Sarah Palin

So the common wisdom is that you’re not supposed to talk about religion or politics in polite company. Of course, I talk about religion incessantly here, and also, I’m pretty sure you’re not supposed to talk about your transgender issues in polite company, so I guess this blog isn’t “polite company” (whatever that even means). And that means I can talk about politics too.

So here’s the deal.  I consider myself a conservative, but it’s hard for me to identify with the Republican party right now.  It seems like right now you either get tax-and-spend Democrats, or don’t-tax-and-still-spend Republicans.  Also, their idea of a “social conservative” is Mike Huckabee, who sincerely believes that anybody who does not look, think and act just like he does is the demon spawn of Satan. It’s not enough to defend the family. We have to actively hate gay people (and anybody else who’s different), because obviously God (or at least Huckabee’s god) hates them too. I guarantee he would have a problem with a Mormon (ack!) with GID (eek!).

Anyway, my personal political philosophy is considered extremely radical by most.  I think that the Federal government should do maybe 5% or less of what it currently does.  Welfare, agriculture, education, environment, energy—these things are not powers given the Federal government in the Constitution, and the 10th Amendment says that therefore it’s none of their business.  The states can do that stuff if they’re so inclined, but not the feds.  I believe the federal government should have strong power in its specifically-delegated areas:  Defense, interstate commerce, patents and copyrights, treaties, and a few others (ironically, in 1789, this would have made me a radical liberal, in an era when people were very suspicious of any centralized government).  I also believe in courts strongly protecting those rights actually enumerated in the Constitution (and I’m a Complete Incorporationist).   In other words, I’m Hugo Black.

So my point is, I’m not thrilled about John McCain.  To me, he represents the corrupt, rotten establishment.  He’s a career politician.  He’s been in Congress WAY too long, and he’s owned by the lobbyists.  He sponsored the crassly unconstitutional McCain-Feingold Act (i.e., you don’t get to run ads criticizing the incumbent in the 30 days running up to the election—somehow, a plurality of justices on the Supreme Court found no problem with this).

Then yesterday, out of the blue, I check the news in the morning, and I see that “Sarah Palin” has boarded a plane from Alaska to Ohio, and there’s a rumor that she may be a surprise VP nominee.  Sarah who?  I spent the entire morning meeting with a client, so I didn’t find out right away what had happened.  But then while I was having lunch with one of the partners, he commented on how interesting it could be to have the “Mormon vs. the Black Man” presidential race.  So I fired up the Blackberry to see if McCain had picked Romney like I expected—and saw that he had picked Sarah Palin. Again, Sarah who?

Later that day, I did some extensive research on Mrs. Palin (consisting of reading her Wikipedia entry).  My thoughts.

Pros:

• She cuts taxes AND spending (!!!) (i.e., she cut taxes in Alaska, and they had a budget surplus) (!!!)
• She actually fires incompetent government employees.
• She exposes corrupt politicians, including those of her own party.
• She canceled a shady oil deal that the previous governor made that would have benefited her husband’s seasonal employer (also, her husband has a real job).
• She sold the ex-governor’s extravagant executive jet on e-Bay
• She’s a mother of five (this may be a con if she were running for President, because I don’t know where a mother of five would find time to be President; fortunately, the VP doesn’t really have to do anything anyway).
• All the liberal talking heads hate her.
• The famously corrupt Alaska good-ol’-boys legislature seems to hate her.
• She’s a real conservative, meaning if she were ever President, she would appoint good justices (seriously, “W” hasn’t been stellar in many areas, but wow, Roberts and Alito versus Kennedy and O’Connor makes Reagan look like Dennis Kucinich in comparison).
• The biggest dirt her enemies in the legislature could dig up is she fired an incompetent bureaucrat who was also the boss of her sister’s ex-husband, and somebody in her office (whom she later disciplined) may have suggested that the incompetent bureaucrat discipline the ex, maybe.  Also, when she fired the incompetent bureacrat, she wanted to give him another chance, so she offered him another position where his incompetence in managing state troopers wouldn’t have mattered, but he declined.

Cons:

• John McCain is running for President instead of her.

I’ve heard people complaining about John McCain not caring about the country by choosing this inexperienced running mate.  Whatever.  In my opinion, political “experience” generally translates into corruption (I’m also a big fan of term limits).  I like the resume I see—the one about cleaning up corruption and trimming down government waste.  Also, did I mention that she cuts taxes AND spending (!!!).  Where was this woman in primary season?

NOTE: I see from my search logs that apparently everybody wants to know about Palin’s religion. Wikipedia says she belongs to Assebly of God. No, she is not Mormon (where did that rumor come from?) But we’d be happy to have her.

UPDATE:  I read an interview with Palin in TIME in which she says she was baptized Catholic as an infant, but then her family started attending a non-denominational Christian church.  She now attends a non-denominational Christian Bible church.  Sarah Palin is the final authority on Sarah Palin’s religious beliefs, so my earlier research was incorrect.  Also, P-A-L-I-N.  Pronounced like “PAY-lin.”