Sarah Palin: The Barracuda

Websman, despite some harsh comments from outside of your country (many of which are a bit tongue in cheek), none of us would want to see the US fail, or even fall into a prolonged recession.

I think a lot of us are dismayed at not just what is happening right now, but at the gradual and exponential erosion of respect for the US over the term of President Bush's watch.

As a kid, I can remember my parents saying that America was the greatest country on earth, a place of unlimited opportunity for anyone who had the energy to want to get ahead. (Given the race relations at that time, this may have been rather optimistic on their part.)

But now we seem to be witnessing the results of the worst aspects of capitalism in greed and irresponsibility.

Let's hope whoever becomes the next President can restore some genuine and justified sense of pride to your country.

websman said:

Or...Is that what you would like to see....

Click to expand...

Webs, don't leap to delusions mate. It is merely a subjective observation of fact.

I addition to Julia's comments, the USA has quite obviously maneuvered itself into a rut, economically, militarily and morally.

But as I've mentioned elsewhere on this board, I have great faith that America will innovate itself out of the situation it's in, but it has to realize it's in it first. Many Americans do, and that's encouraging, but many who matter still don't.

This is evident in the current crisis.

wayneL said:

Webs, don't leap to delusions mate. It is merely a subjective observation of fact.

I addition to Julia's comments, the USA has quite obviously maneuvered itself into a rut, economically, militarily and morally.

But as I've mentioned elsewhere on this board, I have great faith that America will innovate itself out of the situation it's in, but it has to realize it's in it first. Many Americans do, and that's encouraging, but many who matter still don't.

This is evident in the current crisis.

Click to expand...

Unfortunately Wayne, it is Barack Obama that has not learned the lessons of the economic crisis. He is the one that has proposed over 800 billion dollars in new spending if he gets into office. Every Democrat special interest group has its hand out, and Barack has promised to grease it.

McCain is not in the Bush mold. He is a deficit hawk. He really will veto any bill that overspends. That was one of Bush's many mistakes, especially in his first term. He just wanted to get along, so any bill Congress passed, he signed, whether it would bust the budget or not.

Please be careful not to tar McCain with the Bush brush. He has been Bush's fiercist critic many times. I actually think that Bush secretly hopes McCain will lose.

McCain is a tough critter - I think the world will be in for a pleasant surprise under a McCain administration.

ZzzzDad said:

Unfortunately Wayne, it is Barack Obama that has not learned the lessons of the economic crisis. He is the one that has proposed over 800 billion dollars in new spending if he gets into office. Every Democrat special interest group has its hand out, and Barack has promised to grease it.

McCain is not in the Bush mold. He is a deficit hawk. He really will veto any bill that overspends. That was one of Bush's many mistakes, especially in his first term. He just wanted to get along, so any bill Congress passed, he signed, whether it would bust the budget or not.

Please be careful not to tar McCain with the Bush brush. He has been Bush's fiercist critic many times. I actually think that Bush secretly hopes McCain will lose.

McCain is a tough critter - I think the world will be in for a pleasant surprise under a McCain administration.

Click to expand...

Well so long as you guys stop bombing countries you don't actually need to bomb.

Unfortunately McCain didn't come across as the diplomatic type in the debate and deficit hawkishness is not the the only thing he is hawkish on. Consequently, perpetual war would seem a certainty.

Living in Europe, that's all I really care about as far as the US is concerned... and to stop ****ing with free markets.

Now for Thursday 9pm US time to see the VEEP debate!
Is Palin Obama's greatest asset?

Palin sends the cringe meter off the dial

No one will be more relieved than John McCain if a major crisis erupts on Thursday to overshadow the debate between the vice-presidential candidates, Sarah Palin and Joe Biden.

Alaska's one-term governor is hugely popular with voters, but she is also a liability for the Republican ticket, as her painful-to-watch interview last week with Katie Couric of CBS News showed. Her woeful inexperience and the yawning gaps in her knowledge of basic issues reminded voters of McCain's advanced age at 72, and sparked questions about what sort of president she would make. Her performance prompted one right-wing commentator, Kathleen Parker of the 'National Review', to call on her to quit. "Only Palin can save McCain, her party, and the country she loves," she wrote. "She can bow out for personal reasons, perhaps because she wants to spend more time with her newborn."

