great video and clearly makes the point. I spent some time on this topic last week using wikipedia... if you want ot look at the raw data of just how much MORE experience other VPs have vs Governor Palin, here is the raw data: http://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?key=p27X6z8lXdnV7GqpzEzpQZA&hl=en (click on VP tab)
you'll see that Palin has only 2 years apples to apples experience in military command, federal office or statewide vs. the average of 17 for the peers she aspires to have
on the question of obama, he has more experience than 10 of his potential predecessors
Great job, professor. As usual, you've only reinforced my hope that you are placed on the US Supreme Court. We really need your voice on the bench, you, our 21st Century answer to Louis Brandeis!!
This video is too long. Palin's experience can be summarized in 4 minutes.
I agree this is good stuff--but a quibble--Mondale was ambassador to Japan AFTER he ran for VP in 76 (indeed, after he ran for president in 1984)
The point is not only that she would be one of the least experienced VPs ever, it is that her experience is minimal and they are touting it as one of her strengths. In the case of Obama, whose experience on the national stage is greater than Palin's, experience is not one of his major selling points. Intellect is. Vision is. The ability to create a movement and inspire a nation is. An unprecedented 20 month long candidacy with astonishing success is. Palin has none of that.
In addition, not only is she inexperienced and not only is there a 1/4 history of VP's becoming Presidents, because of McCain's age, her chances of succession are slightly higher.
Plus, considering how brief her relationship with McCain is, considering their differing opinions on many issues and his maverick reputation, the chances of her serving the kind of hands on Vice Presidency that would afford her the experience to step up in four years is very slight.
Good piece, with two points the need clarification:
1. It is inaccurate to say that there is "decades of proof available to anyone who cared to consider it" that global warming is caused by humans. The scientific consensus on this is very recent, and it is still not "proof" in the normal sense, but rather "a growing body of evidence" (from, yes, over the decades). There is indeed consensus now, but the statement is unfair, since it implies that Palin is way out of the norm to "only this year" come to believe the consensus on this quite complex scientific issue.
2. Saying that there is a "20% chance" that Palin would become President (if McCain were elected), because the historical rate of VPs taking over from Presidents is 20%, is inaccurate and an improper use of statistics. I'm not saying that the historical information is useless or irrelevant, but the claim is slightly misleading due to the unfortunate way it is worded. It's a common misunderstanding of probability, assuming that a particular historical sampling gives rise to a certain probability. (Long, technical discussion of debates in theories of probability will be omitted!)
I appreciate Lessig's comments that complicated issues should be dumbed down to simple yes/no questions. The same applies to these two points.
I'll add that there are 22 Republican governors. All but four have served longer than Gov. Palin, and all but two govern states more populous than Alaska (and that includes the other two female Republican governors, Rell and Lingle). Yet she's the most qualified of the bunch?
How does Biden compare? I don't think he's anyone to be proud of recommending as VP. Sarah Palin has more to admire than him and Obama combined.
Obama's experience doesn't even compare to Palin's let alone any past Presidents....what a scary thought to have him in the White House, when he can't even qualify as a FBI agent because of his past terrorist associations.
A couple of [okay, maybe not-so-] quick points.
The first is that "qualification", as you point out, are not always easily defined. I'm not sure, for instance, that John C. Breckenridge, with two terms in the House of Representatives (a body in which it's difficult to distinguish oneself as a leader without substantial years of service) is really "clearly" more qualified than Sarah Palin. But even beyond the mathematics of length of service, there are always other questions. While it might be nice to look back on Breckenridge and prove that he meets your standards for qualification, it's an ahistorical process. Why? Because Breckenridge's Congressional experience was irrelevant to the party that nominated him. He was nominated because he was a staunch supporter of Southern rights and slavery. He would go on to serve in the Confederate Cabinet.
