By Jonathan Allen
There's plenty of time for voters to get to know Sarah Palin and decide whether John McCain's pick of a vice presidential running mate was wild or wise.
For now, the decision sends two clear messages from McCain about his candidacy and message of reform -- one to the Republican Party and one to the general electorate.
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In picking Palin, who has battled officials in her own party (she defeated fellow Republican Gov. Frank Murkowski, a state political fixture, in the 2006 primary), McCain signaled to Republicans that he intends to clean up the image of a party brand muddied by President Bush's lack of popularity and scandals at the federal and state levels.
He and Palin both have records of bucking the GOP establishment -- including Palin knocking out the sitting Republican governor, Frank Murkowski, in a 2006 primary -- and they might push for a realignment of the Republican Party at the convention and during the election's stretch run.
For the broader electorate, McCain is pivoting from a campaign that was focused primarily on his experience and national security credentials to one that emphasizes government reform as a central theme. National security isn't going away, but McCain won't be a Johnny one-note.
While Democratic nominee Barack Obama makes his case for change, McCain will call for reform - a change without switching parties.
Polls show that McCain holds a significant lead over Obama on national security and foreign policy issues. But a week after Barack Obama shored up his ticket's security credentials by picking Senate Foreign Relations Chairman Joe Biden as his running mate, McCain appears to believe it is more important for him to compete on Obama's change turf than to fight on national security.
That may be a reflection of confidence on McCain's part that he will retain a national security edge over Obama throughout the campaign and should expand from that base, or it could indicate that he believes Obama's more aggressive efforts to build national security credibility make it imperative for him to have another major pillar supporting his campaign. It's probably a little bit of both.
Democrats are assailing the choice of Palin as proof that McCain's national security judgment is suspect. They ask: Why, if experience is as important in foreign policy matters as McCain says, would he put someone with none of it a heartbeat from the presidency?
The counterargument is that McCain has enough experience for both spots on the ticket, that he plans to live for the next four years - no matter what his foes say - and that the Democratic ticket is inverted, with the foreign policy expert relegated to the second spot.
Like Biden and McCain, Palin will be able to speak credibly to the feelings of a parent who is sending a child to war, as her eldest son is heading to Iraq in September.
Ultimately, McCain needed desperately to inject energy into his campaign and establish a positive reason for voters to choose him. It would have been hard for him to do that with most of the candidates who had been mentioned often as possible running mates.
It was even harder to find someone who could both shake up the basic dynamic of the campaign who would not hurt him with the conservative voters who already view him with suspicion.
Enter Palin, who gives the GOP its first national candidate who is not a white man, who appeals to conservatives and who can help McCain build his case for "reform."
The challenge for McCain - as it has been for Obama with his "change" mantra - is to define for voters what, specifically, he means by reform. He and Palin can both point to reform-oriented policy accomplishments, but elections are about visions for the future.
Obama took a bigger swing at defining what he would change in his nomination acceptance speech Thursday night.
It will be worth checking on the GOP convention this week to hear what he tells fellow Republicans about their need to change and independent voters about what he would reform if given the chance.
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