That explains why the McCain campaign did not want his running-mate anywhere near Friday's presidential clash in Oxford, Mississippi. Instead, Palin watched it on TV in Philadelphia, while Senator Biden gave countless interviews in the media "spin room" outside the Obama-McCain debate.

Click to expand...

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/w...nds-the-cringe-meter-off-the-dial-944774.html

Biden and Palin will face off Thursday Oct 2 at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri - 8 pm CDT.

Biden has done nearly 100 interviews since being picked as Obama's VP on August 23.

Palin did her third interview with a national television network last week.

The vice presidential debate has a slightly different setup from the presidential debates.

The second presidential debate is set up like a town hall meeting:
- will include any issues raised by members of that audience and online.

In the other two, there are approximately eight 10-minute segments.

The moderator introduces each segment with an issue:

- two minutes to respond.

- five-minute discussion period, with direct exchanges between the candidates.

* The vice presidential debate will resemble the traditional presidential event.

However, the McCain campaign sought to limit the time for freewheeling discussion in the VP debate.

Advisers to Palin were reportedly worried that format could put the Alaska governor -- a relatively inexperienced debater -- on the defensive most of the evening.

Click to expand...

http://edition.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/09/27/campaign.wrap/?iref=hpmostpop


The agreed-upon format for the v.p. contenders:

- 90 seconds to respond to questions
- 120 seconds discussion period of each topic.

So... that is 7 minutes for P debates per question and
... 3.5 minutes each question for the VP debate!

Biden has to be succinct - this will show him in a new light!

Maybe because Palin appears to have lost confidence and has had competence only when reading those two McCain campaign-written speeches,* she may just surprise us all in being on the ball... and not introduce every statement with what "McCain and I are ready" or "McCain and I are working on that".

*

Her highly-lauded speech to the Republican convention that launched the wave of "Palinmania" that has gripped the party was written by Matthew Scully, who previously crafted the words of President Bush.

Click to expand...

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/new...-relies-on-Bush-veterans-for-her-big-day.html

After all, now, with 2 minutes instead of 5 minutes for discussion, (theoretically one minute each) she should be able to recall the spiel she is learning rote. She was introduced as a fast, efficient learner after all.


Gwen Ifill will be the moderator.

"The biggest pressure you have as a journalist ever is to make sure you get an answer to your question," said Ifill, whose crowded resume includes The New York Times, The Washington Post and NBC News. "That's what I'm focusing on — how to ask questions that elicit answers instead of spin, or in this case to elicit engagement between the two."

People sometimes forget it's a debate, not an inquisition, Ifill said.

"People who watch these debates are incredibly engaged," she said. "I don't have to chase the candidates around the table to make them answer questions. The people will know whether a question has been answered or not."

The format offers Ifill great freedom. Questions on domestic or international issues are allowed, and it's up to her to decide the mix.

One competitor said he expects Ifill to do well. Bob Schieffer, CBS News chief Washington correspondent, said:

"Gwen knows what she's doing. It's pretty hard to slip one past her. I think she'll do a great job."

Click to expand...

http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5iBZRtBDTOeK8QmB-4AwY_BbtecmAD93BEF1G1

Help needed: I can't find whether the debate will be 90 minutes long. Anyone know?

Palin maybe coming to the realisation that she has bitten off more than she can chew as VP.

As a mother of 5 one a new born wit Down syndrome she would be stretched to the limit finding quality time with her family and the enormous intake of knowledge. No-one can be gifted in intellect on every subject, she certainly won't be.

Despite having a supporting husband, family and carers she will in the end suffer from the lack of quality mothering directly gven to her children.

Can you see her in the white house bouncing a baby on her knee? What may seem cute now can be an absolute disaster in the end.

You can't compare her to Hillary who does have experience and Chelsea has finished University.

Julia said:

I think a lot of us are dismayed at not just what is happening right now, but at the gradual and exponential erosion of respect for the US over the term of President Bush's watch.

Click to expand...

