- #176
Vanadium 50
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Evo said:You hear all this talk about how Palin will help get the women's vote.
I don't think women vote as a monolithic entity, and I don't think anyone serious thinks so either. (I'll ignore the people whose lives revolve around the political blogs and/or talk radio/Air America). There is no such thing as "the women's vote".
Back in the days when Sen. McCain was being trounced in the polls by "probably Sen. Obama", I went through the exercise of calculating how many PUMAs would really need to throw their support over to McCain to change the outcome, and the answer was 6% of Sen. Clinton's supporters. I wouldn't speculate on whether 6% would or would not do this - that's just the number that popped out. I'm too lazy to recalculate the number today, but as McCain has been closing the gap, it's got to be smaller.
Tactically, I think this was about the best choice that McCain could have made. I think the choice of Sen. Biden was poor - picking someone with 35 years in the senate undermined the message of change, and when the senator with the most liberal voting record chooses the senator with the third most liberal voting record, it undermines the message of post-partisianship. Contrast this with Governor Palin, who is able to energize the social conservatives without irritating the moderates and swing voters (this is where her lack of seniority serves as an advantage). McCain's choice is newsworthy, and managed to wipe the Democrats off the front page as soon as the convention was over. It reinforces the idea of "McCain as maverick" which let's him nibble at Obama's own message of change. The immediate and inevitable attacks from the left saying "two years of executive experience is insufficient qualifications for the #2 spot" beg the question "what about two years of federal legislative experience and zero of executive for the #1 spot?" (When you circle the wagons, it helps to shoot out, not in!)
The people who dislike this decision the most are the people who wouldn't vote for McCain anyway. So from McCain's perspective, it doesn't matter. Selecting a candidate who can improve the ticket's standing among swing voters and at the same time energize the base was brilliant - I would argue the best move McCain has made in the campaign yet.
Note that in this message I deliberately avoided saying whether I like her or not.