Where to start? How about politics!

A letter to the editor:

John McCain's reckless pandering to gynocentrists and the religious faction of the party in choosing an unprepared running mate exacerbates the desperate position Republicans find themselves in.  His choice is demeaning to women and insulting to those of us who grew up believing in a Republican Party that stood for reason, competence and responsibility.  I am embarrassed watching respectable Republicans pretend that she's qualified for the position. Where are America's true conservative leaders?  Will Republicans have to wait four more years for a candidate worth going to the polls for. 

OK, so maybe 'gynocentrists' is too fancy a word.  And, yes, that's an awfully long sentence.

By the time this was actually published in one of our local newspapers - several days after McCain's choice of Sara Palin and my initial reaction - the story had evolved, as had my thinking.  At this point, this position doesn't appear as desperate as I would have thought.  But maybe the exacerbation part is still to come.

While it might sound like I'm a Republican based on my letter, I'm not.  I was trying to speak with the people I was trying to influence, not at them.  When it comes to politics these days, I don't think Republicans and Democrats can hear each other.  Maybe it's a way to deal with the cognitive dissonance.

Republicans seem to have constructed a reality where McCain's selection of Palin establishes his social conservative credentials.  Never mind that he almost chose Joe Lieberman!  His motto is 'Country First', but he chooses a running mate who is not ready to be president, or even ready to talk to the press for that matter. Doesn't anyone see this as putting the lie to his motto?  Isn't he putting politics first?  

I feel like a kid about to cry out that the emperor has no clothes, but first looking around and wondering if I'm the only one who sees it.  What's going on?  Does it not matter whether she is qualified?  Can it be that she is qualified?  I'm waiting for David Brooks or George Will or Pat Buchanan or, at least, David Gergen to speak up! Maybe it's going to take someone like Chuck Hagel or Richard Lugar to tell their fellow Republicans that she is unacceptable.

We'll see...