True, but worse may be in store. So far, the erosion of respect for the USA is insignificant compared to what it will be if Palin becomes VP. If she eventually becomes President then the predictable outcomes for US policies will probably alienate even the USA's staunchest allies, except for the USA's middle eastern surrogates and the Marshall Islands.

blablabla said:

True, but worse may be in store. So far, the erosion of respect for the USA is insignificant compared to what it will be if Palin becomes VP. If she eventually becomes President then the predictable outcomes for US policies will probably alienate even the USA's staunchest allies, except for the USA's middle eastern surrogates and the Marshall Islands.

Click to expand...

The prospect of Palin as President is just to unthinkable to contemplate.

I do enjoy blogs:

Re: new shortened format of VP debate:

(yep... she'll be learning McCain off by heart and none of her opinions will be revealed.)
Howzat for training a puppet VP!

The wrangling was chiefly between the McCain-Palin camp and the nonpartisan Commission on Presidential Debates, which is sponsoring the forums.

Commission members wanted a relaxed format that included time for unpredictable questioning and challenges between the two vice-presidential candidates. The commission unanimously rejected a proposal sought by advisers to Palin and McCain to have the moderator ask questions and the candidates answer, with no time for unfettered exchanges. Advisers to Mr. Biden say they were comfortable with either format.

McCain advisers said they had been concerned that a loose format could leave Ms. Palin, a relatively inexperienced debater, at a disadvantage and largely on the defensive.

McCain advisers said they were only somewhat concerned about Ms. Palin’s debating skills compared with those of Mr. Biden, who has served six terms in the Senate, or about his chances of tripping her up. Instead, they say, they wanted Ms. Palin to have opportunities to present Mr. McCain’s positions, rather than spending time talking about her experience or playing defense.

Click to expand...

* Well, at least she didn't get the teleprompters the campaign asked for.

* I hope the belligerent third world dictators will be as accommodating.

* Ya don't debate third world dictators, ya bomb 'em. Duh.

* Holy crap! I can't believe the McCain camp actually said that. I know the campaigns try to set the bar low before these things,but this is pathetic.

* This is some bullsh!t. You can't change the format of the debate because Palin is inexperienced at debating. You don't get a handicap. This is a presidential election, not golf, the best player is supposed to win.

* How would shorter answers help someone who doesn't know what to say ?
Doesn't that increase the pressure on her ?

* I thought she was a pit bull who wasn't scared of the elitist media?

* If you believe that, then I have a bridge to nowhere to sell you.

* I.e. let her regurgitate talking points instead of answering the tough questions that a truly qualified candidate would be able to tackle.

* If she's inexperienced, doesn't that tell us something about her qualifications?

* Give her more rope, please. Just tell her its moose entrails, she'll use it as a lasso. Roy Rogers-style.

* But it was Will Rogers who said the famous line about "give a man enough rope, and he'll hang himself." Plus he did lasso tricks during his routines.

Although I'm starting to think that there were multiple references going on here...

* My girlfriend's favorite tactic: If you can't win by playing by the rules, change the rules.

* are you sure it isn't because joe never shuts up once he starts talking? looks like a win for both sides.

http://www.reddit.com

Should we have a poll on what colour lipstick she might wear??

They are probably going over time to work on the cosmetic side of things her dress, shoes, hair, glasses anything to make her look credible.

It's a sorry state of the world when men have to vote with their p......

McCain camp prays for Palin wedding

In an election campaign notable for its surprises, Sarah Palin may be about to spring a new one — the wedding of her pregnant teenage daughter to her ice-hockey-playing fiancé before the November 4 election.

Inside John McCain’s campaign the expectation is growing that there will be a popularity boosting pre-election wedding in Alaska between Bristol Palin, 17, and Levi Johnston, 18, her schoolmate and father of her baby. “It would be fantastic,” said a McCain insider. “You would have every TV camera there. The entire country would be watching.
It would shut down the race for a week.”

She could benefit from a fresh injection of homespun authenticity, the hallmark of her style, provided by her daughter’s wedding after appearing out of depth away from her home state.


The conservative commentator Kathleen Parker, an early admirer, shocked McCain supporters late last week by calling on Palin to withdraw. “My cringe reflex is exhausted,” she wrote in National Review Online, a conservative journal. “Palin’s recent interviews . . . all revealed an attractive, earnest, confident candidate.
Who Is Clearly Out of Her League.”

