Over on another thread, I listened to some of her debate performances in Alaska. What was striking was her solid knowledge of the issues of Alaska, from her time as mayor of Wasilla and membership on the state oil and gas board (”Upinak” can help me with the exact name of this!). She was a regular policy wonk up there with 10 years of experience of watching what was going on at higher levels of government (at the time), formulating plans of how it could be run better, and clearly stating them during the debate. She won those debates on substance and competence.

She will be debating at a much higher level tonight, about issues that she may not have encountered in Alaska, about which she will have less experience than she did in Alaska, some of which have shown up in interviews with Charlie Gibson and Katie Couric.

On issues where her own experience is weak, such as foreign policy, she will have to argue McCain’s positions, and make a good case for them, and attack Obama’s weakness (especially concerning the Iraq troop surge and his impetuous desire to attack Pakistan), as well as Biden’s foolish plan to carve Iraq up into three countries.

She needs to also attack Biden and Obama on issues where she is strong, especially energy issues, and she should probably bring up Biden’s gaffe about not developing clean-coal technology in PA, but outsourcing it to China, stressing the blue-collar jobs that energy development will bring to America, rather than paying huge sums of money to countries like Iran and Venezuela which have been threatening us.

She will also need to state clearly who REALLY caused the financial crisis, especially the role of Democrats in pushing Fannie and Freddie to make risky loans, and resisting Republican (and McCain’s) attempts to regulate them, so that blame can be shifted away from President Bush. There seems to be a misconception out there that a President can control everything that happens during his tenure, and Palin is well-placed to correct this, because she is truly an “outsider” on this issue, and has no blame for the financial irresponsibility.

As for Supreme Court decisions she might disagree with, how about Kelo vs. New London? The Supreme Court sided with a town who wanted to throw ordinary people out of their homes so that rich developers could make money on a private health club, and the conservative minority on the Court sided with the ordinary people! If she were to succeed McCain as President, she would appoint judges like Rehnquist, Scalia, Thomas, and O’Connor, who were on the right side of that issue, on the side of the Constitution.

But she needs to be on-message and show substance and knowledge as well as style–that’s how she won in Alaska.

A pitbull with lipstick won’t be good enough, but she could use the “lipstick on a pig” line–where the pig is the bloated Federal Government and members of Congress who are fattening themselves at taxpayer expense.

Go, SarahCuda! It’s the championship game, and you’re at the free-throw line. Time to sink it!!!

Steve Z on October 2, 2008 at 8:52 AM