Why does McCain want the Spotlight?
I certainly have to give credit to McCain for this:
He got people talking.
There has basically been an unbroken thread on Sarah Palin for the last 24 hours on TPM, probably everywhere else as well.
But here's the thing I don't get about this. McCain may have made this move to "shake things up" or to steal the media spotlight from Obama.
But why?
Shining the spotlight on McCain is not good for him. He should know that.
He had this election setting up pretty nicely as a referendum on Obama. Every grenade he lobbed had the talking heads chattering. And, as we all know, Obama was not benefitting from that chatter.
Maybe the convention changed the calculus and McCain's people decided that if it's a referendum on Obama, they are going to lose because he's just got too much firepower.
Whatever the reason, McCain has got the spotlight on himself now and suddenly this looks more like a referendum on Palin. Beside the obvious fact that she is not prepared to be president - even the McCain campaign admitting as much - we're going to have to "get to know" Palin and all the radical right wing positions she has.
McCain's "hidden" policy agenda will now get exposed to the light of day, and all the ways that Palin either agrees or doesn't agree with them (I imagine before long she will agree with them).
McCain and Palin will also have to answer the question of how it is that these positions - essentially the same as Bush as Obama has been saying - really constitute anything remotely resembling "reform" or "change".
In a nutshell, it seems to me all the work that the McCain campaign had done to define Obama as a celebrity, as an empty suit, as being not ready to lead, etc, is flushed down the toilet and suddenly, it is the McCain/Palin ticket that looks like the less experienced, more risky choice in this election.
Is McCain crazy like a fox, or just plain crazy?
Is McCain crazy like a fox, or just plain crazy?