And if we're going to use history to prove her qualifications, and comparing her to Agnew (who was INDICTED as you put it) why not also compare her to Arthur? Widely considered a lightweight incapable of running the government, Arthur managed to turn in a very good presidency. Meanwhile, extremely experienced VP's like Millard Fillmore and Andrew Johnson turned out to be rather terrible.
How much can experience predict actual performance? The answer is probably: not much. There have been several presidents who came to office with less experience than Palin -- starting with the one so many Obama supporters prefer to reference. Abe Lincoln served one term in the House, a term that is either "undistinguished" or "disastrous" depending on your reading of the situation. And if you think we are now facing "difficult times" then wouldn't it have been only right that Stephen Douglas win the 1860 election?
Meanwhile, a good number of those extremely well-qualified VP's (starting with two in a row, Clinton and Gerry) died in office. Indeed, the tendency of VP's to die in office may well be traced to the heavy amount of experience they have generally had.
And yet, Lincoln is almost universally considered the greatest president of all time.
I'm not certain this "experience" issue does us much good.
Finally, your statistic about 20% of VP's taking office is accurate enough, I suppose. But a majority of those accidental presidents rose to office due to the assassination or resignation of their predecessor-- two events that are considerably less likely to happen to McCain than a natural death. If you count only the four who died of natural causes, the number drops from 1/5 to 1/10.
Isn't that the fun of history? You can prove almost any point you want if you just present the facts in a particular way.
I support Obama in this election, but I'm just not convinced that there's much mileage in attacking Palin's experience, particularly when Obama himself is clearly less experienced than all but a handful of the men you discussed in your video.
I like Sarah Palin a great deal. And I don't think she'd make a good president if it came to that. But I'm a bit more worried about John McCain, who won't have to wait for someone to die to take office in January. And to the extent I'm worried about Palin, her experience is the least of my concerns. I'm not scared of her shallow resume. I'm scared of her ideology.
PS: Henry Wallace wasn't Secretary of Commerce before he became VP, that was his consolation prize when the Party ousted him in favor of Truman.
Almost everyone mentioned also has more experience than Obama. So how does this help Obama?
Obama has not significantly more experience than Palin, of course. Indeed, if you look at the three most commonly used measures of experience for President -- state executive (governor), federal executive (including VP, general, and so on), and federal legislative -- Obama has four years and Palin has two.
Which means Obama has the least experience of any major party candidate for President since Wendell Willkie, in 1940.
You really think pointing at his two more years of experience than Palin -- especially since he's been running for President for the latter two years -- really makes a big difference?
Palin has two years as governor and others in the state executive branch. He has four as Senator. They have about the same number of years as community organizers/PTA, and about the same as mayor/state legislature. Those things are all fairly equivalent.
Every time you point out that Palin is inexperienced, you accuse your own candidate of the same, Lawrence.
Just finished the video ... yeah, as noted, it is simply false to say there is a 1/5 chance that the VP will become President.
And further, it is frankly unintelligent for someone to say Palin should not be VP because of a lack of experience when her experience is at worst comparable to Obama's.
Poor effort, Lawrence. You should just come out and say the actual truth, instead of whatever this is: you like Obama and want him to win.
I think the "experience" when we try to look at it quantitatively doesn't really work. While we like to reduce everything to numbers to make things more "objective", I can clearly see that Sarah Palin is not qualified to be VP or President based on her lack of judgment, the lack of skill she has shown in the jobs she has held, her lack of interest in anything outside of Alaska or the United States (the woman didn't even have a passport until recently) and her propensity to lie/exaggerate.
Quantitatively, McCain supporters are trying to turn the attacks on Sarah Palin's experience around on Barack Obama although it is clear that the quality (and quantity) of his meaningful experience far exceeds hers.
I agree with your conclusion Lawrence. She is clearly unqualified and it is far too great a risk to take. But, the video was about 8 minutes too long and should have focused more on her lack of judgment, her record of lying and exaggerating, her lack of education in constitutional matters, the wake of disgruntled employees and co-workers she leaves behind, her lack of interest in anything outside of her own backyard, etc. etc., etc.