Parker advised Palin to “save McCain, her party and the country she loves” by announcing that she wanted to spend more time with Trig, her five-month-old Down’s syndrome baby:
“No one would criticise a mother who puts her family first.”


McCain is expected to have a front-row seat at Bristol’s wedding and to benefit from the outpouring of goodwill that it could bring. “What’s the downside?” a source inside the McCain campaign said. “It would be wonderful. I don’t know that there has ever been a pre-election wedding before.”

The ice-hockey player wrote on his MySpace page he was a “f****** redneck” and stated, “I don’t want kids.”
But a McCain insider predicted he would marry Bristol whenever his future mother-in-law wanted.

“It’s a shotgun wedding. She kills things,” the source joked.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/us_and_americas/us_elections/article4837644.ece

Doris said:

McCain camp prays for Palin wedding

In an election campaign notable for its surprises, Sarah Palin may be about to spring a new one ”” the wedding of her pregnant teenage daughter to her ice-hockey-playing fiancé before the November 4 election.

Inside John McCain’s campaign the expectation is growing that there will be a popularity boosting pre-election wedding in Alaska between Bristol Palin, 17, and Levi Johnston, 18, her schoolmate and father of her baby. “It would be fantastic,” said a McCain insider. “You would have every TV camera there. The entire country would be watching.
It would shut down the race for a week.”

She could benefit from a fresh injection of homespun authenticity, the hallmark of her style, provided by her daughter’s wedding after appearing out of depth away from her home state.


The conservative commentator Kathleen Parker, an early admirer, shocked McCain supporters late last week by calling on Palin to withdraw. “My cringe reflex is exhausted,” she wrote in National Review Online, a conservative journal. “Palin’s recent interviews . . . all revealed an attractive, earnest, confident candidate.
Who Is Clearly Out of Her League.”

Parker advised Palin to “save McCain, her party and the country she loves” by announcing that she wanted to spend more time with Trig, her five-month-old Down’s syndrome baby:
“No one would criticise a mother who puts her family first.”


McCain is expected to have a front-row seat at Bristol’s wedding and to benefit from the outpouring of goodwill that it could bring. “What’s the downside?” a source inside the McCain campaign said. “It would be wonderful. I don’t know that there has ever been a pre-election wedding before.”

The ice-hockey player wrote on his MySpace page he was a “f****** redneck” and stated, “I don’t want kids.”
But a McCain insider predicted he would marry Bristol whenever his future mother-in-law wanted.

“It’s a shotgun wedding. She kills things,” the source joked.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/us_and_americas/us_elections/article4837644.ece

Click to expand...

This story is just so False it is not worth commenting on except to say that all these "anonymous" sources are just making things up. Ridiculous.

The human gaffe machine (Biden) is going to put his foot in his mouth in the debate, and Sarah Palin will come out looking much better than him.

I'm glad all of y'all are underestimating Palin. Ever heard of sandbagging? Have you seen any videos of her debates in Alaska for the governors office? against an entrenched incumbent? (shhhh, she's a lot better at debates than gotcha edited interviews - but don't tell anyone)

Maybe it is a hoax -- but Sarah Baxter seems to have credibility as a journalist. (pictured below)

It's not the wedding that smells bad - it's the idea of using it politically!

Who might 'the McCain source' be?

Lots of conservative journalists have changed sides. Is it too late to admit a mistake for Palin to pass?

How I'm grateful for my simple life!

Voters typically focus almost exclusively on the presidential candidates, and even weak vice presidential nominees seldom drag down a national ticket.

While John McCain and his aides have railed against the "liberal mainstream media" in recent weeks, some of the most searing attacks against him have come from conservative intellectuals.

McCain's pick of Palin, and his sharp reactions to the continuing economic storm have led several prominent columnists on the right to slam him as more reckless than bold, more strident than forceful.

The spirited debate may have reached its apogee with George F. Will issuing McCain a harsh dressing-down.

"Under the pressure of the financial crisis, one presidential candidate is behaving like a flustered rookie playing in a league too high," Will began his column, which is carried in more than 450 newspapers.
"It is not Barack Obama."

The conservative elder accused McCain of "characteristically substituting vehemence for coherence" and of attacking his Democratic rival as a big spender, rather than mounting a philosophical challenge to the largest government bailout of business in American history.

