palin is important to the culture -- far more than to her base base. she is a symbol of something in the character of this country that needs to be looked at -- some self-destructive mass psychosis.

I just wish he'd applied a little more thought to the running mate selection process a year ago.

Maybe she winked at him?

"I just wish he'd applied a little more thought to the running mate selection process a year ago."

Why? Schmidt took an election in which "our" candidate was already favored and made it all but impossible that he would lose.

The question I have is why is Schmidt writing for the New York Times. Is it the "failing upwards" principle, or is it just that you have to be spectacularly wrong to write for them?

Chicago is out of IOC consideration in first round!

Teabaggers around the country jump for joy!

I for one am VERY glad he chose Palin. I know many people who were lukewarm toward Obama, but who voted for him in the end primarily because of the Palin nomination. You may remember there were a lot of voters (I'm not referring to the talking heads here) who were concerned about Obama's lack of experience. McCain's highly questionable judgement in choosing Palin trumped these concerns. Had Ol' grumpy picked someone more palatable (can't think who it would have been, but basically someone more mainstream) the race would have been a lot closer.

Schmidt, for example, has encouraged the GOP to support gay marriage. He's also encouraged Republicans not to "put public policy issues to a religious test."

Considering his track record on getting the GOP to follow his advice on those, here's hoping they again ignore him on this.

"My honest view is that she would not be a winning candidate for the Republican Party and in fact were she to be the nominee, we could have a catastrophic result."

Taking that to the next level, in fact if she were to be the President, we would have a catastrophic result.

Teabaggers around the country jump for joy!

Yeah, they're a pretty sad lot.

I just wish he'd applied a little more thought to the running mate selection process a year ago.

The choice of Palin allowed the Republican party to demonstrate to the country what they really are all about. It's one of the few things that make me vote for Democrats, when there isn't a viable third option.

Schmidt was trying to figure out how to get McCain elected, in which case having Palin has a VP might have made sense, even if Schmidt would never think to run her as president.

And I don't think he knew Palin was as up-front nutso. Most politicians know how to talk outside of the revival tent.

Taking that to the next level, in fact if she were to be the President, we would have a catastrophic result.

Don't worry, she'd probably resign after a year and a half so she could really get out there and fight for the American people.

(Seriously, though, how is someone who quits the highest elected office she's held for no obvious reason a credible candidate for anything?)

Criticism of Schmidt is hindsight. McCain needed a gamechanger, and Palin was a clever choice. She added youth and tons of pizzazz, she was a reformer/maverick, she appealed to social conservatives. She truly had gamechanger potential ... if only she wasn't utterly uninformed and clueless about national and international issues. He probably didn't know that, or if he did, thought she could fake her way through it. Wrong, but only in hindsight.

Palin in '08 was a big plus for Obama because McCain could no longer pound him on his lack of experience and the focus became Sarah Palin and HER lack of experience. She intially revitalized Mccain but he really did himself in and would have probably lost by a greater margin if it weren't for Sarah Palin.

McCain's only chance to win would have been to reinforce the idea that Obama lacked the experience to be President. If people didn't want to take his word on it, he could have used the clips of Hillary, Biden and Bill Clinton saying pretty much the same.

I just wish he'd applied a little more thought to the running mate selection process a year ago.

Why? She's one of the key reasons McCain lost. I'm THRILLED she was on his ticket.

I don't know - if McCain had picked a more reasonable VP candidate, he might have won the election.

And THAT would have been catastrophic.

I just wish he'd applied a little more thought to the running mate selection process a year ago.

Freddie's reading is plausible, as is qwrty's, but I'll take this to mean Steve laments the elevation of a wrong-headed individual to the public discourse, to put it politely.

j s is right, too. Schmidt's calculation on the Palin pick made sense at the time, considering that McCain was on track to lose either way.

I just wish he'd applied a little more thought to the running mate selection process a year ago.

