It's just a game

By Mustang Bobby

John McCain and his crew still think that Sarah Palin was a great choice for vice president in spite of polling that indicates she's the biggest drag on the ticket.

Where the selection of Palin was once seen as an asset, a majority of voters now say McCain's vice presidential pick reflects poorly on the decisions he would make as president, according to the Post-ABC News poll. Overall, 52 percent of likely voters said they are less confident in McCain's judgment because his of surprise selection of Palin; 38 percent are more confident because of it. That represents a marked reversal from the initially positive reaction to the pick.

[...]

Saul Anuzis, the chairman of the Michigan Republican Party, said Palin remains a popular figure, particularly with conservatives in his state. "She has still been a net plus for us," he said.

But he conceded that the national party spending $150,000 on clothes for her was a "dumb political decision" that was not likely to play well among many of his hardscrabble voters. "You're talking to a guy who wears Lands' End shirts," Anuzis said. "I don't even know how you would spend $150,000 on clothes. You can get a pretty darn good men's suit for $300 to $500."

Mike DuHaime, McCain's national political director, called Palin's addition the ticket "a shot of adrenaline to our entire base, and not just our conservative base," adding: "She can appeal to conservative Democrats, to working women, and she can certainly rally Republican voters."

But the problem with that is that apparently no one in the GOP or the McCain campaign takes into consideration that the voters have moved on beyond the conventions and the campaign trail to wonder what it would be like if John McCain and Sarah Palin actually win the election and she is sworn in as vice president to a man who has the actuarial statistics of a ripe banana. On November 5, voters turn back into citizens who have to think about things like the economy, the education of their children, their health care, and the rest of the little things that make up their lives. You know; the future.

But that doesn't seem to matter to the Republicans; all they really seem to care about is winning the election and staying in power. As if the last eight years of heedlessness haven't taught them anything -- and there is no indication that they have -- they go on with their shameless bamboozlement and 1950s retro campaigning of fear, loathing and divisiveness. And win or lose, there is no evidence whatsoever that they will have learned anything at all from the lessons of of this election. Why should they? It's all a game to them anyway, and everything they've done so far indicates that they have given no more thought as to how they'd run the country after November ...except to start getting ready for 2012.

(Cross-posted from Bark Bark Woof Woof.)