Update: McCain Selects Gov. Sarah Palin as Running Mate

[mheisig]

Originally Posted by BringBackJoeT

I didn't say anything about a "massive upheaval" of Dem voters going Republican by virtue of this pick. What seems clear (certainly at this point) is that we're in store for another very close election. Independent voters, to a cliche-like extent, have been identified as key. But from the moment Obama was declared the winner of the D primary, the McCain campaign has identified pissed off Hillary voters as a potential source of some key swing votes, and they have not made any secret of that. Have they banked on getting all 18 million? Of course not. The vast, vast majority of those were cast by dyed-in-the-wool Dems who wouldn't be swayed by a Republican female VP candidate who shares, politically, almost nothing in common with them. But again, given the potentially very small margin of victory that the winner may have, McCain's camp has obviously considered that even a small percentage of Hillary primary voters could, in this election, make a huge difference.

Sure, Gov. Palin, as you say, may "solidify" McCain's base, but she was hardly the only VP candidate who could have. And given her very obvious lack of experience (putting aside for purposes of this point how that experience measures up to Obama's), she can't be said to have been the most experienced VP candidate either. She is also from a traditionally red state (Alaska went to Bush both times), so it's not like this pick was geared toward potentially picking off blue one. So, unless I'm being extremely unfair here, it appears that what the McCain camp liked most about the independently-but-not-comparatively talented Gov. Palin is that she is a woman. What's important about that, for purposes of this campaign? The pissed off Hillary, voters, that's what. The McCain camp is very aware of the very large turnout in the Dem primaries, and understands (as does everyone) that a lot of Hillary fans thought she got screwed, which is why such a big deal was made this past week about how much enthusiasm Hillary would exhibit for Obama in Denver.

Will Gov. Palin appeal to, along with the conservative base, some soccer moms, independents, and possibly a few "greens"? No doubt. But, my point is that what McCain is really after here is just a sliver of those disaffected Hillary voters, who, given their sheer numbers, would possibly make more of a numerical difference in yet another election that will probably be decided by a 1-2% margin.

I think I agree with you in principle, I may just not agree as to the margin.

I simply can't fathom of an individual who would have voted for Hillary who would now vote for Palin. Again, the only "issue" they remotely have in common is that they're both women.

Again, I'm sure their may be a small number of people who would go from Hillary to Palin solely on that basis, but my gut feeling is the number is so infintesimally small that even in a close race (which I agree it will be) it wouldn't matter. I can't imagine that number being in the tens of thousands, let alone millions.

I suppose if the race gets down to one candidate winning by a margin of a few thousand votes than maybe it will be important, but even when elections are close they're not THAT close.

You never know though - we'll only know when the whole thing is said and done come November.