Well, here’s the way I see it. The 2008 election is a lost cause. Either way, we’re going to wind up with a President McCain or a President Hopenchange. But if McCain were to win, that puts Palin in an excellent position to secure the 2012 nomination. What do we wind up with in 2012 if Hopenchange wins?

2012 nomination?  Hell, she stands a damn good chance of getting sworn in by 2010.

It’s over for McPalin.  The pregnancy scandal will burst whatever boost the GOP ploy hoped to attain.

Btw, SA, the Hannah Montana/Hendrix analogy was a stroke of genius.

Well . . . the thing is, between Obama and McCain I can’t make a choice.  They’re both horrible, and while one must be a better choice than the other, I really can’t decide because they’re so mealy-mouthed and wishy-washy.

So, considering I can’t really make a reasoned choice between Evil #1 and #2 this time around, I think my only hope is to vote for McCain and pray that he dies in office.

Even if Palin is pro-Iraq War, she’d still be better than McCain or Obama.  Besides, it’s not like my vote will matter anyway, right? :)

It is fair to assume that Mrs. Palin’s daughter’s condition was known during the vetting process.  Rather than viewing this as a scandal, instead consider it a way to further cement the support of the pro-life and Christian fundamentalist wings of the Republican Party in a way that The Mad Bomber could never have done on his own.  I will be writing in Ron Paul for president this November, and I realize that whichever sad excuse for a human being wins the White House, the general public is screwed.  But, I am beginning to think that Palin’s selection for V.P. will carry the day for the Republicans.  She is the only person on either ticket that the voters can really identify with.  Unlike any other person running on either major party ticket, she is apparently: conservative, honest, and sane.  She does not associate with known terrorists, nor does she get a sweetheart deal on real estate from another Chicago machine slickster. So far, she has not even been accused of plagiarism! She is also bravely facing issues that most Americans can face, which is likely going to result in sympathetic support in the voting booth.  I think this whole scenario will radically alter the dynamics of this election.

The establishment is in such control of The Stupid Party that we ought look at the choice of Palin as a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.

We all recognise that a Phillips, Buchanan, or Paul can not garner enough votes in the Republican Primaries to win the nomination. There are many reasons, previously rehearsed in here, why that is so.

So, refusing to vote for McCain - Palin, while understandable, will result in another Neo-Con at the head of The Stupid Party Ticket next time around.

The choice of Palin was totally unexpected. Conversely, the refusal of too many Paleos to capitalise on this singular opportunity was very predictable.

I sometimes think that when it comes to politics, the Paleos are no different than religious Donatists.

Few are those considered pure enough for them.

Amen, brother!

Scandal?  What Scandal?  We don’t live in America any more, it’s Jerry Springer Land now. Don’t the majority of this site’s readers understand that there are no such things as traditional American values anymore? The only kind of thing that’s scandalous in America today is being linked to neo-Nazis, the KKK, or Iran.  A few years ago, I watched a TV interview of recent immigrants to America.  One of the interviewees was an older South Asian(Hindu) woman.  She stated flat out that she and her family wanted no part of America “culture”.  They were here to earn as much money as possible, and no other reason.  As she said, “America is a country of bastards.”

I know a number of parents of teenage daughters.  The vast majority of them pray fervently that they can get them through school sans pregnancy.  Sometimes, the prayers are answered with a grandchild born out of wedlock, despite the best efforts of parents.  This is one of the fears that many families have, and they can consequently identify with the anguish felt by the Palins over this matter.  Our Lord frequented such fallen people, including the Samaritan Woman at the Well.  But then perhaps His standards are not as high as those of the xman.

a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity

this singular opportunity

Seriously--what’s the evidence?  That she wore a Buchanan button in 1999 when greeting Pat at the airport, and a couple days letter wrote a letter to the editor denying that she was a Buchanan supporter?

For this, we overlook her lack of experience, the fact that she’s clearly an affirmative-action choice which guarantees that every Republican ticket from now on will have to have a woman on it, her willingness to support a man that you, Spartacus, don’t find worthy of support on his own?

Think about that last point: Anyone who has his doubts about McCain needs to ask himself why he doesn’t have doubts about a woman who apparently has no doubts about McCain.

The idea that she’s some sort of deep-cover paleo is nuts.  The paleo women I know are homeschooling their children and raising questions about why a mother with an infant child would brag about going back to work three days after his birth (let alone potentially put his life in danger in order to make sure that she could deliver a speech at the Republican Governors Conference in order to impress John McCain).

