Specifics

A thing I've noticed:

Sarah Palin has now, in several interviews, used the following phrasing. In reference to which newspapers she reads, which constitutional rulings she disagrees with, and other completely non-essential issues:

Interviewer:
Name me a specific case of X.

Palin:
I can name you specific cases of X. You know, I think it's important in terms of X bla bla bla. So, you know, X.

Interviewer:
And what specific case of X are you thinking about?

[At which point she says basically more of the same, and you scream in agony and close the window you were looking at.]

So she specifically says that she can name specific cases of whatever it is (newspapers, constitutional law cases. Y'know: elitist things), and then reveals that she can't. Anyway, watch for it. As Michael Bérubé says, it's like watching a student try to fake a term paper in real time. Which, btw, is exactly the feeling I got watching that "all under the umbrella of job creation"-answer, which Tina Fey repeated verbatim in the Saturday Night Live sketch.

the definition of "funny, but not ha-ha-funny"

Actual Palin interview.

The Saturday Night Live version.

I can't tell the two apart, except one is hysterically funny, and the other one makes me hysteric. I'm foetal under the desk right now.

Also note how the SNL version uses many actual quotes from the Couric/Palin interview, with almost no change.

Paling. With embarassment.

Oh my goodness. Palin's new interview is just painful. It is quite simply just the most embarassing interview ever. What were they thinking? She's just spectacularly unskilled.

Palin: He's also known as the maverick though, taking shots from his own party, and certainly taking shots from the other party. Trying to get people to understand what he's been talking about - the need to reform government.

Couric: But can you give me any other concrete examples? Because I know you've said Barack Obama is a lot of talk and no action. Can you give me any other examples in his 26 years of John McCain truly taking a stand on this?

Palin: I can give you examples of things that John McCain has done, that has shown his foresight, his pragmatism, and his leadership abilities. And that is what America needs today.

Couric: I'm just going to ask you one more time - not to belabor the point. Specific examples in his 26 years of pushing for more regulation.

Palin: I'll try to find you some and I'll bring them to you.

That's just the horrific part. The rest is only toe-curlingly bad.
Transcript here. Video + full transcript here. Read the whole thing. Don't watch it, you'll throw something at the screen.

I prefer Michael Palin, myself. More cosmopolitan.

I don't know if this analysis by Ezra Klein of McCain's vice-presidential choice of Sarah Palin is accurate, but I hope it gets a lot of play, because it's convincing. The "he's trying to look cool"-angle is great. It makes McCain look like one of those really old teachers who get the kid's slang wrong trying to "reach out to them". Good narrative for the Obama campaign:

This was, for McCain, a major decision. And we can learn from it. And here's what even his supporters must admit: Country did not come first. Polls did. The calculations are fully transparent. Understanding that he needed to broaden his electoral coalition, he picked a woman. Understanding he needed youth, he picked a young politician. Understanding he needed to emphasize his reformist credentials, he picked a onetime whistleblower. What he didn't pick was anyone able to help him govern, or capable of stepping forward in a moment of crisis. Palin is not an experienced foreign policy hand like Lieberman or a successful and experienced governor like Tommy Thompson. Today, McCain chose his campaign over his presidency. Over our presidency. Palin seems like a promising young politician, but McCain increasingly seems like a desperate one.

That having been said, I was kinda underwhelmed by Obama's speech at the convention. He gorged on a whole bunch of silly tropes he'd been sensible enough throughout the rest of the campaign to use sparingly. It just seemed too over-the-top to me.

And there was way too much emphasis on the military, Georgia and Israel for me to feel entirely comfortable. Also: you might not have heard the dog-whistle, but he was talking about doing military operations against Bin Laden and Al-Qaida, which means going into Pakistan. That's very troubling.

Update: although, when I think about it, he's finally putting some policy ideas more widely into the field, which is probably what his campaign needs at this point. Or maybe it's just my blood sugar talking. Who knows?