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Will Palin Win Ben Stein's Vote? Stein: 'She Scares Me'

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September 03, 2008 6:28 PM

ABC News' Lindsey Ellerson and Nitya Venkataraman Report: Political commentator and actor Ben Stein, in a starring role this week as one of the Republican National Convention's biggest celebrities, told ABC News he has his concerns about Sen. John McCain's, R-Ariz., vice presidential pick, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, but hopes it "works out for him."

Stein, a former speechwriter in the Nixon and Ford administrations, expressed doubt over McCain's VP curveball. "I don't know if she scares Obama, but she scares me -- and I hope I turn out to be totally wrong -- but right now, she's scaring me. He has chosen a very oddball, strange choice and, God bless him, I hope it works out for him.

"What if he wins the election and passes into eternity and she becomes president?" wondered Stein.  "I think it's quite possible that he'll win the election.  Whether or not we will be happy if he passes into eternity and she becomes president is a very big question."

Despite Stein's strong reaction to Palin, he did give her some credit, saying she has "some credentials," just not enough "familiarity with national policy."

Stein may have had Minnesota Gov. and former McCain VP contender Tim Pawlenty on his mind in another reference to Palin when he stated that Palin was "like 52 to pickup, where you just toss a deck of cards up in the air and somebody has to pick them all up. Now the Republicans have to pick them all up, and Mr. McCain basically threw it all up in the air by picking Sarah Pawlenty, now we've got to pick it all up again," Stein said.

Given the busy and newsy week in presidential politics, Stein says being a celebrity at the convention feels like, "everything has been turned upside down."

"Movie stars are not stars," Stein said. "Movie stars are paper mache stars.  The real stars are in Afghanistan and Iraq, and at Walter Reed Army Medical Center.  The real stars are giving their hearts' blood to defend this country and to suppress the terrorism."

Stein also doled out some advice for Palin in advance of her speech to the RNC Wednesday evening, suggesting she be declarative and stay true to her basic conservative values.

"Look here, I am Sarah Palin from Sandpoint, Idaho, I'm not from Harvard, I'm not from Yale, I'm not from Wellesley, I buy my clothes at Wal-Mart ... I don't have a cook, I don't have a chauffeur, I don't have an image consultant ... I don’t have a maid, I clean up the house myself ... But, I know what's right and what's wrong," Stein offered.

Stein recently wrote "How to Ruin the United States of America," with friend Phil DeMuth. The bottom line, he says, is "it's great being in America." 

September 3, 2008 in McCain, John, Palin, Sarah, Veepstakes, Vote 2008: Republicans | Permalink | User Comments (108)

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I like what she's accomplished in Alaska with that pipeline, amongst other things. She has the "right stuff" to pull this off. I'd prefer her "on-the-job training" to Obama's anytime.

Posted by: obamamama1 | Sep 3, 2008 6:38:17 PM

You mean you like that she took the project from a coalition and gave it to a Canadian company instead?

Between Mike Murphy, Peggy Noonan, and Ben Stein, we're getting a good look at what conservatives really think about this pick.

Posted by: Jonathan | Sep 3, 2008 6:44:24 PM

Why the lowest common denominator. An individual without a world view (recently got a passport), no expertise in foreign affairs, economy, health care, large city infrastructure, poverty, you name it. So she can shoot a moose from an airplane. Give me the one who made it, not because they went to a school (like Bush, or McCain, since they could not have gained admittance without being born into their family), but by their own merit. Obama pulled himself up, is brilliant, is an expert in the only oath the president should take "I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States." since he has been a professor of Constitutional Law at one of the most prestigious law schools in the world, and actually is respected by world leaders.

When Ben Stein sends his family member to a surgeon does he want the one that graduated top in his class, or graduated in the lowest 1% like McCain did in the Naval Academy? Give me brains and ability and wisdom. Tired of faith-based wackos.

Posted by: lxg | Sep 3, 2008 6:44:35 PM

Posted by: revealed | Sep 3, 2008 6:46:04 PM

I'm scared too. This right wing extremist is one bad biopsy away from being president should McCain win. There is simply so sense to this. Shame on McCain for putting my life and the lives of my family in such jeopardy.

