Opinion: Vice-Presidential Debate Pits Biden Vs. Palin

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Today marks exactly one month since Alaska Governor Sarah Palin was tapped as the Republican Vice-Presidential running mate to John McCain. Since that time the media has slowly brought into the conversation whether Sarah Palin has the experience, knowledge and judgment to be Commander-in-Chief, necessary prerequisites for the job of Vice-President.

Now let's keep in mind that for the last seven months the media has indeed fully brought into question whether Senator Barack Obama possessed those qualities. Remember, it was Senator Hillary Clinton who first suggested that Obama does not have what it takes to lead when she famously stated:

“Senator McCain brings a lifetime of experience to the campaign, I bring a lifetime of experience and Senator Obama will bring a speech that he gave in 2002.”

Though it was initially raised by Clinton, the McCain campaign seized upon that theme and drove it home through a series of ads that featured Obama as the biggest celebrity on the planet, asking the final question, “But is he ready to lead?”

During their first appearance together John McCain remarked “She is ready to be President,” during a rally in Ohio. By choosing Palin to be his Vice President, John McCain completely undermined his argument about Obama’s experience, judgment and readiness. However, with the Palin choice, McCain cleverly attempted to change the parameters of the presidential race, by essentially having Barack Obama run against Sarah Palin and not himself. The media initially fell for this ploy by running reports about Obama and his differences with Palin, while McCain, already unpopular within his own party, was left out of the conversation, save a commentary or two about how brilliant a game changing choice Palin was.

Now with the only debate between vice-presidential set to take place later this week it is time to focus on the qualifications of the actual VP candidates: Sarah Palin and Joe Biden.

Electoral History

Sarah Palin, 44, is the current Governor of Alaska. She was elected to the post in 2006, defeating the incumbent governor in the Republican primary and a former two-term Democratic governor in the general election. Prior to serving as an elected official Palin briefly worked as a sports reporter for KTUU-TV in Anchorage, Alaska in 1988, and for the Mat-Su Valley Frontiersman as a sports reporter in 1992. She also worked in her family's commercial fishing business. Her elected office experience prior to winning the governorship was two terms on the Wasilla City Council from 1992 to 1996, and a stint as Wasilla’s mayor from 1996 until 2002. Between serving in elected offices, she chaired the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission from 2003 to 2004.

Joe Biden is a long-time member of the U.S. Senate and is currently chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee. Prior to his election to the Senate he was a practicing attorney in Wilmington, Delaware and was elected to the New Castle county council in 1970, serving there until 1972. Biden was first elected to the Senate in 1972, becoming the fifth-youngest senator in U.S. history. He was re-elected to the Senate in 1978, 1984, 1990, 1996, and 2002, and has served for the sixth-longest period among current senators.

Education

Part of the process of electing a President or Vice President is knowing that a candidate, has the intellectual capacity to handle the job. What do we know about the candidates education?

Joe Biden attended the University of Delaware in Newark where he graduated with a Bachelor of Arts with a double major in history and political science in 1965. He ranked 506th in a class of 688. He went on to receive his Juris Doctor from Syracuse University College of Law in 1968 where he ranked 76th out of 85 students.

Sarah Palin enrolled at Hawaii Pacific College in 1982 spending one semester there. She subsequently transferred to North Idaho College, spending two semesters there as a general studies major. She then transferred to the University of Idaho for two semesters. She left the University of Idaho to attend Matanuska-Susitna College in Alaska for one term, before returning to the University of Idaho to complete her Bachelor of Science degree in communications-journalism, graduating in 1987.

This is not about intellectual elitism. It is about the ability to handle the most intellectually demanding and challenging job on the planet. No, you don’t have to be a lawyer to be president. No you don’t even need to have an advanced degree as was made evident with the election of Lyndon Johnson and Richard Nixon. But when you lack substantive experience to demonstrate your capacity, academic credentials can be reassuring.

Nor has her short reign as Governor of Alaska been scandal free. After her election as governor, she was ushered into the State House on a wave of voter dissatisfaction with the old regime. She deserves credit for her service as Governor for nearly two years, though Alaska is not California, New York, or even Illinois or Arizona. Alaska ranks 48th out of 50 states in population. It is the least densely populated state in the nation. Because of petroleum revenues and federal subsidies, Alaskan governors historically have not had to worry about income taxes, and property taxes are also exceptionally low.

