Today, CNN’s Campbell Brown elicited a mixture of cheers and rage with her strongly-worded assertion that the way the McCain campaign is treating Sarah Palin is sexist. The campaign is hardly allowing Governor Palin to speak to the media, Brown argues, because they unfairly believe that as a woman she is too fragile to stand up to questioning.

If you read the statement, maybe you’ll agree with me that, whatever she really thinks on this topic, Ms. Brown’s main goal with her statement was to drive an explosive reader reaction and rake in the resulting pageviews. Either way, her support of her point is extremely weak. In fact, while it’s certainly true that the McCain camp is doing all it can to keep Palin under wraps, there’s no evidence whatsoever to suggest that this is due to sexism, and Brown hasn’t managed to find any to show us. Just saying the campaign is sexist doesn’t make it so. As I see it, sexism isn’t the issue here, but Palin’s lack of public exposure is a symptom of other critical problems for the McCain campaign.

To start with, there’s the fact that Sarah Palin isn’t qualified to be the Vice President of the United States. She lacks the knowledge, the experience and the judgment required to run the most powerful country on earth should the need arise. This is effectively demonstrated by, among other things, the fact that she lacks the skills and judgment required to get through public appearances without major gaffes. The few times we’ve seen Governor Palin take questions in public she has faltered through them, her few real political convictions liberally mixed with non-answers and lies. If I had a running mate (male or female) whose post-appearance reviews ranged from the biting “visibly nervous” to the derisive “dribbling and dribbling the ball but refusing to take the shot,” I wouldn’t let that person out in public much either.

And there’s another problem which is becoming more and more apparent as the economy slides downhill: Sarah Palin’s policies are (in most respects) the same as John McCain’s policies, and John McCain’s policies are really not what Americans want right now. McCain is the guy who, in face of an economy that is depriving many members of the middle class of their jobs and homes, wants to pile on tax cuts for the very rich, with minimal relief for working Americans. He also wants to keep fighting a war that has cost the country nearly two trillion dollars, even though nearly all political leaders agree it’s time for an exit strategy. If Palin busts through her stage fright and starts talking policy, she’ll just be parroting more of the same (except for her pet cause of Arctic drilling, which isn’t a crowd-pleaser in the lower 48 the way it is in Alaska). If she stays quiet, there’s always the chance that the public will think she’s mysterious rather than realizing she’s just bad news.

So Sarah Palin is keeping out of the public eye as much as possible, but it’s not sexism so much as a defense mechanism. Want more proof? As of today, John McCain is making a retreat as well. To the great surprise of pretty much everyone, today Senator McCain declared that he was suspending his campaign to return to the Senate to help work out a resolution to the Wall Street bailout. While this may sound like a great idea on paper, it’s definitely out of character for the Senate’s most absent member, and other Senators have responded by indicating that they have the matter under control without his contribution. Since it seems unlikely that McCain’s sudden presence in the Senate will make or break the deal (and thus unlikely that he would think he could make the difference), it’s much more plausible that there’s another reason for the move.

I see two possible explanations for the maneuver. Either this is an act of penance by the man who just days ago asserted that “the fundamentals of the economy are strong,” trying to prove that he can take the financial crisis seriously after all, or McCain simply doesn’t think the time and place are right for a debate this Friday. Either way, he’s motivated more by a desire to pull himself together and win this election than by a new-found concern for our houses and jobs.

In the face of McCain’s flailing, Barack Obama has kept his cool. Rather than dropping everything and running to Washington, he has expressed his intention to keep campaigning while also remaining alert in case leaders in Washington believe he can do more good there than on the trail. Earlier today, he issued a statement saying, “It is my belief that this is exactly the time when the American people need to hear from the person who, in approximately 40 days, will be responsible for dealing with this mess,” and that “It is going to be part of the president’s job to deal with more than one thing at once.” He’s exactly right. The election will go on in November, and it will decide the fate of the country for the next four years. The bailout plan is very important, but it is under control in the Senate. There are many capable people who can work together to reach a decision on the plan, but only Barack Obama and John McCain are running for president.

Americans need information about the candidates in order to make informed decisions in November. With every appearance he cancels and every debate he postpones, John McCain denies voters of an opportunity to get to know him and his policies. Why do this, unless he is deeply afraid they won’t like what they see?

Oh, and what about Sarah Palin? This evening CNN ran a little item saying that if the presidential debate is delayed, the VP debate “would be rescheduled for a date yet to be determined,” which may or may not be a code word for “never.” Because if you can’t say anything nice, you can always hope you won’t need to say anything at all.

This will be a quick update, since I’m just catching up after a few days of travel, but I wanted to let everybody know about a great site that was sent to me. The site is fivethirtyeight.com, and it’s an election poll tracking site put together by a man who analyzes baseball stats for a living.

The great thing about this site is that it not only aggregates results from all the top polls, it also analyzes what each batch of numbers actually means in terms of electoral votes. Most of the national news outlets focus on nationwide percentages when reporting on poll results, but those aren’t necessarily meaningful in terms of who will win the election. Some websites, like the New York Times and Slate.com, do have Electoral College tracking maps, but the data at fivethirtyeight.com is the most detailed I’ve seen and their analysis methods are transparent and rigorous. And it’s updated daily!

Right now, the site shows a strong lead for Obama in the Electoral College, though his lead in the popular vote remains pretty slim. I encourage everyone who hasn’t seen this site already to click on over and have a look. If we have any statisticians out there, feel free to let us know what you think of their method. Or, if you know of another site you think is useful to people trying to understand the polls, please suggest it in the comments.

