Sarah Palin: A Bridge Too Far

Have we reached the point of mediocrity in this country that Sarah Palin's debate performance was actually acceptable to her supporters (fortunately, Independents in early polls do not share that view) because she didn't fall on her face, as many conservatives feared? That's your standard? No wonder there are still some of you who still think George Bush, the very definition of mediocrity, is a good president.

In a word, Palin's debate performance was awful. She couldn't win a high school student council election with those homespun platitudes, repetitive inane comments about the war, and most strikingly her refusal to answer not a few but EVERY question put to her that demanded a direct answer.

Every economic question received the tired tax-and-spend slogans Republicans have bellowed for years.

Foreign policy: "You were wrong on the surge." -- That was it. Not one single idea of her own (which is understandable, since she has none). What would you do different in bad economic times like this? "Cut more taxes in Walissa." The great foreign policy team around McCain-Palin includes Rudy Giuliani, who has about as much foreign policy experience as Madonna, and who history will record mishandled 9/11 in tragic ways.

Palin's next foreign policy guru? Mitt Romney. -- The same stiff-haired flip-flopper whose entire foreign policy experience was pedaling his bike trying to convert Mormons in France. Or Henry Kissinger, who ran illegal wars in Laos and Cambodia to get Richard Nixon re-elected and lied when he told Americans before the 1972 election that, "Peace is at hand" in Vietnam. I suppose if your worldview is seeing Russia from an island in Alaska, and having a border with our threatening neighbor, Canada, you love these guys.

The Economic Crisis: When asked about the current economic crisis, she says nothing because she knows nothing. But she sure talked about her family breakfast table a lot. That's the table the citizens of Alaska paid per diem for her to sit at for over 300 days as governor. She says electing her and McCain is electing two mavericks who will cut spending, including earmarks. Palin has asked for, and gotten, $1 million every day in pork for Alaska since she's been governor.

Palin says she and McCain will appoint the most qualified people to government despite party labels. Sort of like your second grade friend you put in charge of Alaska's agriculture because "she loved cows as a little girl," Sarah?

A word for Moderator Gwen Ifill: The right intimidated you. You never forced Palin to answer a question directly and not duck; you bent over backward to take her sophomoric answers seriously; and frankly you treated her with girlie gloves.

But that's not the point. Even with your softball questions she couldn't get past "aw shucks," "hockey moms" and "Wasilla values" (which get weirder and weirder).

If the stakes weren't so high, this obviously nice and fairly articulate person can probably still govern the state of Alaska, where frankly it doesn't much matter. But vice president of the United States? That is a bridge not only too far, but the real bridge to nowhere.

More on Palin: Palin Should Focus on Energy Contrasts

More on the Election: Obama, McCain to Present Health Care Policy

Bob Beckel managed Walter Mondale’s 1984 presidential campaign. He is a senior political analyst for the Fox News Channel and a columnist for USA Today. Beckel is the co-author with Cal Thomas of the book "Common Ground."