Applaud the shattered glass, but be wary of the woman doing it...

Ok – so a week ago Friday, I choked on my Pret a Manger breakfast, when Senator John McCain appeared to have screwed up spectacularly announcing that a woman nobody had heard of was his running mate. I looked up Alaska in the atlas for the first time since I left school: it took up two pages and I couldn't find the capital. (Juneau, not Anchorage.)

So I spent the week reading "Who the hell is Sarah Palin?" stories and looking up more about Alaska (population 657,000 - a smaller number than in Birmingham or Belfast.). By Thursday she was a national joke because of her Beverly Hillbillies family and their wacky names and teen pregnancies. So I sat down to watch her speech with my heart in my mouth. Poor woman! Shoved into the Republican machine by cunning Karl Rove, Bush's Svengali, so as to get the Hillaryite Democrats to vote Republican. (Not to mention the Dems who won't vote for Obama for lower, more visceral reasons.)

And then she strode out on stage and made that speech.

Suited and coiffed like the beauty queen she was, Palin strode onto that stage like the “pit bull in heels” she claims to be waving and smiling to a screaming republican crowd. Well groomed and primed by the party’s aids after two days of in depth prepping holed up in a hotel room. She was there for specific reasons… to win over the disillusioned Hillary voters and give John Mccain’s campaign the needed youth and exuberance it so obviously lacks.

With all the sincerity of a dish rag she spoke of a war with victory in sight. WHAT VICTORY??? It’s been six years since “mission accomplished” and I don’t know anyone who knows of any near victory. She preached her beautiful family’s virtues – yes… teen pregnancy, high school drop outs shipped off to Iraq… shotgun husbands-to-be. (The Republican machine had wiped his Facebook page, with its remarks: "I'm a f------ redneck" and "Don't want no kids". They also cut his hair before they flew him to the convention.) Sarah Palin is already being touted (by pro-Republicans) as a cross between Thatcher and the Great Communicator Ronald Reagan.

She's neither.

When she got to the meat of her speech, it was Dubya's Axis of Evil again. As I am not actually a citizen of the united stas it's their foreign policy that is my primary interest. Sarah Palin is a true believer in the warfare state: ready to fight as many "dangerous foreign powers" as Bush and Cheney think are out there: never mind Iraq, let's tool up for Iran! And Eastern Europe! She said: "With Russia wanting to control a vital pipeline in the Caucasus, and to divide and intimidate our European allies by using energy as a weapon, we cannot leave ourselves at the mercy of foreign suppliers." Oh, yes? If Russia invaded Georgia to control a vital pipeline, they need better maps. And if energy is "a weapon", I'm feeling nostalgic for WMDs.

Her jibes at Obama were well crafted. She said: "Terrorist states are seeking nuclear weapons... he wants to meet them without preconditions. Al Qaeda still plot to inflict harm on America... he's worried that someone won't read them their rights?" and then went on to compare her position of Govoner of an area smaller than Belfast to having more “actual responsibilities” than his “community organsing….”

Hmmmm….. This coming from the gun toting mother of five who is against abortion even in cases of rape and incest and thinks creation should be mandatorially taught over evolution…. this woman is denying the facts of SCIENCE!!! But then again… she is an ex-beauty queen from Alaska who has published pictures of herself kneeling by a dead moose she shotand others wearing t-shirts saying "I may be flat broke, but I'm not flat busted."

She is quoted as being openly racist… insulting Obama, and regularly refering to Alaska’s Aboriginal people as “Arctic Arabs” – lumping two apparently undesirable groups into one ugly description – as well as the more colorful “mukluks” along with the totally unimaginative “f**king Eskimos,” according to a number of Alaskans and Wasillians.

Now… don’t get me wrong… she is no totally evil. She has no horns, has not appeared (as far as we know) in a porn flick and has no sex tape, although she may have had an extramarital affair. But a couple of things are true -- and troubling -- about Alaska’s governor, and they go beyond irresponsible parenting that led her unwed, teen daughter to become pregnant.

Palin’s religious extremism is assault on her beloved First Amendment. She justified the Iraq War and the construction of a $30 billion gas pipeline through Alaska as “all part of God's plan.” Her religious fundamentalism is rooted in the Wasilla Assembly of God where the pastor is a fiery apocalyptic extremist, who believes the world is clearly divided between good and evil.

He’s preached that critics of President Bush will be banished to hell; questioned whether people who voted for Sen. John Kerry in 2004 would be accepted to heaven; charged that the 9/11 terrorist attacks and war in Iraq were part of a war "contending for your faith;" and said that Jesus "operated from that position of war mode." More than once, he has denounced criticism of President Bush, and said those who did so were going to go to hell… literally.

As for Palin, he said her election as governor was the result of a "prophetic call" by another pastor at the church who prayed for her victory. "[He made] a prophetic declaration and then unfolds the kingdom of God, you know."
One of Palin’s new preachers at the church she now attends in the state capital said during a sermon last month (Aug. 17) that Jews' "unbelief" in Jesus was the reason for the 9/11 terrorist attacks. The pastor also described terrorist attacks on Israelis as God's "judgment of unbelief" of Jews who haven't embraced Christianity.

So far, Palin hasn’t said or done anything to distance herself or denounce these hate-filled rants, nor has she explained her views on supporting and upholding the Constitution.

In a presidential election that is focusing on our terrible economy, the threat of terrorism and other weighty issues, such small town politics may seem inconsequential. But Palin could soon be a heartbeat away from becoming leader of the free world. Her disregard for our fundamental freedoms is far more troubling that whether she’s been photographed in a bikini or had extramarital affairs.

And spare a thought of Hillary Clinton... as proud an Obama supported as i am... there is a small part of me that feels for the woman who was so close to the finish line... to have it smashed by the govenor of the middle of nowhere...