During the campaign she’ll be dutifully playing Hannah Montana’s tune, but after she’s elected she will have a chance to solo, as Jimi Hendrix actually did when he was the opening act for the Monkees.  The difference is that this time, it won’t be only the Monkees fans (mainstream Republicans) who’ll be listening.

The Jim-Webb-as-VP-candidate analogy is flawed as well.  Webb represents a faction of the ruling elite which has unlimited access to the media.  He delivered the Democratic response to Bush’s State of the Union speech.  Palin, if she really is a Buchananite, represents a tiny group of outsiders whose main problem is their lack of media access.  If Palin is elected VP, it will matter more what she says on TV than what she does in DC.  In 2012 or (God forbid) 2016, she can run as a conservative against the Obama or McCain establishment.  This will give conservatives another chance to get their voices heard.

It’s nice to see there are some individuals out there still capable of thought.  From Virginia, WHO LOVES YA!?  Keep the Faith!  Ron Paul!!!!!!!

The question is not the Samaritan Woman’s morals.  The question is her mother’s adequacy.

I would prefer to write in a vote for Ron Paul.  However.....

I will probably vote for McCain. I don’t think that Palin will have any influence on McCain’s decisions; especially on the foreign policy front (Is that a positive or a negative...I don’t know). She may have some influence (a small amount) regarding Domestic policy.  I don’t think that the American public wants another Cheney-like veep.

I have to agree with the pundits that her selection was either the result of “genius” or “incredible
stupidity.”

She comes across as a populist (which is what many Repubicans liked about Huckabee).

Obama will win NYS..unless some sort of miracle happens.  So, it probably doesn’t matter who I vote for this year.

It is unfortunate that Palin’s place on the ticket won’t persuade the Republicans to have Ron Paul speak at the convention.  He has an excellent grassroots organization and he reflects the will of many Americans.

Why not Ron Paul for VP?  As long as that low-life broad is out ....

uh oh

http://markhalperin.files.wordpress.com/2008/09/magcover.jpg

Lester,
Thanks for the link.  What makes this so sad is that Palin and her husband (and McCain) knew that her daughter’s pregnancy would be revealed to the world and that her poor daughter’s entire life would become the subject of tabloids and crass jokes.  Yet, instead of protecting her daughter and her privacy by refusing the VP offer, she (and presumably her husband) decided to accept the offer.  I suspect that political calculation and ambition won out over the natural instinct to protect one’s child and it appears to be working – at least with evangelicals and other self-styled conservatives.  Why so-called family values conservatives are actively encouraging a young mother of small children to abandon them for the benefit of a stooge like McCain is beyond me.  Heck, I’d have reservations about a father who was prepared to abandon his young children for the benefit of McCain.  The problem is made more acute when it is realized that she’ll have zero positive influence on McCain, that this is all an obvious trick to win the election and that the GOP will never, and I mean never, do anything substantial on abortion.

jospeh- I thought you said “and her husband (mcain)” hahaha

yeah it’s too bad.  I’m mostly upset with mcain for plucking her before she was ripe so to speak.

a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity…
this singular opportunity

Seriously--what’s the evidence?

She appears to be an authentic Christian Conservative but the reality of who she is and the possibilities she presents are being buried beneath boxes of freshly baked political Donatism.

This site has had Daily Kos rumors repeated here; this site has quoted political enemies from within her own party as though what they said must be probative as to her character and competence; this site has had political priests declaring her unclean and unworthy to be considered “one of us.”

That this is a singular and once-in-a-lifetime opportunity is evidenced by the reality The Stupid Party has never chosen a woman as VEEP, and certainly not a woman like Sarah Palin. And there is not one poster or write-backer here who predicted she would be chosen as VEEP (at least as far as I remember).

If considering the possibility of positive results from her selection is malum in se I’ll admit to not having been properly Catechised in Paleo Doctrine.

I confess I am worse than a Paleo-heretic. In this matter, I am a florid apostate.

Happily so.

A take home message from this should be that 17 year olds should not be allowed to date unsupervised. While a parent can’t follow their kid around all the time, allowing unsupervised dating is foolish.

So, Spartacus, I asked a direct question--what’s the evidence?--and you responded with no evidence.  Instead, you pointed to people on this site opposing her. 

