Heckuva Job, Sarah

If she was vetted, very few people in Alaska knew of it:

Phillips has been active in the Ted Stevens re-election steering committee and remains in close touch with Sen. Lisa Murkowski and other party leaders, and she said nobody had heard anything about McCain's people doing research on his prospective running mate.

"We're not a very big state. People I talk to would have heard something."

Gingrich is talking about the triumph of authenticity. Yes: conservatives for the importance of authenticity over basic competence. Well: they sure aren't elitists.

The important thing for today's Republicans is that the leaders evoke the kind of cultural identity of evangelical Christians, regardless of their competence or knowledge or even interest in, you know, governing. You pick a candidate because of her gender and religion and recent baby, even if she has no record of even any opinions on foreign policy and the only opinion you can actually find opposes the critical plank of McCain's war "strategy."

War? What war? The Republicans have a base to rally. Readers know what I think of the current GOP. But this pick, and the base's response to it, suggests a political party that has nuked the fridge.