McCAIN’S GOLDEN GAMBLE—HOME FIELD ADVANTAGE

By Edwin Cooney

Two and a half weeks have passed since Senator McCain introduced forty-four-year-old Alaska Governor Sarah Heath Palin as his vice presidential running mate. The beauty for Republicans is that since then, Mrs. Palin has become the major focus of the 2008 presidential campaign. Exactly how many Americans consider her the campaign’s most significant factor may well decide the 2008 presidential election.

It appears that nothing much matters now except how fairly the press treats Mrs. Palin: star of the woman’s high school basketball team in 1982, second runner-up in the 1984 Alaska Beauty Queen Pageant, Mayor of Wasilla, Alaska from1996 to 2002, and now the voter’s surprise choice as Governor of Alaska in 2006.

It’s amazing how Conservatives who, just three weeks ago, could barely fathom the idea of Senator John McCain becoming President, are now all excited about the prospect. The possibility that this unknown “hockey mom” -- or is it lipstick-decorated “Pit Bull Mom”? -- could become Vice President of the United States of America has made all the difference in the world.

Even if Republicans have never really been concerned about devaluation of the dollar, the reform of health care, the home mortgage crisis, seven percent unemployment, or the loss of American jobs to overseas American run corporations, it was not that long ago that sufficient experience in high public office was of vital concern to them. They were absolutely stunned to think that Democrats would hand their presidential nomination to a Senator with less than four full years of national experience.

Well, sorry, but those days are gone for the duration of the campaign—and many are wondering, “Why, how could this be?”

Keeping in mind that neither Republicans, Democrats, Conservatives, or Liberals have a monopoly on wisdom, stupidity, vice, or virtue, a look back at recent political history might be illuminating.

In 1988, three term Massachusetts Governor Michael S. Dukakis faced two term Vice President George H. W. Bush in the presidential sweepstakes. Both men were well educated and had behind them differing but significant public service accomplishments. Vice President Bush had the enthusiastic support of Ronald Reagan, the exceedingly popular incumbent President. However, the economy had stumbled slightly in 1987 and thus there were a few economic and international uncertainties. These uncertainties were disquieting and therefore had to be buried as quickly as possible. Hence the major issues of the 1988 presidential campaign focused on Michael Dukakis’s polluted Boston harbor, Dukakis’s willingness to excuse Massachusetts school children from saluting the American flag, and whether or not Dukakis was responsible for the terror visited on a family by a black convicted murderer on furlough from a Massachusetts prison. None of these issues had anything to do with the crisis that President George Herbert Walker Bush or Michael Dukakis would have faced in the 1,361 day presidential term extending from January 20th, 1989 until January 20th, 1993. What they did do, however, was to make Michael Dukakis the issue rather than focusing on the plans, purpose or person of a potential President named either Dukakis or Bush.

In 2000, the question was whether Al Gore was a liar. Did he really invent the internet? Did he lie during the campaign about a fifteen-year-old Florida girl who, he said, was forced to stand in an overcrowded classroom due to the lack of available funding for education? Wasn’t he lying about global warming?

Then came 2004 and the question was whether or not CBS news anchor Dan Rather and the Democrats were guilty of forging documents purported to establish the reality of President Bush’s less than stellar military career. Additionally, the truth about John Kerry’s Vietnam War service was much more important than either the economy or Iraq—certainly, it was right up there with America’s national security and the fight against terrorism.

As Senator Barack Obama points out in his book “The Audacity of Hope,” morality and personal security have largely replaced the economic and social issues that once separated Democrats and Republicans. Thus, it seems to this observer that Senator McCain has to force the campaign to focus on the personal morality of the Conservative movement rather than on the highly questionable policies of the George W. Bush administration.

Senator McCain’s choice of Governor Palin to be the next Vice President of the United States of America appears to be the embodiment of that force. If guns, gays, God, and the empowered personal character of Sarah Palin can be sustained as the primary focus of the 2008 campaign, Republicans and their powerful sometime moral majority allies may well prevail.

National issues such as unemployment, health care, home mortgage foreclosures, and the future of “freedom of choice” are all issues planted and cultivated for the 2008 campaign in democratic fields.

The likelihood of victory, in sports and even in politics, is very often increased if the final contest can be played on a team’s home turf.

Thus we have the lipstick-toting-mama-pit-bull Sarah Palin as John McCain’s golden gamble for home field advantage.

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,

EDWIN COONEY