That this is a singular and once-in-a-lifetime opportunity is evidenced by the reality The Stupid Party has never chosen a woman as VEEP

So, the choice of a woman as vice president is ipso facto good?  This, from a traditional Catholic?

and certainly not a woman like Sarah Palin

But that’s precisely the point, isn’t it?  Our “evidence” that she is something special as a woman is not that she’s pro-life--like most conservative women her age--but that she’s supposedly some sort of paleo sympathizer.  And that’s based on one report that she wore a Buchanan button in 1999--which she denied at the time meant anything.

So, again, what’s the evidence?  Where does she stand on immigration, trade, Islam, the new Cold War that McCain is trying to foist on us?  Heck, where does she stand on embryonic stem-cell research?  McCain has proved that you can claim to be pro-life AND support the destruction of embryos.

Or are you really suggesting that the choice of a woman outweighs all of those things?

I note, too, that you didn’t address the question of whether her support for McCain calls her judgment into question.

I think far too many people are letting the wish become the father of the thought.  Like James Dobson, they were looking for a reason to vote for McCain or at least against Obama, and they’re using this ridiculous nomination as the excuse.

A pox on both their houses.

The next president will either be McCain or Obama.Some on the right can knit pick to doomsday-and I think doomsday is BHO.BO would be the most leftist president ever.My vote goes to McCain.BHO represent multiculturalism and liberalism run wild and he is my worst nightmare.

I think people are confusing the woman taken in adultery with the Samaritan aka the woman at the well. The adulteress was caught in sin once and forgiven. The Samaritan woman seemed like an innocent woman but had lived with a string of men. Hopefully the daughter is more the former. A lot of Christians I know are of the later and spend most of their time throwing rocks at other sinners trying to con people into thinking they are the true Christians. Christ took the rocks out of peoples hands. Love the sinner, hate the sin, unless you can drag Him into the sordid political sewer to make cheap points or provide cover for those rocks.

Where are we getting the info that she was for Buchanan? Maybe she was in ‘96, but this link makes it clear she was for Steve Forbes in 2000, a serious error in judgment, IMO.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080902/ap_on_el_pr/cvn_palin_politics

Where are they getting the info?  Out of their desire for it to be true.

All that being written, Southern Avenger’s You Tube presentations are a joy to behold.

Good video, but I’d hardly consider Jim Webb to be “good on illegal immigration.” Although he campaigned as tough on immigration, he has become a great disappointment on this issue.

http://grades.betterimmigration.com/testgrades.php3?District=VA&VIPID=1211

So, Spartacus, I asked a direct question--what’s the evidence?--and you responded with no evidence.

Mr. Rovson. It is clear you did not like my response. It is also clear I did respond with factual evidence - evidence you later addressed and dismissed.

But that’s precisely the point, isn’t it?  Our “evidence” that she is something special as a woman is not that she’s pro-life--like most conservative women her age--but that she’s supposedly some sort of paleo sympathizer.

Paleo sympathizer? Please. The woman is happy, motivated, and the antithesis of a sandwich-board wearing, “The end is near, woe is we” defeatist, which, sad to say, appears to be the sine qua non of paleoconservatism.

She is a mythological character right out of the old west. She could have been a character in one of James Fenimore Cooper’s books. She is a virtual female Natty Bumpo; although she is bit more civilised, and a hell of a lot prettier.

But, the materialistic paleo-con can not appreciate who she is as a woman totally unique in our captious political system and so the paleo wearily, when not angrily, sets about the task of a dreary and desultory taxonomy that pins her down as an enemy of Paleo-conservatism without even bothering to notice just how unique she is and what a refreshing persona she presents as opposed to, say, Viagra Bob’s wife.

As far as I can tell, the paelo’s have thrown in the towel and will accept only those doomed to political failure.

Look, I like Ron Paul but the boy ain’t got soul and nine Americans voted for him. I suppose there is joy to be derived from pitching one’s tent amongst the Political Donatists and supporting only those who can never ever win but I have not given up on America.

I still hold out hope that incremental change can happen in America and Sarah Palin is an unanticipated gift to Christians and Conservatives yet far too many, especially paleos, race to dismiss her as beneath their standards.

Well, when reality kicks you in the teeth that your standards are impossibly high, you can preen that only the toothless are wise, or, you adjust those standards to vote into office those who can implement incremental change and, over a long period of time, move the country in the right political direction so that some day, and that day will come long after we die, the standards we treasure can be recognised as reasonable.

But such long-term strategery is never embraced by the paleocons.

Perfection or perdition are the sole scores given out to politicians parading before Paleocon judges.

Isn’t it ironic the paleos have become, functionally, those engaged in instant gratification?

