It is hard to believe that John McCain and his Republican supporters can keep a sraight face in presenting Alaska Governor Sarah Palin as a viable choice as his running mate.  The basic argument is that she will solidify the Republican conservative base because she is a pro-life, pro-gun, anti-corruption reformer.  As a woman, she will make an appeal to the disaffected supporters of Hillary Clinton.  However, he has shot himself in the foot in arguing that Obama is inexperienced and not ready for the presidency -- especially when he said that his primary criteria was to select someone who would be ready immediately to assume the presidency.

In making such an unabashed bid for supporters of Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, he risked undercutting his central case against Senator Barack Obama -- inexperience.  In fact, I would think that this selection is an insult to the supporters of Hillary Clinton.   Some Republicans, though, distinguished her résumé from Mr. Obama's by arguing that Ms. Palin's "executive experience" as governor was more valuable than Mr. Obama's legislative history. The "not ready" argument against Mr. Obama, they suggested, will focus more on judgment than pure experience.  How can they keep a straight face while insulting the intelligence of the American electorate?

Barack Obama has pent the past 19 months traveling all over the country and the world to further prepare himself, and convince a global audience that he is ready to lead the free world.  The response has been overwhelmingly positive.  And now, almost as an afterthought, the Republicans offer up someone who has barely traveled outside Alaska, who has no earthly idea about the challenges facing the vast majority of Americans, and less of a global worldview.  They must think that the racist rejection of Black candidate is so powerful that voters will accept a hockey mom as VP at the most critical juncture in the history of the world instead of the most compelling presidential candidate since JFK.

McCain's campaign now needs to convince the public that it can imagine in the Oval Office a candidate who has spent just two years as governor of a state with a quarter of the population of Brooklyn.  The 115,000 votes she received in winning the governor's office two years ago barely eclipsed the 80,000 people who packed a football stadium in Denver on Thursday night to watch Mr. Obama's acceptance speech.  And they want to suggest that this woman is ready to lead the free world?

One analyst describes his choice this way: "He's a respected Washington lifer who's run into political forces that are bigger than himself. And he's responded by making a decision that feels panicky."  John McCain has demonstraed with this decision that he is incapable of using good judgment in making leadership decisions.  In fact, this decision is ridiculously manipulative in its premise.

Supporting this ticket will require the willing suspension of disbelief.