Palin Shuffle

A few years ago, President Clinton was on the daily show. He said that all one needed to be a democrat was to think. Little has changed in that truism. I am watching the Charles Gibson interview with Palin and the words that come to mind are subterfuge, misdirection and embarrasing. Much like the McCain interviews the past few days, it consisted of not answering questions, blurring the past and present, ignoring the inconsistencies in record and message and pretending to offer change when it is clear it is more of the same.

She seems to have little knowledge of foreign affairs (including the comment that she is sending her son to redeem America for 9/11 after all the evidence linking Iraq to 9/11 has been refuted over and over again), talked about reforming Washington while it is clear she has strong relationships with lobbyists, a long record of getting money for her town and then the state of Alaska and dancing around the truth of the Bridge to Nowhere. She also appears to know little of how Washington works or where these cuts she offers will come from. She talks about tax cuts and shrinking government, while she raised sales taxes in her own town and created a huge budget deficit. She claims tax cuts for the rich are what all Americans want and continues to lie about what Obama is offering (middle class tax cuts and higher taxes for those earning over $250,000). And she is socially conservative to a radical extent.

McCain is doing equally absurd dancing around his record and turn toward lobbyists in recent years (including the top advisors to his campaign). He appears to have huge lunanas in his own foreign policy experience and real understanding of economics (supporting supply side economics and trickle down theories long disavowed even by their original advocates). I think the two are embarassing, their campaign is embarassing and a victory by them would be an embarassement to the country.