Sarah Palin

I just finished watching Sarah Palin's speech. She is beautiful and articulate. She will remind a lot of us of the soccer mom down the street, except that she reportedly wakes up at 3 am to hunt moose (at least when she was a kid).

According to CNN, Palin was on the city council of Wasilla, AK (pop 5,470 in 2000) from 1992-1996, then mayor from 1996-2002. She's been governor of Alaska since 2006. (Note: there were 10,000 people at the speech she gave to indroduce herself today!)

Not yet mentioned on CNN (though CNN.com devoted a paragraph to it): Palin is under bipartisan investigation for firing a state official, Public Safety Commissioner Walt Monegan, for refusing to fire Palin's former brother-in-law, state trooper Mike Wooten, who was locked in a child-custody dispute with Palin's sister.

My initial take:
1. If elected, this person will be a 72-year-old-man-with-a-history-of-cancer away from being president. She has less than two years of experience at the state level, none at the federal level, and no foreign policy experience whatsoever.

2. She was chosen because she was a woman. That's where the similarity ends. Hillary supporters, please think about this: you love Hillary not just because she is a woman but because she is a highly qualified woman and because of what she stands for and stands up for. This woman is neither, and the McCain campaign is trying to manipulate you. What Hillary stands for and believes in: universal health care, equal pay, abortion rights, and so forth, McCain-Palin will speak against, fight against, vote against, and veto. McCain will probably appoint three judges to the supreme court while in office. If you never read my first blog post, Why No Hillary Supporter Should Vote For McCain, please, please, take a look before you vote for him out of anger and disgust over the Democratic primary.

Addendum: For a better-written commentary, see Paul Begala on CNN.com today. Just another reminder of why I'm a doctor and not a writer or a politician.