There is not one single, solitary human being out there in the GOP that would hae been 100% perfect for this job. No, not even my beloved Fred! All carry some type of negative to someone.
That being said, you lay out your critique. Fine, I got no issues with your opinions. I would like to remind you that she is the sitting governor of Alaska and that her #1 priority is to fight for the citizens of Alaska. IMO, her positions thus far are in line with looking out for her state.
As to school choice, seriously, this issue shouldn’t even be an issue for a VP at this point in the game. Let’s see how she matches up on some of the biggies first.
Lastly, this whole “I may not vote meme” is just ridiculous. And I really don’t care where you live.
This is an election with great consequences. Find the candidate that best supports your views and vote for that candidate. If it isn’t John McCain, fine, but don’t lay it in Sarah Palin’s lap. She’s not the one running for president. And just remember, if Barack Obama wins, you get nothing you want.

but I take your challenge.

The issue is good governance. John McCain and Sarah Palin have a responsibility to live up to the standards of good governance. Unless they do, they will not merit my vote. And unless they do, they will not merit the votes of others.

But, I hope you give the McCain/Palin Ticket enough time before November to prove their commitments to your ideals.

Many Republicans, including southerners, believe Bush and Cheney moved too far right and some of them have gravitated to Obama’s camp.
They’re glad McCain chose someone far removed from Washington with more moderate approaches to governance – and they’re dropping Obama like hot potatoes.
Palin doesn’t fit neatly into Bush Republican boxes and she’s very refreshing.

McCain/Palin08!

The windfall profits tax in Alaska appears to be a bit of an anomaly related to Alaska’s unique relationship with oil companies. In an August 4, 2008 press release, in which she expressed satisfaction with Obama’s call for the creation of a new natural gass pipeline in Alaska, she questioned Obama’s decision to give people rebates based on windfall profits. The Governor did question the means to pay for Obama’s proposed rebate — a windfall profits tax on oil companies. Specifically, “In Alaska, the state’s resource valuation system, ACES, provides strong incentives for companies to re-invest their profits in new production.”

“Windfall profits taxes alone prevent additional investment in domestic production. Without new supplies from American reserves, our dependency and addiction to foreign sources of oil will continue,” Governor Palin said.
http://gov.state.ak.us/print_news-53432.html

So regardless of what happened in Alaska, and I’m sure there’s more to the story than we know, she is not on board with doing this nationally. Rest easy.

Erich
Austin, Texas

Any discussion of Palin’s possible economic policies should mention that as a small business owner herself, she should bring a practical understanding of economics to the White House that none of the other three ticket holders have. According to the Small Business and Entrepreneurship Council:

According to the 2008 edition of “The Almanac of American Politics,” Palin was the owner of a snow machine, watercraft and all-terrain vehicle business, and co-owns with her husband a commercial fishing business. A small business owner on a major party ticket – how refreshing!

This is from her State of State address 2008

We will enable schools to finally focus on innovation and accountability to see superior results. We’re asking lawmakers to pass a new K-12 funding plan early this year. This is a significant investment that is needed to increase the base student allocation, district cost factors and intensive needs students. It includes $100 million in school construction and deferred maintenance. There is awesome potential to improve education, respect good teachers, and embrace choice for parents. This potential will prime Alaska to compete in a global economy that is so competitive it will blow us away if we are not prepared. Beyond high school, we will boost job training and University options. We are proposing more than $10 million in new funding for apprenticeship programs, expansion of construction, engineering and health care degrees to meet demands. But it must be about more than funds, it must be a change in philosophy. It is time to shift focus, from just dollars and cents to “caliyulriit,” which is Yupik for “people who want to work.” Work for pride in supporting our families, in and out of the home. Work for purpose and for action, and ultimately destiny fulfilled by being fruitful. It’s about results and getting kids excited about their future – whether it is college, trade school or military. The Lieutenant Governor and I are working on a plan to make attending Alaska’s universities and trade schools a reality for more Alaskans through merit scholarships

Pejman, intellectuals, albeit brilliant ones such as yourself sometimes miss the point…Willie Mays was once asked how was he able to achieve all he did during his baseball career, he replied “You throw the ball, I hit the ball you hit the ball I cath the ball.”

Sadly, we are engaged in a philosophical war which could alter America and jeopardize our lives, and those of our descendants..

If liberalism(socialiism) wins, free trade dies, education of americans becomes buried in a “glorious mosaic” of america is always wrong…diversity beats merit, and religious and moral values are meaningless…Pailin has an anchor in her faith and family .I’ll trust her foreign policy instincts…what she doesn’t know she’ll learn…

This is the battle, Pejman..You are one of our front line commanders..consider yourself lightly slapped, ala Patton!

