Mark Gregory Turansky

Tina Fey is a deadringer for Sarah Palin. Funny stuff.

McCain announced his Vice-Presidential candidate on Friday.  By choosing Sarah Palin, I think Team McCain made an excellent move that diverted media attention from Obama’s exceptionally strong speech Thursday night.  Had he choosen a boring white male candidate, the media would probably still be covering Obama’s speech.  Instead, he shook it up with an unexpected choice, and all the pundits and journalists and bloggers immediately started talking about it.  Well done.

Except there are a couple of problems with his choice.

First, it opens up McCain’s age and health as campaign issues.

McCain’s team successfully blocked any critique of his age during the primary season.  Other candidates (Democrats and Republicans) could only hint about it and the attempts were always successfully paried by McCain’s team.  By choosing Palin, McCain instantly made his age and health campaign issues because his Number Two may very well be president.

Why?

Because John McCain is 72 years old, which would make him the oldest president ever, should he be elected.  Average male life expectancy is 73-74 years.  He’s had 4 bouts with cancer (melanomas).  Suddenly, his age and health matter because of his choice of NumberTwo.

Second, McCain instantly neutered his most powerful argument of the election:  experience matters and Obama doesn’t have it.  Obama chose Joe Biden for his vast foreign policy experience, an area where Obama is weak. By choosing someone less experienced than Obama, McCain removed both the hammer and anvil that I thought he’d strike for the entire campaign in a Karl Rove kind of way.  I think it might have worked, too.  Not now.

This is the GOP ticket for 2008:

I’m a born and raised New Yorker.  I know what Rudy did for my city.  It was tremendous revival of the city’s urban culture and revitalization of world famous landmarks like Times Square that had been taken over by peep shows and porn shops.  Today, Times Square is a place you bring your family.  In the aftermath of September 11, Rudy showed remarkable courage and provided strong leadership at a time we needed it most.  I could not have had more respect for Rudy.

Then he waged the most moronic campaign for president modern politics has ever seen.  He skipped all of the early primaries to focus on Florida.  By the time FL came around, the primary was over.  Rudy had lost.  Prescient?  I think not.  Stupid?  Yes.

And now he’s giving political advice to Barack Obama about how to win?  He said during the DNC’s convention, the night of Hillary’s speech:

“The normal political thing to do, in terms of the best decision to make to win, would’ve been to pick Hillary Clinton,” Giuliani, former mayor of New York, told CNN’s Wolf Blitzer on the floor of the convention.

Hello?  Rudy, you don’t have the savvy to win a national election.  You didn’t have the savvy to place in a primary.  Obama’s primary campaign beat the crap of your’s.  It’s obvious you’re only trying to fan the flames for the PUMAs.

I remember watching Rudy on the Daily Show several times.  As mayor, he was a great guest.  Jon Stewart and Rudy joked around and genuinely had a good time.  Then, after 9/11,  after embracing the Bush wing of the GOP and campaigning for W in 2004, he was back on the Daily Show where he parrotted right wing talking points.  The tension between Rudy and Jon (both native New Yorkers who love their city and country) was palpable over the air.

Today?  Rudy has no political future.  He won’t ever win a national election.  He may win a senate race, but not while Hillary and Schumer hold their seats.  Would he run from another state?  Would another state (other than New Jersey) accept an Italian, Catholic New Yorker as their candidate?

Rudy can ride his 9/11 fame into the sunset.  He’ll collect more in speaking fees than I’ll probably earn in a lifetime.  But he’s done politically.  At least on his own.  McCain — should he win — might have a position for Rudy.  But since we don’t need four more years of the last eight years, Rudy won’t have a position in a non-existent McCain cabinet.  Eight years from now, Rudy will be very much a has-been.

In the meantime, Michael Bloomberg is an electrify and exciting mayor in NY who will play well on the national scene.  Move over Rudy, here comes Mike.