Yeah, Steve, it's a shame that McCain didn't have a more competitive ticket....

Chicago is out of IOC consideration in first round! Teabaggers around the country jump for joy!

I got news for you coastal rubes -- Chicago progressives are jumping for joy. We can now put those billions in taxpayers money we would have lost to hiring teachers and moving towards a more sustainable city. Maybe we can even reopen that southside hospital we already lost to the failed Olympic bid?

You ignoramuses really need to take off your partisan blinders and start evaluating issues on their, ya know, merits.

the libtards obsession with palin news continues.

Somebody here isn't listening to Steve. On my way back from the beach this morning, I saw my first Mitt Romney/Palin bumper sticker-on a Buick, of course, with the license plate WMP S (wimps?). The driver? An older white guy talking on a shoebox-sized mobile phone. Only in South Carolina, home of the wingnut fringe.

You ignoramuses really need to take off your partisan blinders and start evaluating issues on their, ya know, merits.

Miss Thing, it was the conservatives who framed the Olympics as some sort of referendum on Obama's foreign policy abilities, not liberals. Ignoramus, indeed.

What Disputo said at 12:22 PM! (from a Chicago progressive)

I wouldn't make too much out of Palin's book sales figures. What probably happened is that her backers paid for a huge first printing then sent most of them to a warehouse to rot. They'll get the bragging rights to have "sold" so many copies to boost her cred, but you don't think that many people actually bought that drivel, do you?

You ignoramuses really need to take off your partisan blinders and start evaluating issues on their, ya know, merits.

Do people suddenly remember urgent appointments across town when you enter rooms? Christ, but you're an asshole without anything to justify the constant arrogance.

Let's try to get our heads around the fact that two things can simultaneously be true. It is perfectly possible to mock conservatives for their mindless Obama Olympic-bashing without arguing that more than a few people in Chicago wanted the Olympics.

Sometimes people are going to post comments that don't coincide in every detail with your own opinion or that leave out points you find important. Get the hell over it and quit deriding this entire posting community in the style of a high-school sophomore every damn day.

Great- more useless advice from a McCain follower. In the last election the GOP nominated a moderate-leftist who was soft on illegal immigration, for big government, and who actually stated that Chairman MAObama was a "good man"- despite Frank Marshall, Rev Wright, Bill Ayers, Bernadette Dohrn and his history of extortion-oops- community activism.

The GOP is always accused of trying to remove "moderates but in reality the GOP establishment personified by Schmidt is always trying to remove conservatives.

Schmidt and McCain should just make their ideology official and join the socialists.

Are you nuts, Steve? The old man might've won without her (and, well, okay, Wall Street). But how many Indys shuddered at the thought of that empty pantsuit ascending to the WH and then pulled the Dem lever?

— An Indy

LOL McAncient a "moderate leftist!" The wing-nuts keep getting wing-nuttier...and still talking about Bill Ayers! No wonder you guys lost...oh well you'll always have Fox Snooze and AM blowhards to tell you how to thing because you so obviously lack the capacity to do so yourselves.

Palin/Plumber 2012!

Superficially, Schmidt seems to be distancing himself from the wing that likes Palin. But he shares exactly their view about the role of politics in society. He analyzes Palin only in terms of her political usefulness. Her possible performance as an actual leader is mostly ignored. This is what is makes the situation so dangerous: the Republicans seem to be almost entirely concerned with winning, and not so much with governing.

"Going Rouge"?

Is she some kinda Frenchy or sumthin?

He said that Ms. Palin clearly has strong support among base voters [...]

Very base; bastards every last one of them.

Oh yes, please God, may your daughter Sarah Palin win the Republican nomination for President for the next National election...Rove, the demonizer of fellow citizens at *any price*, couldn´t possibly of thought up anything more certain to promote a Democrat win and a Democrat GRAND SLAM!

Ann Colter would be a savvy, and balanced, choice for Vice President...Palin/Colter and the Great American Revolution, Part II !