Will mocked McCain as a veritable Queen of Hearts (a la "Alice in Wonderland") for demanding the head of Cox, a former Republican congressman, who is chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission.

The Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist argued that such impulsiveness sows doubts about McCain's ability to apply "calm reflection and clear principles" to important decisions. He ended his broadside by all but declaring McCain unfit for the Oval Office.

"It is arguable that, because of his inexperience, Obama is not ready for the presidency," Will wrote. "It is arguable that McCain, because of his boiling moralism and bottomless reservoir of certitudes, is not suited to the presidency. Unreadiness can be corrected, although perhaps at great cost, by experience. Can a dismaying temperament be fixed?"

The dismay expressed by Will and other columnists, including David Brooks of the New York Times, who at times is a McCain cheerleader, arises primarily over McCain's selection of Palin.

Palin, Brooks argued, "has not been engaged in national issues, does not have a repertoire of historic patterns and, like President Bush, seems to compensate for her lack of experience with brashness and excessive decisiveness."

Brooks wrote that eight years of "inept" governance by Bush has helped persuade him of the ineffectiveness of a president who makes decisions on gut and instinct.

But David Frum, a former Bush speechwriter, is among conservatives who have worried that the Palin pick weakens one of McCain's best arguments: that he has superior experience and is better prepared to protect America.

"How serious can [McCain] be," Frum wrote even before Palin appeared at the GOP convention, "if he would place such a neophyte second in line to the presidency?"

Charles Krauthammer and Ross Douthat, two other conservative stalwarts, have also doubted Palin's readiness to lead.

Click to expand...

http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-na-palin28-2008sep28,0,3440078.story

Tina Fey has just done Saturday Night Live again... as Sarah Palin.

- The skit mocks Palin's recent interview with CBS News' Katie Couric

Quite clever...

It's not on youtube yet but no doubt when it is, THEY'll be turned into a pop video clip as the last one was!

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/09/27/tina-fey-as-sarah-palin-k_n_129956.html

Scroll down a page for the video clip. There's a transcript of part of the skit below it... e.g.

POEHLER AS COURIC: "On foreign policy, I want to give you one more chance to explain your claim that you have foreign policy experience based on Alaska's proximity to Russia. What did you mean by that?"

FEY AS PALIN: "Well, Alaska and Russia are only separated by a narrow maritime border. (using her hands to illustrate) You got Alaska here, this right here is water, and this is Russia. So, we keep an eye on them."

POEHLER AS COURIC: "And how do you do that exactly?"

FEY AS PALIN: "Every morning, when Alaskans wake up, one of the first things they do, is look outside to see if there are any Russians hanging around. And if there are, you gotta go up to them and ask, 'What are you doing here?' and if they can't give you a good reason, it's our responsibility to say, you know, 'Shoo! Get back over there!'

Click to expand...

Note that Fey often quotes directly from Palin's original interview -- apparently no parody was required:

Here's the SNL transcript (below) with the original Couric-Palin video: (1min 15 secs)


FEY AS PALIN: "Like every American I'm speaking with, we're ill about this. We're saying, 'Hey, why bail out Fanny and Freddie and not me?' But ultimately what the bailout does is, help those that are concerned about the healthcare reform that is needed to help shore up our economy to help...uh...it's gotta be all about job creation, too. Also, too, shoring up our economy and putting Fannie and Freddy back on the right track and so healthcare reform and reducing taxes and reigning in spending...'cause Barack Obama, y'know...has got to accompany tax reductions and tax relief for Americans, also, having a dollar value meal at restaurants. That's gonna help. But one in five jobs being created today under the umbrella of job creation. That, you know...Also..."

Something to think about if you really want to know who is at fault in this financial crisis. It is too easy to blame Republicans - look below for the real culprits

McCain/Palin Could Win this Election by Exposing the Trillion Dollar Scam

James Lewis
Sarah Barracuda could win this election on Friday night for the Republicans. All she needs is the courage to tell the truth in her debate with human gaffe machine Joe Biden -- with John McCain's permission and support -- to tell it like it is.