Because I don’t think anybody has pointed this out yet, I’m tossing out a slightly cantankerous bonus post today.

In her interview with Charles Gibson, Governor Palin stated that you can see Russia from land in Alaska, meaning that “they’re our nextdoor neighbors.” I’m sure it’s true that you can see Russia from Alaska on a clear day. They’re not too far apart. However, the part of Russia that you can see from Alaska isn’t the part of Russia that has many people in it. According to a population density map I found online, the part of Russia closest to Alaska has a population somewhere between zero and ten people per square kilometer. The eastern portion of the country, where the capital is, is much more populous.

This is part of the reason why Governor Palin has no diplomatic relationship with Russia. How well do you know your neighbors when your front window looks out on the back of their three billion acre estate?

Good afternoon, BeyondHillary.com readers!

Did everybody have a chance to watch Sarah Palin’s interview with Charles Gibson yesterday and the day before? If not, it’s up on YouTube, so head on over and check it out. I’ve linked to the first segment below, and you can link to later segments after you finish watching it.

Sarah Palin Interview, Part One

For me, one of the most interesting quotes came near the end of the interview, when Governor Palin was asked about Hillary Clinton. In response to a question about whether Senator Obama should have chosen Senator Clinton as his running mate, she replied that she thinks “he’s regrettin’ not picking her now.”

This may or may not be true. For my part, I think that for all the lack of media fanfare around him, Senator Biden has a lot to offer to the ticket (for one example, check out his compassionate and well-reasoned stance on abortion as quoted in the New York Times Caucus Blog). Can he do more than Senator Clinton? I don’t know, but we can trust him to do what he was brought on board for. However, I know who certainly isn’t regretting that Senator Clinton didn’t end up on the Democratic ticket, and that’s Governor Palin herself, who owes her entire presence on the national stage to Senator Clinton’s absence.

As I watched the interview, particularly the foreign policy segment, I saw a visibly nervous Governor Palin half-answering and dodging her way through question after question. When asked about foreign policy experience, she answered with energy independence. When pressed for more detail she would repeat previous answers nearly verbatim. To me, this says that not only does she not know enough on these subjects to give comprehensive answers, she also knows she doesn’t know enough to give good answers, but thinks that maybe she can get away with it if she skirts those topics nimbly enough.

We’ve seen her political resume and we know it’s somewhat shorter than usual. Now we’ve seen her speak without a script and can tell that she is, in fact, uncomfortably uninformed on several key issues but ready to dodge and bluff rather than admit there’s anything she doesn’t know. This is not a person who is ready to hold the second most powerful job in the country. As her potential qualifications wear thinner, it becomes moe and more clear that McCain choosing her likely was little more than a transparent play for the many voters, especially women, who supported Senator Clinton.

To anybody who looks at this closely, the idea that Governor Palin is a good consolation prize for Clinton supporters is shocking. Her experience pales next to Senator Clinton’s, and her policies are nearly a polar opposite, especially (ironically) on women’s issues. Senator Clinton fought hard for the Democratic nomination with a solid and well-defined platform that she articulated clearly and defended with strong and well-informed arguments. Governor Palin can speak with confidence on only a small fraction of these issues.

If Senator Clinton were on the ticket, we can be sure that Governor Palin would be nowhere to be seen–she’d fall apart in a debate against a VP nominee Clinton, who would remind people that women have made it as far as they have in politics not by touting their hockey mom credentials but rather by taking an intelligent and informed stand on the issues. However, with Hillary Clinton out of the picture, John McCain picked Sarah Palin over a handful of men and women with stronger leadership qualifications because he thinks it’s fine to sub in any woman he likes for Senator Clinton and expect women to vote for her.

After the ABC interviews, I think the choice is clearer than ever. It’s time for Clinton supporters to say a real “thanks but no thanks” to Governor Palin. Maybe she can look us in the eye and say she’s ready, but I can look right back and say “I know Hillary Clinton. Hillary Clinton represented my party and my interests. Governor, you’re no Hillary Clinton.”

Please talk to your friends about where Governor Palin stands on the issues, and pass on BeyondHillary.com, if you haven’t already. If we keep the focus on the issues, we can help elect the candidate who best represents what Senator Clinton and her supporters stand for: Barack Obama.

Hi everybody!

My name is Joanna, and I’m a founder and writer here at BeyondHillary.com. We’ve had the site up and running for a little over a week now, and we’re excited to see more and more traffic coming in. Thanks to everyone who’s stopped by so far, especially those of you who have helped spread the word to the people you know, we’ve already reached thousands of voters!

To keep things current on the site and provide a forum where we can post our thoughts and discuss with our readers, we’re adding this blog to the site. We’ll use the blog to report and comment on current events, including the role Senator Clinton takes as the election wears on as well as any exciting moves by the current candidates.

We’re always open to suggestions, and would love to get your input on the blog and our site in general. If there’s a topic you’d like to see covered here, or if you have a short post you’d like to contribute, please send us an email at contact@beyondhillary.com. While we may not be able to fulfill every request, we’ll read and consider every suggestion we receive.

I look forward to hearing from you guys via email and in the comments. I hope to be back online with comments on Governor Palin’s interviews once I watch the second installment tomorrow, but in the meantime, we’ll leave comments open for any of you who want to post what you thought of her showing tonight.

Talk to you soon!

Joanna