By James Donahue

One of the great mysteries surrounding the McCain bid for the White House this summer has been his unexpected pick of Alaskan Governor Sarah Palin as his vice-presidential running mate.

As many television talking heads have noted in the days immediately following the Palin announcement, if voters choose McCain this fall, the odds are high that she could move quickly from an unknown former mayor of a small Alaskan community, to the high office of President of the United States. After all, the 72-year-old McCain is a former cancer patient and he would be among, if not the oldest person ever elected to the office of president.

Americans need to take a long and careful look at Sarah Palin before casting their vote this fall. While this attractive former beauty queen and mother of five portrays herself to be an outspoken ultra conservative, there may be more to her than meets the eye.

For example, ABC News has confirmed a story that Palin was once a registered member of the Alaskan Independent Party (AIP). That party has been pushing for Alaskans to secede from the United States. Of strange contrast, is that the AIP’s motto is “Alaska First – Alaska Always.” This is contrast to McCain’s motto which is “Country First.” When did Palin shift from an Independent to an ultra conservative?

Palin joins the presidential race with some personal political baggage. It appears she has been under investigation by the Alaskan legislature for the firing of her public safety commissioner because he refused to fire a state trooper who had divorced Palin’s sister. Did she use her office as governor to try to take personal revenge?

University of California professor George Lakoff outlined his own list of issues “swirling around Palin.” He wrote:

“She is inexperienced, knowing little or nothing about foreign policy or national issues, she is really an anti-feminist, wanting the government to enter women’s lives to block abortion, but not wanting the government to guarantee equal pay for equal work, or provide adequate child health coverage, or child care, or early childhood education, she shills for the oil and gas industry on drilling; she denies the scientific truths of global warming and evolution, she misuses her political authority, she opposes sex education and her daughter is pregnant, and, rather than being a maverick, she is on the whole a radical right-wing ideologue.”

Gregg Erickson, a reporter for the Anchorage Daily News, quoted Lyda Green, president of the Alaskan Senate and a Republican from Palin’s hometown of Wasilla, as saying: “She’s not prepared to be governor. How can she be prepared to be vice president or president?”

Palin is an earth criminal. She does not accept scientific evidence that global warming is caused by man-made greenhouse gas emissions, she has opposed efforts to protect beluga whales in the Cook Inlet because it might adversely affect the oil and gas industries, she favors drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, and used state money to fight a bill in the state legislature that would have prohibited shooting wolves and bears from aircraft.

The Huffington Post reported that “Palin’s Board of Game spent $400,000 of public money on brochures and radio ads to influence the election (a vote on the prohibition of shooting animals from aircraft.). She not only took an inhumane and unsporting position at odds with the principles of wildlife management and fair chase, but did it in an undemocratic and underhanded way.”

Palin also declared this year that her state would sue the Department of the Interior over its decision to add the polar bear to its list of endangered species. She explained that people are “over-reacting” to global warming and that the polar bears can fend for themselves.

According to a report by Alternet staff, Palin is “a firm supporter of abstinence-until-marriage sex education, despite the fact that numerous studies show that abstinence-only sex education does not delay sexual activity and may in fact lead to unsafe sex practices.” That Palin’s 17-year-old unmarried daughter now is found to be pregnant strongly supports these studies.

During the announcement that she was picked to be McCain’s vice-presidential running mate, Palin announced to an Ohio audience that she rejected Congressional pork barrel money for a proposed “bridge to nowhere,” that would have linked Ketchikan, Alaska, to an airport on nearby Gravina Island. Her statement, it seems, was untrue. Palin actively supported the bridge project.

Other reports show that when she served as mayor of Wasilla, Palin ran that town of some 7,000 deep into a long-term debt of nearly $20 million.

If they get into office, McCain and Palin appear well groomed to continue the destructive Bush policies that have plagued the nation for eight long years.