Posted by: hang | Sep 3, 2008 6:47:38 PM

Northern Exposure

Posted by: Omentum | Sep 3, 2008 6:55:38 PM

Northern Exposed

Posted by: Omentum | Sep 3, 2008 6:55:56 PM

Did you hear the off-camera comments by the conservative commentators Peggy Noonan and Mike Murphy (right wingers usually)? They called Palin "Complete Bull*sh**", "totally unqualified", "cynical" and "gimmicky". And this is from the right! (Of course if any left wingers said this they would be "sexist" and evil). Its floating around the web.

Posted by: jane olin | Sep 3, 2008 6:57:50 PM

Let play the drinking game tonight. Every time Rudy Guliani uses the phrase nine eleven, take a drink! You'll probably be drunk in in ten minutes! By the way, they just announced that after Sarah Palin gives her speech she leaving to see her son off to Iraq, then, she'll be off to some sort of boot camp training inside the McCain campaign. Basically, it's a strategy of Run and Hide. She won't be available for any interviews with the press. What does that tell you? Run and Hide, Run and Hide!

Posted by: roxanne | Sep 3, 2008 7:09:29 PM

This whole republican party is getting worse the ones who do run for president are to funny the good ones stay in the back ground.I as an indp most of the time voted republican but people NOT this time...

Posted by: indp voter | Sep 3, 2008 7:15:15 PM

Only time will tell if Sarah has bigger or more cojones than her male counterpart politicians. She can handle the M16, she has cojones plus woman does not have the problems with premature ejectculations or ED as in male counterparts, so certain man who has such an issue who may feel inadequated to be around her. LOL.

Posted by: mtr2311 | Sep 3, 2008 7:17:07 PM

Let's hope she doesn't have PMS tonight.

Posted by: samurai | Sep 3, 2008 7:25:59 PM

Would love to sit and chat with you all, but our future vice-president is speaking at the GOP convention in a few hours and I'm getting the place ready for a crowd of supporters!!! Go Sarah!!

God bless, and ps. who cares what Ben Stein thinks?
:)

Posted by: Theresa T. | Sep 3, 2008 7:27:49 PM

lxg: 'Brilliant'???? 'Wisdom'????? You can't be talking about Obama with those two words!! He may have booksmarts but he has no morals.

'Respected by world leaders?' yeah, terrorists.

Posted by: Mrs. R. | Sep 3, 2008 7:34:56 PM

So Sarah Palin, a strong women who goes after corrupt politicians and wins is a scary women. Good for her. Corruption is the middle name of the so-called Democratic (Socialist) Party since Obama took over. He belongs in jail with Rezko and other south Chicago hoodlums.

Posted by: Mary | Sep 3, 2008 7:42:35 PM

Mary: The singular of women is woman, Sarah Palin is a woman.

Posted by: samurai | Sep 3, 2008 7:46:18 PM

Just give me two honest, loyal
Americans not Socialist/Marxist
ideals of terrorists, black ideology,
communist radicals like Obama and
his terrorist friends Bill Ayers,
Jeremiah Wright and Tony Rezko. With
that kind of Community Organizer,
America will suffer.

Posted by: lou011 | Sep 3, 2008 7:47:50 PM

Poor Obama, his handlers tell him what to think, say, and do. Watch him without a tell-a-prompter-- its Barrack Ostammer.
Sarah Palin is the real deal. No matter
how the media slams her, she has more class than all the dit reporters you can cram back under the rocks they crawled out from under.
Most don't have enough collective brain cells to share a headache.

Posted by: Tiny | Sep 3, 2008 7:51:21 PM

Stein, if Stein is scared of Palin he should be frightened out of his wits by Obama. What the media does not want you to know about Obama.

"It seems Obama has occupied the executive chair two times in his life, one directing the Law Review and the other chairing the CAC. There's nothing to show for the first and the second remains a mystery. All we really know is that $110 million (including over $60 million in public funds) was spent on a project that yielded no discernable result. To whom and for what was that money spent and how much of it, if any, might have been used primarily to grease the wheels of a political career?

What doesn't Obama want us to know? That he was incompetent in his oversight? That he was merely a figurehead, his appointment a political favor made for resume enhancement purposes? That the one time he had both the opportunity and the means to make significant reforms in inner city education, he failed utterly and completely? What? Inquiring minds demand to know and have no intention taking the excuses proffered thus far for an answer."

Posted by: Kyda Sylvester | August 21, 2008 02:48 AM

Posted by: terry | Sep 3, 2008 8:03:49 PM

Stein cried when Nixon resigned on national tv. Who gives a rats for what he thinks!?!

Posted by: argh! | Sep 3, 2008 8:21:18 PM

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