Tough Cookie?

Repub spokesperson, excuse me, spokeswoman: "She's one tough cookie." Having little else with which to defend McCain's choice, they're playing the gender card, and will likely play this card repeatedly, because it's the only card they hold right now in the Palin game.

If McCain wanted to divert attention from the hollowness of his campaign, the continuing sadness of our war in Iraq, our fumbled war against terror, global warming, the mortgage crisis, the falling dollar, our international reputation, health insurance questions and the well-being of the Republic, he's done it.

Why?

I think of Bush choosing Harriet Meirs for the Supreme Court - without credentials, but with all the Bush-loyalty and ideological fidelity, she would have, if confirmed, carried on the fundamentalist agenda, which is the heart and soul of a political party no longer capable of serious thought.

McCain describes Palin as a soul-mate. Not his soul-mate; I doubt if McCain has any soul left, having sold it to the fundamentalist interests of the party. Not a soul-mate, but a hook for the gun-tottin' religious nuts that now constitute a serious voting block in the one-time Grand Old Party of Senator Everett Dirksen.

The gender card, like the race card, isn't a card at all.

Those who play it, either to engender (so to speak) favor or sow seeds of discontent, aren't playing the game at all. But this year, what with all the serious issues facing us, issues created mostly by failed Bush policies, the Repubs haven't a leg on which to stand.

The debate is already in full swing: parents relating to children. Children and pregnancy. Being a working mother. Mighty important stuff, but is this where the presidential debate needs to be heading right now? The "sympathy" votes are already being counted in the swank restaurants of St. Paul.

Is this the ultimate Karl Rove move? Take the gender values of the Dems, turn them inside out and upside down, use them to create an impression of feminist commitment, while in fact, setting back the cause of women a hundred years, using Palin to promote a right-wing, anti-woman, agenda.

Yup, one tough cookie. To survive being used by the GOP, she'll have to be tough, and even tougher, her family.

And let's hope the American people will be a whole lot smarter.