How is prudence acquired? Through experience. The prudent leader possesses a repertoire of events, through personal involvement or the study of history, and can apply those models to current circumstances to judge what is important and what is not, who can be persuaded and who can’t, what has worked and what hasn’t.

Experienced leaders can certainly blunder if their minds have rigidified (see: Rumsfeld, Donald), but the records of leaders without long experience and prudence is not good. As George Will pointed out, the founders used the word “experience” 91 times in the Federalist Papers. Democracy is not average people selecting average leaders. It is average people with the wisdom to select the best prepared.”

Not to mention David Frum: “Ms. Palin’s experience in government makes Barack Obama look like George C. Marshall. She served two terms on the city council of Wasilla, Alaska, population 9,000. She served two terms as mayor. In November, 2006, she was elected governor of the state, a job she has held for a little more than 18 months. She has zero foreign policy experience, and no record on national security issues.

All this would matter less, but for this fact: The day that John McCain announced his selection of Sarah Palin was his birthday. His 72nd birthday. Seventy-two is not as old as it used to be, but Mr. McCain had a bout with melanoma seven years ago, and his experience in prison camp has uncertain implications for his future health.

If anything were to happen to a President McCain, the destiny of the free world would be placed in the hands of a woman who until the day before Friday was a small-town mayor.”

I like a lot of what libertarianism stands for (and that the Republican party gives lip service to). I’d like to see a balance between much lower taxes (perhaps eliminate income tax completely in favor of sales-oriented taxes) and some care for society, to allow people to have their basic needs met. But I do wonder if libertarianism is even realistic – it seems so Wild West. I should probably dig further and see if there any libertarian governments in the world. I think it would be a really hard sell in the US because people are not conditioned to think for themselves.

The issue of higher taxes is debatable, since the Republican MO for the past 30 years has been to reduce taxes with the real benefits going to the wealthy folks who don’t need any more tax breaks. But perhaps the issue is not taxes but income – an interesting article (as usual, from the NYT) shows that family income grows more under Democratic administrations than Republican: http://tinyurl.com/5swe96

Palin is a frightening choice. McCain’s first presidential decision confirms my lack of faith in his abilities. But Palin should be old news in a couple of weeks and hopefully we’ll get back to the actual issues. McCain can only hide behind something for so much longer (ie being ignored while Clinton & Obama duked it out, being ignored while Palin grabbed the spotlight). I still can’t believe he could utter the words ‘fundamentally strong’ in describing our economy (then spinning it as a positive look at Americans and not the actual economy after getting smacked around by his handlers).