by Pete Langenfeld

Created on: June 11, 2009

The quick and easy answer to this question is "no."

Why she is not qualified takes a little more explaining. Let's begin with her career to date. She was mayor of a small Alaskan town, population under 20 thousand, Governor of Alaska for about two years. And that's about it.We'll leave out the political aspects, such as whether she did a good job. We'll give her the benefit of the doubt and say she did do a good job.

Based on those facts I can't say that she is not qualified, she may have done a wonderful job. But I can say this, the idea that because she has held those two jobs that MAKES her qualified is silly. The fact that she had those jobs doesn't disqualify her nor does it make her more likely do a great job as Vice President.

What Gov. Palin needed to do, in interview after interview, is prove herself to the American people. President Obama didn't have a lot of experience, but what he did have is two years of campaigning, answering questions and putting himself before the people.

Palin had two months to show that she was up to the challenge. She could not do it. Why? She was not qualified for the job. It's that simple.

No amount of finger-pointing, accusations or back-biting is going to change that fact. She was given interviews to do and she came off as un-informed and out of her depth. She claims that she was unprepared for the interviews and she blames the McCain camp for sending her out again to continue the interview. Where is her responsibilityto be prepared? And why wasn't she prepared when they sent her out the next time?

The easy answer is the "gotcha media" But that fails Gov. Palin also. Despite what all of talk radio and Fox News will tell you, the mainstream media was not out to get Palin. If asking her what newspapers she reads constitutes a "gotcha" question, I'm not sure what she would have done as Vice President or President. Asking her policy questions, like the Bush Doctrine, is not an out-of-bounds question. And the fact that she couldn't answer it is not the worst thing in the world. The fact that she tried to pretend that she knew the answer is the part that bothered me. If you don't know the answer, say you don't know.

I think that ultimately what makes me believe that she was not right for the job is that I don't think she has the temperament for the job. She come off as someone who will look you in the eye and smile and as soon as you turn your back, she is aiming the knife to stab you. After she appeared on "Saturday Night Live" she talked of how nicely they treated her. When the campaign was over she talked about how she felt used by the show. She had nothing but praise for John McCain before the election, as soon as it was over, she blamed him for everything that went wrong.

I think that is my major complaint with the campaign of Sarah Palin. She never took responsibility for anything that happened. She always found a new party to blame. Whether it was the "gotcha media", ultra-liberal Democrats or John McCain's campaign itself, she had no hand in anything. She didn't have anything to do with the thousands of dollars spent on clothes for her family. He daughters pregnancy was revealed and the media was to blame. There was never anything that she did that she took responsibility for. Someone else was always to blame. "The buck stops here" should be on every presidents desk. Hers would have been "the buck stops over there somewhere."

I'm just not sure that our country needs a "someone else is responsible" kind of administration right now.

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