Though styled as taxes, royalties, and severance, the revenue scheme just establishes the price at which we will part with OUR property.

The TAPS and Prudhoe Bay field were built to be profitable with oil at $7.50 bbl. in mid-’70s dollars, that would be $30 or so in today’s dollars. The oil from the legacy fields doesn’t cost any more to produce today than it did then, adjusting for inflation. Now that it is more valuable on the market, we want more for it when it rises above the historic levels. It’s called selling for what the market will bear.

When the NEA thinks that you have done a good job on the issue of education policy, chances are that you haven’t. By denying parents and children the many benefits of school choice, Governor Palin betrayed–yes, that is the proper word–the people of Alaska and their efforts to seek either for themselves or for their children the best education possible.

Alaska is a sparsely populated state. The vast unorganized borough is directly controlled by the state. What are you going to have a remote village with as many people as schools?

Now you choose to “break your silence”?? The time to do so would have been before she was the nominee. Nominee selections are kind of like marriage – go into it with 2 eyes wide open, and afterwards have 1 eye half shut.

You present a false choice between McCain/Palin and McCain/(candidate who agrees with you on school choice, free trade, etc.). The real choice is between McCain/Palin and Obama/Biden. And there is not enough to go on to say Palin violates a sine qua non on any issue as yet.

On school choice and free trade I agree with you, but Palin has not had occasion to take a stand on free trade as yet, and school choice issues in sparsely populate Alaska where the public schools are not under attack and failing like they are elsewhere in the country make it a rather poor predictor of how she’ll approach the issue on a national scale.

Nor did she execute a Obama type windfall profits tax on big oil. Obama’s plan would stifle the profit incentives of oil companies to drill at all. Alaska returns its oil revenues to the citizens of the state beyond their 0% income tax, (despite which she still managed to lower property taxes), and in Alaska, oil companies gladly make that trade because it garners them the requisite support for drilling and the new transcontinental pipeline she spearheaded. There is probably no politician in America as Governor Palin in achieving progress towards independence from foreign oil.

Betrayed is not the right word for her stance on school choice at all. For goodness sake, give her a chance.

Yes, she has to prove herself in the debates, and I believe she will do so admirably. She is consistently more impressive than Biden.

Your diary is the first one that even begins to address my concerns. Let me make the following perfectly clear:

1) I like Sarah Palin and think she is a good, strong conservative. Indeed, in fairness to her, I think there are a few legitimate countra-indicants to explain some of the “non-conservative” positions and statements of her’s that you cite. As I have said many, many times before, I think she has a bright future within the GOP.

2) Sorry but despite my general agreement with her policies, I do not think she is ready to be President if something should happen to John McCain.

2a) And because John McCain has repeatedly said that his first criterion for selecting a Vice President would be there ability to take over from “day one” if something happened to him, I think John McCain has failed on that promise.

But the above are not the reasons for my disagreements with many here and why I referred to this place as “Bizarro RedState.” My reasons are:

3) The explicit and blatant way that many here (not all but many) have argued for and now support Sarah Palin’s nomination as a way to appeal to women voters and specifically “Hillary Clinton’s ‘disgruntled’ supporters.” That is wrong.

4) The way most people here (maybe not all, but definitely most) have argued that “experience matters” and that Obama does not have the experience (an argment that I wholeheartedly agree with) but who are now saying that, no experience really isn’t all that important or that it is really “executive experience” that matters. This is hypocritical.

For the record, I raedily admit that I may be wrong — indeed, I vry much hope I am wrong — in that Sarah Palin does not have the experience to take over on “day one.” To me, that is not the issue.

What I personally find so discouraging is that apparently many so-called principled conservatives are willing — no wanting — to nominate someone to the second highest office of the land based on their gender and/or are willing to completely deny — no, reverse — their position on the the issue of experience.

My sincerest congradulations and kudos for you, Pejman Yousefzadeh. Who knows, we may both end up voting or not voting this year, or one of us may vote and the other not, but I give you the utmost respect for raising the issues that many on this board seem hellbent on avoiding.

To play off Bill Clinton’s meme in ’92.

Firstly, there are no well defined requirements for what it takes to be VP, no job description. If John McCain thinks she is ready then she is ready to be his backup.

Someone please define for me what exactly it requires to “pass the commander in chief” threshold from a VP perspective and please tell me how Obama meets that threshold any more than Palin.

Republicans aren’t doing the best job defend her “experience”. It isn’t how long you have been doing something it’s what you have accomplished!

Pej, this post is as beautifully written and tightly reasoned as I’ve come to expect from you. But I think on one portion of it — the portion relating to “windfall taxes” — you’ve been misled.

