amateur

that's my current assessment of sarah palin. she might be intelligent (although i'm not totally convinced), and she may be an awesome multi-tasker. but in no way do i find her to be at all ready to lead this country. and it's not the lack of experience per se, it's the ignorance. she seems to know about as much about foreign policy and current events as i do, which is not very much at all. 

i'm happiest with this assessment of her because, for now (although i'm not sure for how long), i can still believe that she is an exceptionally intelligent and capable person who was just put into a position that she wasn't quite ready for yet. i can put aside our ideological differences (not enough to vote for her) and want her to succeed for the (metaphysical, at least) benefit of girls everywhere. what i cannot stomach is the nomination of a woman who is under-qualified when there are plenty of qualified women around (e.g., Harriet Miers, the Bush nominee for the Supreme Court that preceded Alito). it's like setting up a straw (wo)man just so it can be torn down and proven inadequate yet again.

and, to chime in with others (for example, dowd and warner, usually not my favs, and i still don't agree wholeheartedly, but we're definitely on the same page), the sexism we're seeing these days is truly outstanding. republicans and conservatives now get to champion gender equality and accuse the "liberal media" of sexism. i would have been ok with strange bedfellows if it meant that we could really make some inroads for women, but these accusations of sexism are thrown about every time sarah palin gets examined critically. so the new gender equity "champions" are saying that palin shouldn't be, and making sure that she isn't, held to the same standards as men. which, of course, begs the question of what equality actually means. and, for their part, the "liberal media" is doing a terrible job too - for all the times that you ignored complaints from conservatives, now you're backing off palin for fear of appearing sexist? all the critiques you were happy to print about hillary clinton, and not even a tiny fraction of that is relevant for palin?

finally, here is a great clip from SNL, although i'm not sure whether to laugh or cry.