatives, an important branch of the party that has been wary of McCain’s maverick reputation.
Palin has the positions to please that constituency: The mother of five, including a Down’s syndrome baby, she’s staunchly anti-abortion. In her not-quite-two years as the governor of Alaska, she’s pleased conservatives by cutting taxes and championing reforms. A longtime member of the National Rifle Association, she likes to hunt. She has questioned the threat of global warming, favors drilling for oil in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, opposes the designation of polar bears as an endangered species and favors shooting wolves from airplanes.
The GOP right was quick to praise McCain’s choice, and while there was never any danger of many in that branch of the party voting for Barack Obama, they might have stayed home, or at least not mobilized to work for McCain.
While McCain was smart to choose someone who would excite that important constituency, the question is whether he might have chosen someone better known and safer who could have accomplished the same thing, someone such as former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney.
The answer must be that McCain figured that Palin would have the added benefit of winning votes from women, especially the disaffected Hillary Clinton supporters. That’s a gamble. Palin is a strong, attractive woman who’s had considerable success in politics in Alaska. She’s apparently done a good job of combining career and family life. She might win some votes from women who are swing voters, those without strong party identification.
But it’s a stretch to think that many active Democratic women are going to vote for the McCain-Palin ticket simply because Palin is a woman. Many of them supported Clinton not just because she is a woman but because she is a woman who stood for issues they believe in. They are unlikely to overlook Palin’s anti-choice, anti-environmental and anti-gun-control positions, for example, especially when control of the U.S. Supreme Court for decades to come could be in the balance.
The single biggest risk in McCain’s choosing Palin is her youth and inexperience. It’s not just that he may have made it very difficult to continue to criticize Obama, who is a few years older than Palin and has more relevant experience, as unready to lead. It’s also that as the oldest presidential candidate ever, and one who has had serious health problems, McCain probably should have had as his No. 1 criterion choosing the running mate who would be most qualified to assume the presidency on short notice. He may have a tough time convincing voters that, considering all those candidates available to him, he made the best decision in that regard.
McCain has made a bold choice. The Republicans have their time in the spotlight this week, and then the campaigns begin in earnest. The debates should be worth watching.

—Winston-Salem Journal