Cheney on Palin

While parrying with the host of ABC's "This Week" today, former vice president Dick Cheney certainly had a full plate of hot button issues to address and Bush era policy decisions to defend during the interview. Of course he felt compelled to address the Obama administrations handling of the war on terror and it's incessant attacks against him and former president George Bush.

And of course the former VP had to address the most recent lunacy of the current VP Joe Biden as it concerned his remarks concerning Iraq and the Obama administration taking responsibility for the success of something that they opposed from the beginning.

But something I found particularly telling about the interview with Dick Cheney today, was not so much what he had to say concerning Joe Biden and the Obama administration, as much as what he had to say almost obliquely, concerning Sarah Palin and the 2012 race.

When asked about former Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska's presidential qualifications, Cheney said,

"I haven't made a decision yet on who I'm going to support.

"I think all of the prospective candidates out there have got a lot of work to do if in fact they are going to persuade a majority of Americans that they are ready to take on the world's toughest job," Cheney said.

Currently, I see Dick Cheney as the only true statesman of the republican party and certainly the only person in the present party, capable of standing and making cogent rebuttal and defense to what are once again the mindless attacks of partisan democrat demagogues and their minions in media.

And for Dick Cheney to make a statement such as that? Is a telling epitaph of precisely where he both sees and knows the republican party currently exists in the minds of most conservative Americans IMO.

Dick Cheney has obviously weighed Sarah Palin politically and she has come up short in his perspective. Apparently, his opinion isn't an isolated one in the party either as was revealed later in the summary of the interview.

An ABC News/Washington Post poll released this week found 71 percent say "no" when asked if Palin is qualified to serve as president. Among Republicans polled, approximately 52 percent think she's not qualified to be commander in chief.

Cheney took issue with Palin's suggestion that President Obama could help himself politically if he declared war on Iran.

"I don't think a president can make a judgment like that on the basis of politics," Cheney said. "The stakes are too high, the consequences too significant to be treating those as simple political calculations. When you begin to talk about war, talk about crossing international borders, you talk about committing American men and women to combat, that takes place on a plane clear above any political consideration."

Apparently Dick Cheney maintains a better feel for the pulse of conservatives in America than many people have given him credit for. Party followers may still be worshiping at the alter of American conservative punditry, but the party insiders and those with enough sense and experience to be able to read the tea leaves, see that Sarah Palin is not alone in her short comings as a potential candidate in 2012. The GOP is still a rudderless ship and will remain so until someone steps forward with some fortitude and the capability to seize upon the swelling undercurrent of resentment in the party concerning the lack of fiscal conservatism that has permeated the party for the past eight years.

Those that follow polls for what they are worth know what the polls have shown over the past year. The honeymoon is over with the Obama presidency and once again the American people have awakened from their self induced stupor to learn that they have been had. The polls are consistently showing that a majority of Americans are espousing conservative ideologies and a desire to see America return to being a more conservative country period.

Politicos in the know realize that it is majorities that win elections, but in this case (as Dick Cheney is rightly pointing out) the people are savvy and they are looking for substance before they will commit their vote. In addition to that, who ever ends up carrying the GOP standard into the November 2012 election, will need to have either a demonstrated track record of leadership, or a plan that is so appealing to the sensibilities of conservative Americans, that they will gamble on the person with that plan.

One thing is for sure IMO, as Dick Cheney noted today, there are a lot of people sitting back and watching and waiting to see who rises to the challenge and who has the moxy and the leadership capabilities to put back together a badly damaged republican party.

And I for one tend to see it as Dick Cheney sees it. I don't think that Sarah Palin is anything other than a sure thing to fail and a return trip of guaranteed four more years of Obama.