If the great American middle class ever figures out the trillion dollar phony mortgage scam from Freddie and Fannie, they will finally rise up in wrath and throw the liberal bums out. Let it start hitting their pocket books, their ATM cards and credit cards, let their home prices fall like a rock -- and Barack Obama will be out of politics, along with the Democrat majority in Congress.


For conservatives this is the opportunity of the century.


That is why the Democrats are screaming with fear about the abyss that has suddenly opened at their feet. Since the Carter Administration first threatened the banks with punishment if they didn't allow themselves to be robbed by sub-prime borrowers, since the Clinton Administration made it all even worse in 1995, even the Democrats have known full well that the bills had to come due at some time.


There is a sane reason why bankers and trustees have to exercise "due diligence" over other people's money. All the politicians are lawyers, and they know about money and theft. But "due diligence" was criminalized for bankers through Federal law. They were compelled, on penalty of law, to lend money at high-risk through Fannie and Freddie. It is the Great Stock Market Crash of 1929 all over again, where everybody bought stocks on margin until they could see the abyss opening up at their feet. Well, this time it was the Feds who created an insane lending scheme themselves. The US Government threatened to punish bankers for "redlining" -- which in real life means giving money only to people who can pay it back.


You can only bend the market through coercion for so long -- then things fall apart. That's what's happened here.


The taxpayers are now on the hook for a trillion dollars, if you add the failed 300 billion dollar rescue package from two weeks ago to the 700 billion dollar Paulson package. This is a trillion dollar scam, and all the politicians in Congress, the ACORN mafia, the people who played the market on unsecured mortgages, and the scam artists who were hired by Freddie and Fannie -- they all knew it. In case you haven't been watching, that includes all of Barack Obama's "home mortgage advisors" -- Franklin Raines, Jim Johnson and Jamie Gorelick. It includes Senate Banking Committee members like Chris Dodd. It includes House members like Barney Frank. Watch this video and you can see them strutting their stuff when the US watchdog agency criticized Fannie and Freddie in 2003.



They knew exactly what was going on.


This crisis is not financial -- it is political. It's not a market failure. It's a decades-long theft by the Left, finally exposed for what it is.


http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2008/09/mccainpalin_could_win_this_ele.html


The Democrats deserve the wrath of the voters this time.


Sarah Palin could defeat Obama and Biden Friday night. All she has to do is tell the truth about the Democrats and the Trillion Dollar Scam. Not to do so would be collude in a massive Ponzi scheme, designed to fall on the shoulders of the taxpayers.


This is precisely why we have elections.


John McCain and Sarah Palin will need a lot of guts to do this. But the scam has to be exposed, or the fetid wounds in the financial sector will fester and metastasize.

Sarah Palin reminds me of Mal Meningas' attempt at being a politician.

ZzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzDad,

As I recall there were some Republicans in between there, since Jimmy

1/ Ronnie
2/ Bush the Elder
3/ Bush the Dumber

Why didn't they do something?

And the inconvenient truth is that the poo is hitting the propeller at the end of two terms of conservative watch, AND the period of greatest acceleration of this trend was in the last 7 years under Bush The Dumber.

I have a feeling the Republicans won't be mentioning this. They wouldn't just be shooting themselves in the foot, it would be blowing it off with a bazooka.

That was actually laughable. (Understand that I'm not a fiscal liberal either)

Ahh ump we wont then discuss who changed the leverage rules from 12/1 to 40/1 the investment banks could use in 2005.........

Oooops... Who let Palin out?

They'll now have to keep an eye (ear?) out to stop Palin talking to people in restaurants!

Palin didn't listen very well to the P debate...
Even though Bush has said this...

McCain chided Obama for saying publicly he supports striking terrorist targets inside Pakistan if the Pakistani government is unable or unwilling to do so.

"You don't say that out loud, If you have to do things, you do things."


"If that's what we have to do to stop the terrorists from coming any further in, absolutely, we should," Palin said in a restaurant on Saturday, which was captured on video and reported by CBS News.

"She was in a conversation with some young man," McCain said during his own interview Sunday on ABC's "This Week."
"She understands and has stated repeatedly that we're not going to do anything except in America's national security interest and we are not going to, quote, announce it ahead of time."

McCain said Palin's exchange was not an official policy statement.

"I don't think most Americans think that that's a definitive policy statement made by Governor Palin," McCain said.