Palin: A public rift with McCain

Has Sarah Palin gone off the reservation? asked Ben Smith in Politico.com. In the final weeks of the presidential campaign, the Republican vice presidential nominee is visibly putting distance between herself and John McCain’s campaign organization, voicing public disagreement with the decisions to give up on Michigan and not make use of Barack Obama’s connection to his former pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright. To the horror of campaign “minders,” the Alaska governor walked over to reporters on a tarmac one day last week and answered impromptu questions, as if simply to prove she could do it. Palin has also let it be known that she’s blaming McCain’s aides for undermining her “just folks” image by buying her a $150,000 wardrobe. Incredibly, McCain aides are firing back, telling reporters that Palin is “going rogue,” and accusing her of letting her popularity with the party’s base go to her head. “She is playing for her own future,” one McCain advisor told CNN. “She is a diva. She takes no advice from anyone.”

There’s only one explanation for this rift, said Andrew Romano in Newsweek.com. Palin is “making plans for 2012.” She’s clearly more interested in her own image than in helping McCain win. By moving to his right, and publicly taking hard-line conservative positions on such issues as Rev. Wright, gay marriage, and abortion, she seems to be telling conservatives, “Don’t blame me if this guy loses.” If, however, McCain does lose, Palin would immediately emerge as a favorite for the 2012 nomination. That’s how it may look today, said Michael Medved in Townhall.com, but vice presidential nominees on losing tickets end up being seen as … well, losers. John Edwards, Joe Lieberman, and Dan Quayle all mounted presidential bids after their respective losses—and all “failed miserably.” If McCain does lose, “many Republicans will blame Palin,” and it’s hard to imagine the fractured party rallying around her as some kind of savior.

Win, lose, or draw, Sarah Palin isn’t going away, said Gerald F. Seib in The Wall Street Journal. Independents and Democrats may view her as unprepared and unqualified, but among the GOP base, she’s already wildly popular: Three-quarters of Republicans have a positive opinion of her. Politicians usually have to work for decades to attain the name recognition and “star power” that Palin has achieved in just seven weeks. Hers is “one of the more amazing political stories of our times,” and whatever happens on Nov. 4, that story isn’t over.