Update: McCain's VP not in Constitution party. Husband was.

[Alyrium Denryle]

Let me see if I can break down Kast's post:

Educated people have done stupid things in the past. Therefore, education is irrelevant to decision-making and we might as well have Palin making decisions as anyone else.

Your criticisms of Obama may be valid, but that doesn't help the fact that your opening premise is absurd. Palin's record as governor makes me far less confident of her abilities in any sort of foreign-policy decision-making.

There is also a difference between having trouble making a decision and quickly making a catastrophically bad one

[Patrick Degan]

First, you have no good argument as to why it is at all repugnant for Palin to garner votes from AIP members, especially when a vote for Palin is not advancing the secessionist cause, but seeing to people’s needs independent of it. There is certainly a bit of Lincoln in that, although, obviously, nobody is arguing that Sarah Palin is unifying a broken nation.

You are, as always, full of bullshit. For a start, I never said Palin's trolling for votes was "repugnant". It does, however, indicate where her sympathies lie in regards to her entire conception of American governance and that tilts heavily towards States' Rights. Secondly, the comparison with Lincoln is utterly invalid: Lincoln's outreach was the attempt to actually heal a broken nation as even you admit to but then try to dance around to keep your broken argument going. Either you are a complete moron or completely dishonest in trying to even advance the comparison in the first place.

Second, the AIP’s old voters had to go somewhere – and the Alaska Independent Party didn’t absorb all of them, if you consider the relative percentages.

Third, you can’t talk about the AIP if you don’t understand its structure, or the general theory of Third Party voting. Not every AIP member is a secessionist. Not everybody who considers putting their vote outside the two major parties really intends for the AIP to succeed in any secessionist effort.

Blather on, Tigerboy. The fact still stands: the AIP advocates a secessionist position as part of its official platform, and Palin's dalliances with the party only lends it credibility.