The tax in question isn’t a windfall profits tax. It wasn’t designed based on a perception that one element of society was reaping a windfall that needs to be seized and re-distributed (which is Barack Obama’s plan).

Rather, this is a severance tax. You may be a far better tax lawyer than I am — that’s likely if you have any expertise in tax law at all! — but I did have occasion a few years ago to learn something about severance taxes. I was representing Conoco in a lawsuit against Mobil involving jointly owned oil and gas leases in Idaho. The contract between them made one kind of provision for sharing the expense of paying “property taxes,” and a different kind of provision for “income taxes.” So the question arose whether the Idaho severance tax was a “property tax” or an “income tax.” The answer was “property tax,” because severance taxes are, by their nature, a tax on certain types of property — typically subsurface oil, gas, and minerals — that cannot be accurately measured for taxation purposes until they’re produced. Once they’re produced, however, they’re typically carted off outside the state’s borders, so traditional forms of property tax don’t capture them in the state’s tax base. Severance taxes therefore are imposed on those substances when they’re produced, and they’re typically calculated based on the market value when produced.

Sarah Palin didn’t pass a new type of tax at all. Alaska, like most oil-producing states, had long had a severance tax. But the rate for Alaska’s pre-existing severance tax, 22.5%, had been set in closed-door negotiations between the energy companies who rule the roost in Alaska (ExxonMobil, ConocoPhillips, and BP) and an ethically challenged governor and legislature. One of Sarah Palin’s campaign planks when she ran against that governor (Frank Murkowski) was that she would re-visit that entire subject, and replace it with a new tax that was the product of transparent negotiations and discussions fully disinfected by the sunlight of publicity. As a result, the new structure that the legislature passed and that she signed drew wide support from both Republicans and Democrats.

So how much of a tax increase is it, compared to what went before? From 22.5%, it went up to 25%. That’s a very modest, almost symbolic, increase.

The Alaska severance tax was previously progressive, and it became slightly more progressive. Under Palin, the additional tax imposed above the base rate went from 0.25% on proceeds above $30/bbl up to 0.4% — again, hardly a confiscatory increase! On proceeds above $92.50/bbl, the rate drops back down to 0.1%, which was actually a tax reduction compared to what had gone before, and a very significant one when oil is up in the $130-$140/bbl range.

My main source for this information is one with which you’re probably familiar, cchtaxgroup.com. I’ve previously posted on this at my own blog, here and here. By no stretch of the imagination is Sarah Palin engaged in class warfare, nor is she demonizing energy companies. Rather, she’s incentivizing them, and setting them up at competitive purposes against one another for the benefit of the taxpaying public. I think she’s done a job that any committed conservative can, and should, applaud. I hope you’ll consider revising your own views in light of these additional facts.

About as much as Hillary or Barack. Also, Bosnian snipers wouldn’t dare take a pot shot.

I happen to believe that 40 years of being wrong is not better than having little or no experience.

Biden voted against the first Gulf War. He even voted against the Alaskan pipeline that has brought us billions of barrels of oil. In Joe Biden’s world; Saddam would be in Kuwait; and likely in Saudi Arabia. Imagine our oil supply issues without the pipeline.

It’s more about effectiveness and judgment than experience.

NOW compare the 2 tickets.

We are not here to debate her qualifications! We are here to help get the ticket elected. Redstate does not engage in arguments that tear us down. Otherwise all the sock puppets would play here all day. IMHO you can take you’re negativity to some watered down newspaper forum!

I have voted Republican in the past and honestly believe my govenor in Michigan that is Democrat is seriously failing us. However I have seen how bad Bush is and the fact that John McCain has supported him 95% of the time and he is against equal pay. He even called Hillary a b** tells me that he could care less about Sarah and her great work that people are saying she has done. Also that he believes our economy is doing great is pure truth that he is out of touch. I have several family members that have lost their homes in foreclosure and they are working everyday. My family has suffered since me and my spouse both lost our job since the is no market for new sales in our area, we have a 11%+ unemployment rate and the government is saying that we have to wait till we lose it all before they will help. We have a young daughter too! I honestly thought I would stick with the party but then this crap with Palin happened. I think she is probably a women that has done great things and one day will be great for government but anyone who cant see that she is being used is crazy. Watch the speech from Ohio my family noticed that McCain was checking out Sarah’s backside through most of that speech. She dont deserve such disrespect. McCain could have choose so many overly qualified women or men that have everything in expierence and he only picked Sarah since she was a women no one knew about and he could get her to support to start drilling in Alaska,and could ty to pull in Hillary people. It seems that if you get the govenor from the state that has the most oil influence on your side then you can get what you want through her. Seriously that is a huge disrespect to us women. I am a proud women and we all put the country first. Honestly so does Huckabee, Thompson, Romney, Biden and Obama and Hillary and well anyone who lives here duh! Dont you care about this country? I know I do and I want my daughter to have the best education atleast I am hearing that the Democrats can feel my pain. The Republicans are telling me that me losing my home and my daughter not having food at the dinner table is OK since the big shots and those making $5 million are OK so everything is just fine. I am out everyday looking for a new job and I am not a whiner. I have Fibromyalsia and also Conjunctive Sleep Apnea and more than I can explain but I have worked everyday for my little girl. I am determine to work till it kills me just like it did my dad. I cant even get help to get therapy for my Fibro. Tell me that life is great the way it is! I am sorry but the disrespect and poor judgement on the part of the republicans has told me they dont care about me in the Middle Class thats Falling Fast!

