Every day that passes, Palin become a bigger and bigger joke.  McCain's only hope of winning is to throw her off the ticket -- but fortunately he won't do so...

Palin: Stevens Should Quit... After the Election

posted by John Nichols on 10/28/2008 @ 5:52pm

http://www.thenation.com/blogs/campaignmatters/377455/palin_stevens_should_quit_after_the_election

After struggling for the better part of 24 hours with the question of how to respond to the conviction of her long-time political ally on corruption charges, supposed reformer Sarah Palin finally concluded that she should put a little bit of distance between herself from Ted Stevens.

But she still refuses to suggest to the voters of Alaska that the state's senior senator ought not be reelected next Tuesday.

The governor of Alaska, who has pitched herself as a battler against governmental wrongdoing since accepting a place with John McCain on the national Republican ticket, initially adopted a wait-and-see approach when a federal jury found Stevens guilty on seven counts of concealing his receipt of illegal gifts.

The notion that Alaska's senior senator had accepted what looked a lot like bribes did not trouble Palin enough to call for the resignation of the man who cut campaign commercials for her 2006 gubernatorial campaign. Nor did she suggest he was unworthy of reelection.

Only after McCain and other top Republicans declared that Stevens should resign did Alaska's governor finally get in touch -- sort of -- with her inner reformer.

"After being found guilty on seven felony counts, I had hoped Senator Stevens would take the opportunity to do the statesman-like thing and erase the cloud that is covering his Senate seat. He has not done so," Palin grudgingly announced a day after the longest-serving Republican senator was found guilty on all the counts brought against him. "Alaskans are grateful for his decades of public service but the time has come for him to step aside. Even if elected on Tuesday, Senator Stevens should step aside to allow a special election to give Alaskans a real choice of who will serve them in Congress."

What Palin did not say is that Alaska can spare itself the expense of a special election by electing Stevens' Democratic challenger, Anchorage Mayor Nick Begich, next Tuesday. Such a declaration would have required some stateswomanship on the governor's part. And that's not a commodity the rabid Republican partisan seems to possess at this point in the election year.