Judging from her response to this rather simple question about what the Vice-President does, one has to wonder:
Q: Brandon Garcia wants to know, “What does the Vice President do?”
PALIN: That’s something that Piper would ask me! … [T]hey’re in charge of the U.S. Senate so if they want to they can really get in there with the senators and make a lot of good policy changes that will make life better for Brandon and his family and his classroom.
Now let’s see what the Constitution actually says:
The Vice President of the United States shall be President of the Senate, but shall have no Vote, unless they be equally divided.
The Vice-President isn’t “in charge” of the Senate in any meaningful sense. That fact was made clear way back in 1789 when John Adams, the first Vice-President, tried to take an active role in deliberations of the first Senate, he was quickly reminded that his only Constitutionally granted power was to break tie votes. In modern times, of course, the agenda of the Senate is controlled my the Majority and Minority Leaders and, except for ceremonial occasions or tie votes, which rarely occur, the Vice-President almost never presides over the Senate as President of that body. Instead, that duty falls to the most senior member of the party that controls the Senate and, more often than not, it’s actually some junior Senator who sits in for the President pro tempore.
So no, Sarah, you wouldn’t “run the Senate” if you became Vice-President anymore than you have control over America’s air defense network as Governor of Alaska.
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October 21st, 2008 at 7:41 pm
Palin was on CNN tonight. Even the softball questions gave her fits. She again proved that she personifies the intersection of arrogance and ignorance; she offered no substance in any of her answers and provided nothing to persuade Americans to return the Republicans to the White House.
The sooner that POS is off of the National stage, the sooner the GOP can begin to rebuild around a competent group of libertarian-Republican leaders.
October 21st, 2008 at 11:15 pm
Tyler,
I agree, but mark my words — she will be back in 2012.
And if it comes down to a race between her and Mike “the Huckster” Huckabee, the GOP may as well just self-destruct.
October 22nd, 2008 at 2:59 pm
Sarah Palin Is The Most Disliked Candidate Of The 2008 Election…
From today’s New York Times:
“Mrs. Palin’s negatives are up, to 41 percent now from 29 percent in September…. Mr. Obama’s favorability is the highest for a presidential candidate running for a first term in the last 28 years of Ti…
October 28th, 2008 at 1:50 pm
[...] her what the vice president does—then subsequently proved that she really didn’t know in her odd description of job duties to young Brandon Garcia. So maybe we can anticipate a grandchild named Zamboni or John Deere or Ski-Doo at some [...]
October 30th, 2008 at 3:31 pm
[...] if she’s demonstrated little understanding of the important issues of the day, and even if she doesn’t seem to know what the Vice-President actually does, whose fault is that [...]
November 6th, 2008 at 11:06 am
[...] joke, if she’s demonstrated little understanding of the important issues of the day, and even if she doesn’t seem to know what the Vice-President actually does, whose fault is that [...]