http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080918/ap_on_el_pr/hagel_palin WASHINGTON - Nebraska Republican Sen. Chuck Hagel said his party's vice presidential nominee, Sarah Palin, lacks foreign policy experience and called it a "stretch" to say she's qualified to be president. "She doesn't have any foreign policy credentials," Hagel said in an interview published Thursday by the Omaha World-Herald. "You get a passport for the first time in your life last year? I mean, I don't know what you can say. You can't say anything." Could Palin lead the country if GOP presidential nominee John McCain could not? "I think it's a stretch to, in any way, to say that she's got the experience to be president of the United States," Hagel said. McCain and other Republicans have defended Palin's qualifications, citing Alaska's proximity to Russia. Palin told ABC News, "They're our next-door neighbors and you can actually see Russia from land here in Alaska, from an island in Alaska." Hagel took issue with that argument. "I think they ought to be just honest about it and stop the nonsense about, 'I look out my window and I see Russia and so therefore I know something about Russia,'" he said. "That kind of thing is insulting to the American people." Hagel, a senior member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, has been a vocal critic of the Bush administration since the 2003 invasion of Iraq. In July, Hagel traveled to Iraq and Afghanistan with Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama. Though he didn't expect to be asked, Hagel had said he would have considered serving as Obama's running mate. Palin was mayor of Wasilla, Alaska, population 6,500, before becoming Alaska's governor in December 2006. Palin visited soldiers in Kuwait and Germany last year and said in an interview with ABC News that her only other foreign travel had been to Mexico and Canada. She also said she had never met a foreign head of state. Hagel told the newspaper that other governors have been elected to serve in the White House without experience in Washington. He said judgment and character were also important for the job. "But I do think in a world that is so complicated, so interconnected and so combustible, you really got to have some people in charge that have some sense of the bigger scope of the world," Hagel said. "I think that's just a requirement."
This is what I am talking about. Honesty. People can look at something and see the truth...stop lying and saying her experience in Alaska qualifies her...it doesn't.... DD
i dont need this article to come to the conclusion that palin isnt qualified to become president... i just need a really really really bad disney movie. MATT DAAAAAAAAAAMON!!!
By the way, I think the pick of Palin by McCain was brilliant, he was dead in the water when he picked her, and at least now, I think he has a chance. I just don't like being lied to about qualifications, and I especially don't like the idea of a VP that is as inexperienced as she is.... I don't think she is stupid, just inexperienced and ignorant.......and this is not a time for on the job training. And when she says..."She didn't blink" that scares the crap out of me, why didn't you blink? Don't you realize the magnitude of what you are being asked? Apparently not. DD
Hagel was the Republican I most wanted to run for president. Unlike McCain, he continues the straight talk. A Hagel vs. Obama election would have been dynamic IMO.
I used to think that. Then I heard her talk, and saw her voting/public record. Now I'm convinced she's both.
Ultimate pwn3rship <object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/EV14xqelWxY&hl=en&fs=1"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/EV14xqelWxY&hl=en&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object>
I don't think she is stupid at all, just ignorant and uneducated on worldly events. People in Alaska are isolated from a lot of what goes on in the lower 48, they have a far different set of challenges than most people in the USA do. I think her views have been shaped by her experiences in Alaska, and her faith..... Neither of which I want anywhere near the Whitehouse. So, while she may not be stupid, she is ignorant of the real issues facing the majority of Americans, IMO. DD
At least Dubya seemed like a nice guy. On top of being ignorant, she also has a reported mean streak worse than Johnny Mac's.. if that's even possible.
I honestly think she is both also. This brought life to the mccain campagin, but I still say this was a dumb pick even if he wins.
Thanks for reminding me why it's not a good idea to elect a man who has never led anything in his life to be the president. That would be your guy Barack Obama. Don't believe me, see the clip I posted from your VP candidate Joe Biden.
The difference Texx, is that Obama surrounds himself with competent people who will help him lead this country forward. McCain's first pick was an isolated extremist from Alaska with a propensity against blinking. I want a thoughtful, intelligent person in the whitehouse, and Obama is it.... Is he my ideal candidate....no....I prefer a more centrist type who is conservative on the economy and moderate on social issues. But, since we have had the far right in charge for so long, it is time to kick them to the curb, make them re-evaluate what it was that made the republican party so popular, and get some new blood that is not tainted by the good old boys network. And it can not be EXTREMIST new blood like Palin, but rather someone like Reagan..... Also, you forget that McCain has not led anything either.....so we are essentially voting on whom is going to do a better job and build the better team...my money and vote is on Obama. DD
Not only does Obama (your PRESIDENTIAL, not VP, candidate) have no foreign policy credentials, but the one chance he had to make an impact (NATO oversight committee), he dropped the ball and did nothing. What's that they say about throwing stones in glass houses? Obama's foreign policy credentials ought to be compared to McCain's... Obama obviously gets blown the frick out of the water in that comparison.
Oh yeah, the same McCain that TWICE said Al Qaeda was Shia. The only thing that's "blown the frick out of the water" is McCain's credibility.