Okay, one more point in Palin's favor! I just now managed to make out what Charles Gibson actually asked her. The question was "Have you ever met a foreign head of state?" This is a very specific question about specific foreign policy experience. Her answer is probably correct -- very few of our early Vice Presidents, other than those who had served as ambassadors in foreign nations, were likely to have ever met a foreign head of state. That would include not a few of those who served as Secretaries of State! I don't know if we can find a definitive answer to how many VP's had met a foreign head of state, but I think it's a bit unfair to suggest that she's saying that her OVERALL experience is equivalent to other VP's through history, when all she actually said was that she, like probably not a few of her predecessors, had not met a foreign head of state. So your rundown of every VP in history doesn't even address the question you ask, i.e. "is what Sarah Palin said true?"
Professor, Thanks for this post., but
Daniel D. Tomkins was VP with Monroe--you misspoke I know because you had already mentioned Madison's vice presidents. Also, Burr was never convicted of murdering Hamilton. He was never even tried.
For those who try to persuade us that Palin is more experienced than Obama, why not wait until she proves it with a press conference or an appearance on Meet The Press? At 44, and with five kids, it is easy to see that for her, foreign policy has been a lifelong irrelevancy, and not nearly as exciting as shooting Bullwinkle.
Now, running with the man who would become our oldest president, her slogan should be: "Ready to Be President on Day 31." (See Tyler, John.)
By the way, Alton Parker's VP runningmate was 81-year old Henry Gassaway Davis. He did live fort the next four years, however. Not bad for 1904, eh?
Can you imagine how different this campaign would be right now if McCain had chosen Romney?
jomace: "For those who try to persuade us that Palin is more experienced than Obama, why not wait until she proves it ..."
Um. Lessig's point is about experience in government. We don't need it to be proven beyond what we already know. She has about the same amount of experience in government as he does. He has slightly more experience as a Senator than she as a Governor, but, of course, Obama has no executive experience. So it could go either way as to who has more.
So no, we don't need to wait to see that she has objectively about the same amount of experience as Obama. But you are on to something, of course, and that's that we need to wait and see what she says, just as we've seen what Obama has to say. Although since I've seen what Obama has to say, it makes McCain an easy choice already ...
I think you made a great argument. However can you do the same with Obama with experience? How would he line up with Presidents in the past? Is that something we could afford?
Undecided Voter??????
I agree that you should do one for Obama also. Also wanted to add that there is not a cut and clear consensus for global warming. It is just that the people who are in agreement are more publicized. The creator of the Weather Channel John Coleman has said that if data is carefully looked at it suggest we are going into a global cooling. This week NASA put out that they measured the coolest sun in the recorded history of mankind. It has been cooling since 2006 and still a few more years to go where it may get cooler. In an article he put out he says that data was actually changed to fit the agenda for global warming. that is is just ambitious scientist who are pushing this political issue. Which suggests that it is all in an effort to put into effect the green tax. We breathe so we should pay the tax. It is as cut and clear as the Theory of Evolution/Creation debate.
Obama has the least experience in federal executive, state executive, or federal legislative departments than anyone running for President in a major party ticket since Wendell Willkie in 1960, if you include (as with General Eisenhower) being a top man in the federal executive branch.
Going back to the turn of the century, however, there's more.
William Jennings Bryan (D, 1908 and earlier) had the same length of experience as Obama, four years in the House. Woodrow Wilson (D, 1912) had two years as governor of NJ. Charles Evan Hughes (R, 1916) had four years as governor of NY. John Davis (D, 1924) had 2.5 years in the House. Alf Landon (R, 1936), four years as governor of Kansas. Adlai Stevenson (D, 1952 and 1956), four years as governor of Illinois. And Wendell Willkie (R, 1960), none.
