Palin: Did McCain Run Out of Time?

I heard tonight on NPR that McCain made his decision on Palin the day before the announcement.

Then there's this:

ABC's Jan Crawford Greenburg reports: It wasn't until Sunday night that John McCain, after meeting with his four top advisers, finally decided he could not tap independent Sen. Joe Lieberman of Connecticut to be his running mate. One adviser, tasked with taking the temperature of the conservative base, had strongly made the case to McCain that it would be a disaster for the party and that the base would revolt. McCain concluded he could not go that route. The next day, McCain studied the three men at the top of his shortlist: Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney and former Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Ridge. All had different strengths and negatives, but McCain was not satisfied. None of them had what McCain believed he needed to do -- and would have done -- with Lieberman.

So on Sunday he excluded Lieberman due to the venomous reaction of his base. Then on Monday -- four days before the announcement -- he excluded all the other frontrunners.

He had basically Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday to vet her long distance ("So, over the next few days ... lawyers reviewed her vetting information.") and work on messaging, rollout, etc.

That's three days to vet a VP candidate, though she had been "in the mix" and presumably her vetting info was on file.

I just wonder if McCain, harried by aides and friends who all had different opinions about the merits of Pawlenty, Romney, and others, decided basically "screw it" and tossed out weeks of vetting and prep work.

From this timeline, I'd wager he ran out of time and had to make a pick too quickly. It's the opposite of a considered, deliberate approach. It's a total trainwreck leading to a rushed decision at the last minute.

In short, it's a disaster of executive decisionmaking.

By contrast, Obama took quite a deliberative app;roach and decided early in the week before his Saturday announcement of Biden. There was no drama.

Of course, Palin could turn out to be a foreign policy savant with a photographic recall of every line in the Federal Budget.

More than likely, she looks good on TV and can read a speech capably thanks to being a sports tele-reporter.

I have a feeling there will be shoes dropping quite a bit in the next few weeks. Like this whopper:

Palin, who portrays herself as a fiscal conservative, racked up nearly $20 million in long-term debt as mayor of the tiny town of Wasilla — that amounts to $3,000 per resident. She argues that the debt was needed to fund improvements.

Fiscal conservatism? Well, it's Republicanism, no doubt.