Happy Days are Here Again

This week anyway. Or such is the theme of Tony Blankley's latest article. His theme is that with the selection of Sarah Palin and the Republican Convention, the Republican Party's fortunes have dramatically improved.

Until last week, Sen. McCain was running as the boring candidate of experience and was unable to substantially replace Bush as the image of the party. With Bush having a 70 percent negative image, he not only was dragging down McCain but also constituted a drowning weight on the buoyancy of Republican candidates at the federal, state and local levels.

But with the addition of Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin to the ticket, suddenly and spontaneously, McCain the reformer, McCain the maverick stopped being a GOP talking point and became incarnate. It is not only that the Alaska governor is a genuine reformer but also that by every aspect of her being, she is fresh, different, recognizably normal, and thus, the un-Washingtonian. The power of her image has supercharged McCain's image.

Palin has certainly proven to be very popular with the Conservative Base, which is doubtless a large part of why she was chosen (the other major reason being her gender, in a cynical attempt to draw Hillary Clinton supporters).

It would be hard to argue that the Republicans didn't have a good week. But there is still plenty of time to go. Plenty of time to remind the American people that McCain the Maverick has followed Bush's lead the bulk of the time, particularly when it comes to the Iraq war. Plenty of time to review Palin's qualifications to be a heartbeat away from the Presidency. Plenty of time for debates, which I hope will make the differences between Republicans and Democrats even more explicit.

Plenty of time.