Pork: The new white meat

The Palin choice says many things about John McCain. A recklessness in his decision-making process; a need to surround himself with people of significantly less stature than himself; a total lack of awareness of his own mortality; self-absorption with his own "image."

But, perhaps most of all, it shows that his campaign -- and by extension, a McCain administration -- is unable to do the most basic requirements of the decision-making process: vetting.

Mr. McCain and other critics of the Congressional pet projects known as earmarks adopted the label to deride a $220 million allocation for a bridge to the tiny Alaskan island of Gravina (population, a few dozen). And Ms. Palin became famous as the governor who, in 2007, finally killed the project.

“I told Congress ‘thanks but no thanks’ on that Bridge to Nowhere,” she said in a speech on Friday after being introduced by Mr. McCain as his vice presidential pick.

But Ms. Palin’s history with the infamous bridge — and earmarks, which many critics call pork — is more complicated.

As the new mayor of tiny Wasilla, Alaska, in 2000, Ms. Palin initiated a tradition of making annual trips to Washington to ask for more earmarks from the state’s Congressional delegation, mainly Representative Don Young and Senator Ted Stevens, both Republicans.

“It was about being face-to-face with those who were actually writing the budget,” she told The Anchorage Daily News in 2006, boasting that she brought home more money for priorities like upgrades to the local sewer system.

She directed Wasilla to employ Washington lobbyists to press for federal money for the town, helping obtain more than $8 million in earmarks for projects ranging from waterworks to a shelter.

And she expressed support for the Bridge to Nowhere earmark as well. “I do support the infrastructure projects that are on tap here in the State of Alaska that our Congressional delegations worked hard for,” Ms. Palin said when asked about that bridge and another in an October 2006 television debate while campaigning for governor.

Later that month, when asked if she would continue state financing for the Gravina bridge and another proposed bridge project, she said yes. “I would like to see Alaska’s infrastructure projects built sooner rather than later,” she responded in a questionnaire from The Anchorage Daily News. “The window is now — while our Congressional delegation is in a strong position to assist.”

So, now, with two months to go, it's up to the media -- and voters -- to do that vetting.

But nevermind, it's a grand political move. And McCain's mavericky credentials are burnished rather than relegated to the dust heap as he acts in the great Republican tradition of divorcing the act of effective campaigning with that of effective governing.

And in the great Republican tradition of aligning itself with cruelty, ignorance, and anti-science.

Palin's political résumé meets all the essential tests for social conservatives: She opposes same-sex marriage and providing benefits to domestic partners; she backs banning embryonic stem cell research and has raised the idea of teaching creationism alongside evolution in public schools.