That is just, another, example of how we,almost always, become like our enemies.

And once again, Spartacus, you’re spinning out words and providing no evidence.  You can go on and on at length, but you never once address the question of where she stands on any issue we think is important (other than abortion), nor do you address her eagerness to support McCain.

So, in the end, it does come down to this: The only evidence you offer is that she is a woman, and, apparently, that’s ipso facto good.

Once again, I thought you were a traditional Catholic.  It astonishes me that Catholics are all gaga over Mrs. Palin because of her “family values,” when right now she’s throwing those family values away.

Seriously--if we’re going to trumpet her virtues as a mother, don’t we need to balance those with her manifest failures?  By that, I don’t mean the pregnancy of her 17-year-old daughter, something which, even if Mrs. Palin had held a more traditional role, might still have happened.

Instead, I mean the choices that Mrs. Palin has made and is making.  Read her account of her youngest son’s birth.  She’d been leaking amniotic fluid for hours, but she refused to cancel a speech.  Why?  Political ambition--John McCain was in the audience.  She put her unborn son’s life at risk because, in her words, nothing was going to stop her from delivering that speech.

Now, when her 17-year-old daughter is pregnant, Mrs. Palin has thrown her under the wheels of the bus.  What kind of mother, knowing that her daughter will be subjected to intense national scrutiny and ridicule (did you watch the Tonight Show last night?) puts her own political ambitions ahead of her daughter’s well-being?

Ah, but she’s a woman, and the Republicans have never picked a woman!  It’s an historic moment!  One might even call it the audacity of hope!  Only a Donatist who loves wallowing in defeat could ever doubt that this is “a singular and once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.”

And only a progressive could believe that it is.

““what’s “conservative, honest, and sane” about rearing a whore of a daughter?” “

What’s conservative, honest or sane about writing like an angry, hormonally deranged 13 year old boy commenting on a youtube video? Do you realize what an embarrassment you are, both to 7th grade trolls everywhere and to the people who took you seriously enough to respond to your tirades with scripture verses and the like? Really, son, it’s time you got back to DailyKos.

Bristol Palin is pregnant at 17? Good for her. I hope it’s the first of many. Who is stranger, B. Palin or the legions of whites who stay in college into their mid 20’s and maybe have one kid before slipping into middle age? Too many white men and women will live childless and lay on their deathbed with only the cold consolation that they always practiced safe sex.  White people in this country need more children.

This Levi boy she is with is a strong, tough looking young guy. I think 9/10ths of Xman’s animosity is from how shabby looking he probably looks in comparison. Call
it the “he’d kick the crap out of me in a fight” syndrome. Men like that can make a good living and provide for their families in Alaska without ever having to waste tens of thousands of dollars and the best years of their lives being lectured by faggot professors. You tell me whose life is screwed up?

By the way, about Donatism…

The problem with the Donatists was that they insisted that those priests who had fallen from the faith no longer had spiritual authority even once they renounced their error and confessed their sins.

For your analogy to work, Mrs. Palin must have once been right, then apostatized, then returned to positions that most of us would consider correct.

There are two problems with that, however.  First, you don’t seem to believe that she ever abandoned the kinds of conservative positions that people on this site support; but second, and really more primary, you have yet to show that she ever supported such positions, other than being pro-life.  (You haven’t even yet offered evidence that she’s against embryonic stem cell research.)

In your desire to avoid discussing Mrs. Palin’s lack of any track record on any issues (other than abortion) that anyone on this site cares about, you’ve grabbed the wrong label.  (A little knowledge...) In the future, please use Jansenism instead of Donatism.  It will make for a better analogy--even though you’ll still be wrong.

I am voting for Obama even though he is too socially liberal, my brother and a couple of my cousins are in Iraq and Afghanistan - it is too important to get them out plus if McCain loses Palin is in the mix for president in 2012.

Was St. Pelagia cute?  Like Sarah Palin?