Currently, Governor Palin is the focus of a state ethics investigation as part of the so-called "Troopergate" scandal, involving the firing of a State Police chief over his reluctance to fire an Alaska state trooper, Palin's former brother-in-law, who has been involved in a bitter custody fight with her younger sister.

While serving in the US Congress for 34 years, Joe Biden has proved to be a pillar of integrity. While the taint of scandal is usually bound to attach itself to someone in a position of power for such a long period of time, no senatorial misdeed has ever scraped Joe Biden. In fact the only time the word scandal has ever been associated with the Senator had to do with plagiarism while he was a student at Syracuse. I contend it is not really much of a scandal at all, and should be considered a non-issue.

Biden's exit from the 1988 race may be worthy of revisiting. The 1988 campaign where the term "media feeding frenzy" was popularized and also served as the beginning of the gotcha politics that have since become commonplace in politics and how the press covers politicians and elections. Joe Biden began as a long shot, but soon began rising in the polls. His downfall began after Biden adapted a speech made by British Labor Party leader Neil Kinnock, who had run unsuccessfully against Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher.

Initially Biden would credit Kinnock when he quoted him. But at a debate at the Iowa State Fair, on Aug. 23, he failed to offer the attribution and cameras recorded it. While Biden maintained he had lapsed only once in referencing Kinnock, Maureen Dowd of The New York Times, subsequently reported two additional incidents of non attribution. Biden borrowed biographical facts from Kinnock that didn't apply to himself: Biden wasn't the first person in his family history to attend college and his ancestors were not coal miners. Later it emerged that Biden had lifted six sentences, four in one case and two in another from Robert F. Kennedy.

Legislative Record

As a long-time member of the U.S. Senate Committee on the Judiciary, Biden has dealt with issues related to drug policy, crime prevention, and civil liberties. Biden has been involved in crafting many federal crime laws over the last decade, including the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994, and the landmark Violence Against Women Act of 1994 (VAWA), which contains a broad array of measures to combat domestic violence and provides billions of dollars in federal funds to address gender-based crimes.

Significant federal legislation that Sarah Palin has drafted? None. In fact, a review of her record suggests that she has taken no stances on foreign policy, free trade or governmental reform prior to being named John McCain's Vice-Presidential choice. They are running on a platform of reform and she has a record of some reform in her state as Governor. But the reform message is duplicitous in some cases.

McCain dubs himself as the master killer of pork barrell projects during his reign in the Congress, and when he picked Sarah Palin he cited her record on the matter in Alaska as being on par with his performance in the Senate. There is a bit of a double standard here though. Alaska's federal congressional representatives did cut back on pork-barrel project requests during Palin's short time as governor, however Alaska is still the largest per-capita recipient of federal earmarks, requesting nearly $750 million in special federal spending over two years and obtaining $295 per Alaska resident from the federal government.

In the 2008 budget year, Palin requested $256 million in federal earmarks. Alaska State revenues doubled to $10 billion in 2008, yet for the 2009 budget Palin gave a list of 31 proposed federal earmarks, totaling $197 million, to Alaskan Senator Ted Stevens.

Foreign Policy Experience

Biden is also a long-time member and current chairman of the U.S. Senate Committee on Foreign Relations. In that capacity he has had a role in some of the most important national security issues our country has faced in the last 25 years. He has collaborated with key Republican Senate figures such as Richard Lugar and the late Jesse Helms and occasionally has gone against his own party. Biden was at the center of the 1990's Balkan conflict debate after traveling there several times, calling Serbian leader Slobodan Milosevic a war criminal on one such visit. Biden's interest in the former Yugoslavia began in 1991 when a Croatian Roman Catholic monk came to him with tales of Serbian abuses in Bosnia and Croatia. He recalled in his memoir:

"I was such a supporter of Israel, he reminded me, and these were Catholics who were being killed here, so why didn't I pay as much attention,"

Biden was a strong voice advocating NATO air strikes in the region and his subsequent "lift and strike" resolution was instrumental in convincing President Bill Clinton to use military force in the face of systemic human rights violations.

