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James Forsyth 1:13pm
The McCain candidacy lives. Sarah Palin needed to hit it out of the park last night and she did. The only thing she didn’t do was point. (Video of the speech after the jump)
There are still legitimate questions about Palin’s experience, her knowledge of national security and her readiness to be president but to deliver a speech of that quality after the last few days she has had showed that she has iron in her soul. No one now need fear that she’ll freeze in the spotlight. One friend who has advised the McCain campaign whose ear I have chewed off in recent days with my worries about the Palin pick sent me an email straight after the speech which just read ‘feel better now?’
The next hurdle for Palin to get over is the tough media interview. Fairly or unfairly, the fourth estate won’t take her seriously until she has gone toe to toe with one of their own. But this morning the Palin pick appears more bold than rash.
Trafalgar
September 4th, 2008 2:20pm Report this commentA few people commenting here that it's easy to make a speech given an autocue - it's not. It's damn difficult giving a speeech to 20000 and millions more on the box, and Palin pulled this off. You could see the autocue on the TV pictures though which grated a bit.
Pictures of her with her baby was pretty powerful stuff and will play extremely well with middle America. Would be interested in the total viewing figures. I think McCain will look frail and dull next to this.
Game on.
Alex Creel
September 4th, 2008 2:32pm Report this commentOh James, sickening sycophancy; the order of the brown nose is yours......and your typo says it all 'the Plain pick' she certainly is - plainly manipulative, plainly power-hungry, plainly a nasty piece of work.
Henry Higgins
September 4th, 2008 3:51pm Report this commentShe's got it.
By George, she's got it.
Oscar
September 4th, 2008 4:33pm Report this commentAfter this speech I think a rousing chorus of Yes She Can is now in order.
Dade
September 4th, 2008 5:06pm Report this commentOscar, "Yes she can"?
Is it now the Palin/McSame ticket?
Don't get too excited yet though, a week is a long time in politics as Ms Palin can sure tell you!
RMH
September 4th, 2008 6:06pm Report this comment"but to deliver a speech of that quality "
Nice, shame she did not write it and is just a pretty face reading someone else's script.....
Craig Strachan
September 4th, 2008 6:54pm Report this commentRMH: "Nice, shame she did not write it and is just a pretty face reading someone else's script....."
I do wonder about how much personal input she had in drafting the speech. As the parent of a six-year-old on the severe end of the autism spectrum, I found the line about needing a special kind of love to parent a special needs kid to be a little odd.
Palin's child is still an infant - the particular challenges associated with parenting a Down's Syndrome child will really only present themselves as the child grows up.
Also, in my experience, parents of special needs kids tend to find themselves constantly stressing to their other, non-special needs children that they don't love them any less, or any differently - even if their siblings inevitably claim more of the parents time.
I much prefer David Cameron's quiet and dignified approach to handling the question of being the parent of a disabled child. I can't seem him delivering a line that essentially uses the child to reflect credit on the parent.
Joe Camel
September 4th, 2008 7:19pm Report this commentTwo things stand out from Sarah Palin’s acceptance speech last night and the reactions to it on the talkbacks, on both sides of the Atlantic.
(1) For anyone who wasn’t quite sure (including myself) what it meant to be a community organizer, now we know: it’s sort of like a small-town mayor but without any actual responsibilities.
(2) The Democratic Party as a whole (including its British supporters) is coming across like Hillary Clinton when she started losing to Obama. They had convinced themselves that the presidency is something their momma had promised them and their shocked discovery that somebody else may get it instead leaves them peevish and sulky.
Oscar
September 4th, 2008 9:50pm Report this commentRMH - well the speech seems to have Joe Biden in tatters. This is what he had to say today:
"I will be unrelenting in my debate with governor, the governor of Alaska in terms of the positions she has taken. But I will not do what she is able to do so well, and many of it's not bad. I am not good at the one-line zingers that go at, you know, that's not my deal. So if that is going to be the measure of how these debates go, then I'm not going to do very well."
Biden sounds like a very worried man indeed.
TGF UKIP
September 4th, 2008 10:30pm Report this commentWell, all I can do is cravenly and humbly confess that I got it totally wrong. While initially being onside with the pick, as the Britol thing emerged I concluded that McCain had made a huge mistake and severely jeopardized his candidacy.
Boy oh boy, did this speech prove me wrong!
Verity, you (and Bill Kristol) were absolutely spot on right down the line, this gal has got IT! This speech was something different and the chemistry of the whole contest was changed last night.
James/Verity can you tell me when the Biden debate is scheduled for - I bet Slimey Joe is crapping himself.
BTW, noteworthy that the BBC did not choose to use any of those passages in the speech where she blew their precious Obama out of the water.
Verity
September 6th, 2008 7:53pm Report this commentHello, TGF UKIP - I believe the Vice Presidential Debate is 2 October - not too long to wait!!
26 September, 7 October and 15 October are the Presidential Debates.
Governor Palin is going to wipe the floor with old time Washington lag Senator Biden.
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