St. Pelagia of Antioch (both of them) are lovely. Real cheesecake of the 400s, and now beatified in heaven contributing to and participating in the unimaginable diven beauty of the place.

http://www.austindiocese.org/newsletter_article_view.php?id=887

McCain’s choice of Sarah Palin was very clever, and I am sure it will
cause a reshuffling among an x-number of U.S. voters for the Republican
ticket.  Her pro-life stand is most admirable.  Nevertheless, she is the
red herring by which voters will be distracted from the neocon game plan
McCain represents.  Not only that, McCain is actually pro-abortion, be-
cause he judges that abortion in the cases of rape, incest, and health
of the mother are justified.  Iraq and Afghanistan will continue.  The
economy will continue to slide into shambles.  Illegal aliens will con-
tinue to infiltrate our nation.  The national debt will continue to be
enlarged.  Gross taxation will continue to deprive us of our hard-earned
income, so that we will eventually identify with Third World inhabitants.
In other words, the Liberal agenda will continue the debasement of
our culture from its roots in Western Civilization and lead us to national
ruin.  The other side of the coin is Obama!  There is no choice.  I will
write in Ron Paul’s name on my ballot.

For your analogy to work, Mrs. Palin must have once been right, then apostatized, then returned to positions that most of us would consider correct.

Mr. Royson. I have been writing that it is the Paleos who are Political Donatists.

I have already addressed your other points but you appear to have a somewhat difficult time with reading comprehension.

But, I do have a soft spot in my heart for those, like everyone in my family, who think I possess a little knowledge (my family specialises in such excessive praise) and so I will just write that I am more interested in the genuine person of Sarah Palin and not her political positions.

Newt Gingrich had all the right po09litical positions (just ask all of his myriad chicks).

I have been writing that it is the Paleos who are Political Donatists.

Yes.  One of us indeed does have difficulty with reading comprehension, but it’s not me.  For paleos to be political Donatists, the person that they are rejecting would have to have been right, then apostatized, then come back.  In this case, that person would be Mrs. Palin.

(I really was trying to help you out here: Donatism isn’t a shorthand way of saying “holier than thou,” which is what you want to say.  Jansenism is.)

I am more interested in the genuine person of Sarah Palin and not her political positions.

Ah--so, there we have it.  We should simply forget about a candidate’s political positions; they’re irrelevant.  All that matters is the “genuine person” of the candidate.  And, as you’ve written, she’s a woman, so that makes her good ipso facto.

Newt Gingrich had all the right political positions

If you think that’s true, that says more about you than it does about Newt.

Spartacus (oh wait a minute you’re not Spartacus) your words would be true if, say, Mitt
Romney was the GOP nominee. But instead its McInsane. And I’m not going to comfort myself saying “Ain’t it
great Sarah Palin is our Vice-President” when the bombs are dropping on Moscow.

Sorry, neither I nor many others will santicfy a War Pig for some etheral notion of incemental change.
This isn’t change. This is a trick. And you’ve fallen for it.

Speaking of the “genuine person” of Sarah Palin, Spartacus, would that be the “genuine person” who risked the life of her unborn son because she was determined to make an important political speech, no matter what happened, and who has now made the choice to throw her daughter under the bus?

Or are her actions as irrelevant to you as her political positions?

For paleos to be political Donatists, the person that they are rejecting would have to have been right, then apostatized, then come back.  In this case, that person would be Mrs. Palin.

Wrong, Mr. Royson. Donatist thought themselves pure and uncorrupted, the same as Paleos do regarding political economics.

Ah--so, there we have it.  We should simply forget about a candidate’s political positions; they’re irrelevant.

Yes, “we have it” is, aptly, self-referential. It was not what I wrote but that is what you took from what I wrote.

All that matters is the “genuine person” of the candidate.  And, as you’ve written, she’s a woman, so that makes her good ipso facto.

That is not what I wrote but...oh, forget it.

This is a trick. And you’ve fallen for it.

Mr. Scallon. You, and others, seem loathe to even entertain the possibility of anything positive deriving from any official capable of being elected (I am not writing about McCain).

I see positive possibilities in Palin and for that I publicly confess my heresy because, for Paleos, any electable is a dupe, stooge, idiot, fool, mountebank or traitor and that means I bear the mark of Cain.

As the Germans say, C’est la vie.

I am not that much of a defeatist.

It appears to me the only Presidential Candidates deemed worthy of paleo support are those candidates every sentient being has zero chance of election.

Thus, Mr. Ron Paul. OK, nine Americans voted for him. Whoop-de-doo.

Once he dies, whom will arise as the political candidate pure enough to be rejected by the masses and, therefore, acceptable to paleos?

Politically speaking, a cult of losing is going to attract as many voters as the Cargo Cult attracts Christians.

Sigh.  Spartacus, I have to assume that you’re being intentionally obtuse, because you don’t normally have such trouble understanding.

Of course the Donatists believed themselves pure and uncorrupted.  That’s precisely the point.  The Christians that they opposed were priests and bishops who had apostatized and then returned to the Faith.  The Donatists did not believe that such priests and bishops could effect the sacraments (or, for that matter, had spiritual authority).