Biden voted against authorization for the Gulf War in 1991, but in 2002 Biden stated that Saddam Hussein was a threat to national security, and that there was no option but to eliminate that threat. The Bush administration rejected an effort Biden undertook with Senator Lugar to pass a resolution authorizing military action only after the exhaustion of diplomatic efforts. In October 2002, Biden voted in favor of the Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Iraq, justifying an invasion of Iraq. He has long supported the appropriations to pay for the occupation, but has argued repeatedly that the exercise should be internationalized, that more soldiers are needed, and that the Bush administration should "level with the American people" about the cost and length of the conflict.

Sarah Palin's foreign policy experience? None. Save for a trip to Kuwait and Germany to visit Alaska National Guard troops, and vacations in Canada and Mexico, Sarah Palin has not been out of the U.S. It doesn’t appear that Palin has ever even traveled to Russia, despite her states proximity. In fact, it has been reported that she didn’t even hold a passport until 2007. Americans should not take seriously her statements that she holds foreign policy knowledge due to Alaska's close proximity to Russia. When she was first selected as VP, this weak argument quickly became a favorite talking point. Fox’s Steve Doocy first used it during a discussion on the Fox and Friends show on the day she was picked. After Brian Kilmeade stated:

"Joe Biden is going to capitalize because she has no international relations experience, she’s not the chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee.”

Steve Doocy then jumped in to try to set the record straight:

"But the other thing about her, she does know about international relations because she is right up there in Alaska right next door to Russia."

Democratic strategist Bob Beckel then noted:

“Believe me Steve, it has nothing to do with that.”

On August 31st, Cindy McCain tried to beat back the early criticism that Governor Palin has no national experience while appearing on ABC’s This Week , again pointing to the fact that Palin’s state is near Russia:

STEPHANOPOULOS: But she has no national security experience.

McCAIN: You know, the experience that she comes from is what she’s done in government, and remember, Alaska is the closest part of our continent to Russia. It’s not as if she doesn’t understand what’s at stake here.

John McCain first used the talking point in a September 3rd interview with ABC's Charles Gibson.

GIBSON: But as you know, the questions revolve really around foreign policy experience.
Can you honestly say you feel confident having someone who hasn't traveled outside the United States until last year, dealing with an insurgent Russia, with an Iran with nuclear ambitions, with an unstable Pakistan, not to mention the war on terror?

MCCAIN: Sure. And one of the key elements of America's national security requirements are energy. She understands the energy issues better than anybody I know in Washington, D.C., and she understands. Alaska is right next to Russia. She understands that. Look, Senator Obama's never visited south of our border. I mean, please.

One prominent Republican, Chuck Hagel of Nebraska, scoffed at the notion that the proximity of Alaska to Russia as evidence of her international experience. Hagel told Joseph Morton of the Omaha World-Herald:

"I think they ought to be just honest about it and stop the nonsense about, 'I look out my window and I see Russia and so therefore I know something about Russia. That kind of thing is insulting to the American people."

It hearkens Americans back to the 2000 election season when Karl Rove tried to argue that President Bush also had foreign policy experience because Texas was next to Mexico.

Sarah Palin's confused boast to Katie Couric about her experience in regards to the proximity of Alaska to Russia, was a disaster that her aides are undoubtedly worried about leading up to Thursday's debate.

Katie Couric: Have you ever been involved in any negotiations, for example, with the Russians?”

Sarah Palin: We have trade missions back and forth. We do. It’s very important when you consider even national security issues with Russia. As Putin rears his head and comes into the airspace of the United States of America, where do they go? It’s Alaska. It’s just right over the border. It is from Alaska that we send those out to make sure that an eye is being kept on this very powerful nation, Russia, because they are right there. They are right next to our state.”

The moderator of Thursday's debate, PBS' Gwen Ifill should ask of the candidates the tough questions. She should dissect their qualifications, and inquire about the scandals. However, she may need to do more than that.

John McCain, at 71, would be the oldest first term president ever elected. Lets be honest here. There are some odds driven by mortality and his personal health that John McCain might not finish his term if elected. I'm not hoping for that, but if it does occur: Is Sarah Palin ready on day one? Is she ready to lead? Does she pass the Commander in Chief test? At 3:00 a.m. when that infamous phone rings in the White House, what evidence is there to suggest that she has the judgment to make the right decisions?

These are legitimate questions for Barack Obama and John McCain, so clearly they are legitimate questions for Sarah Palin and Joe Biden.