Ignoring former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin’s considerable executive accomplishments that are more significant than those of nearly every Republican who is mentioned as a future presidential or vice presidential candidate, former Vice President Dick Cheney on Sunday — on ABC’s “This Week” — said Mitt Romney should not pick another Sarah Palin as his vice presidential nominee, calling John McCain’s selection of her a “mistake.”
Cheney said McCain’s selection of Palin was not “well handled” and said he felt Palin was not ready to become president when she was selected as McCain’s vice presidential nominee in 2008.
“But based on her background, she’d only been governor for, what, two years. I don’t think she passed that test … of being ready to take over,” Cheney said.
Cheney’s feelings about Palin are not news even though the mainstream media is treating it as a big scoop. In 2010, Cheney punted on whether he thought Palin was qualified and his daughter, Liz Cheney, denied a report that asserted Cheney thought the choice of Palin as McCain’s running mate was “reckless.”
Cheney, who led the vice presidential search that picked Nelson Rockefeller for Gerald Ford’s VP, is probably more comfortable with a vice presidential candidate who has similar establishment bona fides to Rockefeller, which Palin obviously lacks.