Read St. Augustine.  The Donatist controversy was really, at heart, over the nature of the sacraments, the sacramental understanding of the priesthood, and whether the Sacrament of Penance was sufficient to reconcile one to the Church.

So, again, Jansenism is the better analogy, if all you’re trying to do is say that we paleos are critical of Mrs. Palin because she’s not good enough for us.

Thus endeth the lesson in heresy.

Mr. Scallon. You, and others, seem loathe to even entertain the possibility of anything positive deriving from any official capable of being elected

Apparently you’ve never read Mr. Scallon’s articles in Chronicles or read his book Beating the Powers That Be.  Otherwise, you wouldn’t make such a remark.

You simply seem unable to understand how anyone could look at this nomination and not end up with stars in his eyes.  Could it not be possible that people such as Mr. Scallon and myself would like to see positive change, but simply do not believe that Mrs. Palin signals such?

Oh brother..Whoever the Hell You Are (if that’s really is your name) you will see in an Etherzone.com
article I have just written, I understand that Sarah Palin’s selection to the GOP ticket is a positive
development because it shows for the first time the GOP acknowledges their is a significant sector of the
electorate made up of paleos, disgruntled Republicans and libertarians that could sink them this November and putting Palin on the ticket would both excite, mollify & divide that grouping so it would not be a threat.

Yes her pick is positive, incremental change. I don’t disagree with you on this. Or anyone else for that
matter.

What I disagree with the uptopianism certain writes around Takimag have approached her selection as this is
somehow a “neo-paleo” ticket and that she’ll be a paleo trojan horse or that when McCain croaks in 2010
she’ll appoint Pat Buchanan as her vice-president.

Oh if it were all true. But it is not.

First of all, we can’t be sure if she’s “one of us.” We see good signs from he past and we know she’s at
least not a neocon by instinct. But if I asked her what a paleo was would she even know? Or care? Is Paul
Gottfried going to be her speechwriter, Andrew Bacevich her defense specialist, Dr. Thomas Fleming her advisor on domestic affairs?

No, not that I know. And if I had asked who all these aforementioned people I doubt if she would know them
either.

For studying her record it seems clear to me she is what she is, a local Republican official in Alaska, who
does have an independent streak, is willing to take on entrenched power if it helps her (mostly local Republcians like State Senate President Lydia Green, not national Republicans like Ted Stevens) and is willing work with independent groups to help get her elected but is also willing to work with the powers that be as well to advance her career or her goals in likewise manner. In short,
she walks a tightrope through the malestrom that is Alaska Republican politics, hoping not to fall off.

So she’s not perferct and she’s not going to staff the vice-president’s office with people she doesn’t know.
She is going to be surrounded by neocons and Republican flunkies (in fact it’s already happening) and she
will do exactly what they say because she’s not going to turn down her ticket to the big time and because
she doesn’t have the experience enough to take on the neocons on the one issue that is clear sticking point
between the factions.

She will be the window dressing of McCain administration. If that pleases you, fine. But remember, you’re
voting for John McCain too. And he’s the one running the show.

To Richard’s point about being a Trojan horse, that was lot easier to do back in 1981 because the necons
already had influence as Congressional staffers and intellectuals as liberals. Paleos are mostly writers and
intellectuals and most live outside of D.C. Do you know anyone on Palin’s gubenatorial staff? Neither do I.
And besides, the neocons make sure running the McCain Administration will make sure no such paleos
will infiltrate her staff, because, they’ll make the hiring decisions.

Look at it this way, if Bill Kristol and Karl Rover, neither of whom are friendly to paleos, want her on the
ticket it’s because they know she’ll attract votes and not make waves when she moves to Washington. It’s
a political pick designed to get votes, fire up the base and divide us and so far it’s working.

“Can we have just one political debate here on Takimag without half you people bringing in Catholic school-of-thought debates that have NOTHING TO DO WITH THE DISCUSSION?!”

No. Simply because you asssume or would like to circumscribe the topic and Catholicism as outside the bounds of relevance does not make it so. All activitiess of every human is relevaant to the Church, for:

*** INFALLIBLE ***: Ex cathedra: “We declare, say, define, and pronounce that it is wholly necessary for the salvation of every human creature to be subject to the Roman Pontiff. The Lateran, November 14th, in our eighth year. As a perpetual memorial of this matter.” (Unam Sanctam, A. D. 1302)