When it comes to the Republican party, I can identify with many of their fiscal policies, I actually love them. Limited government spending, keeping government out of the private sector to a certain extent (in my opinion), small government, and that competition injected anywhere including schools will only bring about better results.

The only problem is that history proves since Reagan this has not been the case. Republicans have not been fiscally conservative, and government actually grew while they were in office and so did the deficit. It grew under Carter as well but not even close to the astronomical levels of Reagan, and the Bush’s. The principles that the Republican party claim to have inspire me, but as they say, actions speak louder then words, and I can’t detect any sign of life. Bush and McCain don’t seem to posses what true Republicans believe in. For the better part of 26 years McCain was not a traditional Republican by any measure. Recently he has changed to appeal to the base. There is a difference between capaigning and governing and McCain knows this. Get into the White House and he will be back to the maverick that turned off so many true conservatives. Bush did the same thing and I cannot take the chance that McCain might turn his back on his pledges.

The reason that I as a libertarian is supporting a democrat is that I believe the country needs someone with a plan to bring about stability. Cutting taxes when we are in a deficit will not help. How will cutting taxes, the income to an underfunded government which pays for the military, infrastructure, and many other aspects that a free market need to flourish help? When the problem is so large, the market cannot fix itself without a counter balance.

I thoroughly enjoyed reading this entry. You did not give Palin a pass just because she might help the Republicans win office. You looked at her policies with an objective eye. I really applaud that. Many blogs are on the polar opposite of positions. I do not agree that the McCain ticket is something I can trust. Her main standing point of the bridge to nowhere, showing she is a maverick against wasteful spending, has already turned out to be a faux. She only rescinded her position when she found out the federal government would not completely fund it.

Every morning I wake up upset thinking that McCain would feel comfortable putting the country in the hands of someone that he only saw as useful to get elected and not lead with. If anyone argues that a man that met this woman once before deciding on her believes she can help him lead, then that someone is a person I would rather not waste my time on. Thank you for the great read.

The place I love yet at the same time would love to escape. Born and raised in the land of the handout. The place where the UAW, the biggest hustle ever perpetrated on American workers, thrives. Forget the fact they sold all the workers out so they could get in on some of the money. Yet the hopeless masses hang on there every word like a baby on its mommys teet. Lets blame the corporation that the plany closed. And forget the fact they offer to pay for said worker to go to school. Blame blame blame and vote for Obama. Thats all you get out of good ol Michigan these days. Well that and a thug Mayor of Detroit who fights cops, one of the worst Governors in the USA who has done nothing but raise taxes, and a Senator who gets a bill passed for Detroit River restoration. But ignores the fact that no one comes to enjoy a beautiful river when they are scared of getting attacked by a crackhead. With an economy so bad you would think that people would of wised up and elected a guy who was a champion of business like say, o I dont know Devos. But nooooo they give old Jenny the Canuck another chance to make it right. Or maybe they put her back in office so they could still bitch and moan about EVERYTHING! I am so disappointed since Engler left that it makes me sick. All of the major population centers are chock full of handout libs and it disgust me that this great state has turned blue. People like the poster above blame Bush when the real problem is the government of this state. And just so you know sockscrash. And I know this will shock you. The government isnt supposed to help your kid go to college, or your friends that lost there home, or your fibromyalgia. And the middle class is not falling fast. Its just that the middle class people have now moved up into rich category. Thats the part they fail to tell you about. When I worked for GM I saw that the company was looking to other more cost efficient places to produce cars. So I did what any self respecting self sufficient American would do. I went to school on there dime and moved into a more stable field. Problem solved. Now I hear all those people with the same chance I had griping that there plant is closing. Go to your family, go to your church, go to school, go do something. Just dont depend on the government to solve your problems. Thats not what they are there for.