Pregnant Pause

The debate about a future President Palin continues, and David Frum, one of those who led the conservative revolt against Harriet Miers, is none too pleased:

"McCain's supporters argue that he is more serious about national security than Barack Obama. But the selection of Sarah Palin invites the question: How serious can he be if he would place such a neophyte second in line to the presidency? Barack Obama at least balanced his inexperience with Mr. Biden's experience. What is Mr. McCain doing? . . . So this is the future of the Republican party you are looking at: a future in which national security has bumped down the list of priorities behind abortion politics, gender politics, and energy politics."

National Review's Kathryn Jean Lopez makes the case in the opposite direction:

"Contrary to popular pundit belief, Sarah Palin is no Harriet Miers. And it's a funny thing: When conservatives like myself opposed Miers's nomination to the Supreme Court on the grounds that she was under-qualified and an affirmative-action pick, we were slammed as being sexist and elitist. Does that mean the Left and others railing against Palin are sexist and anti-Eskimo (her husband is part Eskimo)? Of course not. That would be silly -- as it was in the case of the Miers debate. Instead, lefty columnists and pundits should admit they don't like her because she's a conservative, not because they're concerned about a rot in the conservative movement . . .

"Was she picked because she's a woman? Of course it played a role. Does that annoy me? Yes, especially if she doesn't drop the glass-ceiling talk. Was it smart politics though? Maybe."

Or maybe not, if Hillary voters turn up their noses.

Conservative stalwart Heather MacDonald, in City Journal, isn't buying:

"Thanks a lot, John McCain. With his selection of an unknown, two-year female governor as his running mate, he has just ensured that the diversity racket will be an essential component of presidential politics forever more. Had the 44-year-old Sarah Palin, whose greatest political accomplishment before being elected Alaska's governor in 2006 was serving as mayor of Wasilla (population 9,780), been named Stanley, she would have had exactly zero chance of ending up in the Oval Office in the next four years. But from now on, any presidential ticket that consists solely of white males--no matter their qualifications--will likely be dead in the water."

In Slate, Michael Kinsley calls questions about experience "so five minutes ago, before Sarah Palin. Already, conservative pundits are coming up with creative explanations for McCain's choice of a vice-presidential running mate with essentially no foreign-policy experience. First prize so far goes to Michael Barone, who notes on the U.S. News & World Report blog that 'Alaska is the only state with a border with Russia. And it is the only state with territory, in the Aleutian Islands, occupied by the enemy in World War II.' I think we need to know what Sarah Palin has done, in her year and change as governor of Alaska, to protect the freedom of the Aleutian Islands before deciding how many foreign-policy-experience credits she deserves on their account.

"The official response to the question of experience emerged within hours and is only slightly more plausible: She may not have foreign policy experience, but--unlike Obama, Joe Biden, or even John McCain--she has had executive experience. Why, before her stint as governor of Alaska, population 670,000, she was mayor of a town of 9,000. Remember when the Republicans mocked Bill Clinton for being governor of a 'small state'? That would be Arkansas, population 2.8 million. As it happens, 670,000 is the population of metropolitan Little Rock . . .

"How could anyone truly believe that Barack Obama's background and job history are inadequate experience for a president and simultaneously believe that Sarah Palin's background and job history are perfectly adequate? It's possible to believe one or the other. But both? Simply not possible. John McCain has been--what's the word?--lying. And so have all the pundits who rushed to defend McCain's choice."

The governor of Alaska laughs as two radio jocks call one of her political opponents a bitch and a cancer, then invites them to her State of the State address.