Experience doesn't mean much. Woodrow Wilson had almost no experience in government, and most people think he was a pretty good President.
Lessig basically believes -- I disagree, but he is entitled to his opinion -- that Palin is not ready to be President, and he is committing a logical fallacy by attempting to quantify that with comparisons to back up his opinion, when in reality experience and resume qualifications -- including to Lessig, obviously, since he supports Obama -- are unimportant.
That said, it's true that despite Obama's lack of experience, we've been watching him for some time, and can evaluate him in many ways apart from his (lack of) experience. For Palin, most people don't have that insight, as most people never heard of her before last month. So instead of evaluating what we've come to know about her, we say "oh she doesn't have much experience."
We've been screwed by people with lots of experience, and people without much experience have done very well for us. We've been let down by people with a long resume, and people without one have done fantastic jobs.
At the end of the day all that matters is your opinion of the person in particular, not their resume. And Obama supporters implicitly believe this, if they know about his actual experience, else they wouldn't support him.
Great video. I hope every voter sees this. But how would the average evangelical republican view this video? Lemme try my hand at their logic:
"No we can't" Is the exact opposite of Hillary's "Yes we can" slogan. Hillary is a socialist loon who eats aborted babies for power and red-blooded christian American can't have that. Therefore, we need the opposite of "Yes we can." Did I mention that America is a christian nation?
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Ok, I tried. I'm just playing around but there has to be at least some nut(s) that would come to this conclusion about this video.
I live in Dallas, and remember a scandal in the DISD - ex-Superintendent Yvonne Gonzales in the late 1990s; that is so eerily similar to the Governor Palin's scandal(s).
How you ask? Well, Yvonne Gonzales pointed the finger at the DISD CFO (forgetting 3 fingers were pointing back at her), called in the FBI to investigate - they found no wrong doing by the DISD CFO but found that Yvonne Gonzales had used DISD funds illegally - landing her, eventually in prison.
This is similar to Gov. Palin's "I washed away all the corruption in Alaska (all the while having ethical scandals herself - can we say "TrooperGate", "Bridge to NoWhere", "Road to NoWhere", "EarMarks").
I didn't think it was possible that there could be a replacement as bad for this country as Dick Cheney, but Palin (and McCain and his childish temper tantrums) proves me wrong every day!!
The limited experience the previous VP's had is irrelevant in this discussion as far as I am concerned. McCain could easily and quickly become unable to continue his duties as President meaning she would have to take over.
Today's VP, especially in McCains case, must not be the babbling idiot that Palin is. Sure she may be a top notch snow bunny, but President of the U.S. material she is not. Anyone thinking otherwise is retarded.
Anyone thinking Obama doesn't "babble" incoherently at least as much as Palin is suffering from willful blindness.
Mccain is almost at the life expectancy of american men already, so the 20% probability is probably low. plus, since palin's husband is a wild west secessionist, they would probably add some arsenic to the presidential metamucil within a week of the inauguration. why did the republicans pick her? her candidacy is more like sanjaya's on american idol. i guess obama could have picked his wife for 'running mate' and we would be better off in all ways but the prevalent racism. and i don't like obama that much, either. this is clearly a lesser of the evils election.
Obama's spouse hates America. Biden is going to kill Obama the first chance he gets. Obama is more like a bad competitor of Survivor than a candidate.
Man, you people are so damned blind you don't even see all your statements about Palin and McCain can be made of Biden and Obama.
Obama is literally the least experienced Presidential nominee of a major party in 68 years. He has no qualifications to speak of. He isn't any smarter than anyone else, including Palin. YOU JUST LIKE HIM BETTER. That's the only difference, despite your pretending otherwise.
Do some real introspection.
It’s a nice video showing Plain’s experience. According to my point of views in the case of Obama cell phones, whose experience on the nationwide phase is much superior than Palin’s. Also her understanding is not one of his most important promotion tips.
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