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Like her or not, local observers give Palin high marks

Steven Elbow  —  9/05/2008 6:15 am

Julie Clark is religious, conservative, and was going to vote for John McCain anyway. But after seeing his running mate deliver a burn-down-the-house speech Wednesday at the Republican National Convention, she's going to cast her vote with joyful enthusiasm.

"I was really proud of her last night," said Clark, the wife of the Rev. John Clark of Evangel Life Center on Madison's east side. "I thought she represented the Lord and women and the church beautifully."

Like Sarah Palin, the Alaska governor who until McCain's announcement last Friday had garnered little notice on the national stage, Clark is a devout member of the Assembly of God, a fundamentalist Bible church. They are of a demographic that has been instrumental in past Republican presidential victories, and one that so far has shown little enthusiasm for McCain.

But after Palin lambasted Democratic nominee Barack Obama while the world watched, a longtime Democratic pollster says the Obama campaign has reason to worry.

"Any Democrat ought to be disabused now with any notion that they're going to have any problem with turning out their base," said Madison's Paul Maslin, a pollster with Fairbank, Maslin, Maulin and Associates. "Their base is gung-ho now."

And the smart, 44-year-old former beauty contestant has shown an ability to rally the troops and think on her feet that should make for a lively vice presidential debate with Obama's running mate Sen. Joe Biden.

"She's got some natural abilities that if they channel them right and prepare her right, I think she's going to be formidable in the debate," Maslin said.

Palin comes into the presidential race carrying baggage: She recently announced that her 17-year-old daughter is pregnant out of wedlock, and as a governor who has served only two years, has weathered scorching criticism for her lack of foreign policy experience.

For some, her challenges only make her that much more appealing.

"I think she has a lot of moxie," Clark said. "I think when I saw her last night and just in the last few days with all that she had to go through, I saw a woman of grace. I would look at her and say steely grace."

For the Rev. Tom Edwards of the Living Hope Fellowship, an Assembly of God congregation in Sun Prairie, the choice of Palin put the icing on the cake for his support for McCain.

Edwards said he "probably" backed McCain. But after the GOP nominee chose Palin, he says, "It's good, as far as I'm concerned, that he picked someone that would be in line with what we'd look for, or what I'd look for individually."

But not all in the faith community have been swept away by Palin.

"She's kind of a breath of fresh air, but I don't think she has the experience that is needed for a president," said Rita Macewicz, who until recently served as the president of the Madison Diocesan Council of Catholic Women. "He's pretty old," she said of McCain, "and if he should fall over after the election, I don't think she's anywhere prepared."

Macewicz, who is in her late 70s, said she was brought up on the Depression-era politics of President Franklin D. Roosevelt. She said that social issues like abortion and stem cell research are only part of the big political picture that people should be considering when casting their votes. And despite the fact that Hillary Clinton went against the hard-line Catholic grain on those issues, Macewicz was ready to vote for her.

For now, she's undecided.

"I'm very carefully looking at what's happening out there," she said.

Maslin, who has done political work for nearly 30 years, starting with Jimmy Carter's first presidential campaign, said win or lose, by picking Palin, McCain has changed the face of Republican politics.

"I think she probably is the face of their party in the future," he said. "Even if McCain wins, he's probably a one-termer, and if he loses, she starts off as the front-runner."

Maslin said she could well become the heiress to the Reagan legacy.

"Bush never was," he said. "They've been looking for somebody who's going to be the modern embodiment of what Reagan and Goldwater were all about originally, and I think they just found it."

A poll of 1,000 Democrats, Republicans and independents conducted right after Palin's speech indicated that people from each group believe McCain's prospects were bolstered by his choice.

The poll, conducted by HCD Research and the Muhlenberg College Institute of Public Opinion, showed a 10 percent increase among both male and female independents who say they will "probably" or "definitely" vote for McCain.

But Maslin said polls mean little in the midst of a convention, and McCain is still waiting his turn on the stage Thursday night.

"You have to wait until the whole convention is over and people can take a measure," he said.

As vice presidential picks go, Palin was a gutsy choice, but maybe a necessary one after McCain has battled all summer to pull even with Obama in the polls.

"This choice tells me that they were not convinced that they really had gotten the race back to parity," Maslin said.

And Palin's family -- with two sons in the military, a baby with Down syndrome and a blue-collar husband -- is a stark contrast to the liberal elite label the GOP is trying to pin on Obama and Biden, Maslin said.

"She's interesting," he said. "But the race is still Barack Obama and John McCain, and she by definition is still a bit of a sideshow."

But McCain is likely to make good use of the bounce he gets from a convention where the lasting memory for many will be Palin's speech.

"Clearly, they're going to send her up and down this state," Maslin said. "I'd be shocked in the first couple of weeks if you don't see her in Waukesha, Green Bay, Kenosha and La Crosse. Madison is probably not going to happen, but I think you'll see her everywhere else."

Steven Elbow  —  9/05/2008 6:15 am