McCain Picks Palin

Any woman who grew up hunting moose has a leg up on getting my vote.

Seriously, I think this is a fantastic pick, which probably means it's a disaster. I can see only three downsides: (1) This hurts the inexperience theme against Obama; (2) She's described by CNN as a younger, female version of John McCain (please, stop); and (3) they might choose Starship's gawdawful song "Sara" as a theme song (note to McCain campaign: don't tempt me to vote against you by doing that -- I'm serious).

This is the first time I've been genuinely excited during this election season (sort of like Michelle Obama being proud of her country for the first time, but different). McCain's campaign has done a very good job for the past month or so knocking Obama off-course, and their management of this VP selection process has been fantastic. Palin hits a number of good notes -- she's a darling of conservatives but has maverick tendencies, is a governor who's actually running a state and is a mother of five who is tough enough to stand toe-to-toe with Joe Biden.

With that being said, the guys at Powerline seem lukewarm to say the least on this pick. I do see the downside of inexperience being an issue, but it will be a difficult one for the Dems to exploit, since they've nominated someone with arguably the same level of experience as their standard-bearer (and with even less experience in an executive capacity).

At the end of the day, though, this is just a VP selection. In other words, it's good for the story and for next week's convention; after that, it's probably not relevant. Unless they use that Starship song, in which case I'll be pissed.