That’s a great question for someone, but I don’t have a substantive answer today – I simply don’t know. I know that the left wants me to be seen stammering over questions about who voted for what, the names of finance ministers in obscure countries that none of the candidates has ever visited, how many angels can dance on the head of a pin, and other minutiae that is irrelevant to whether I can lead. They even have Tina Fey playing me like this, which is pretty funny, but just not accurate.

I’m not running for President. Many argue that a Vice President can become President if unfortunate events occur. That’s not likely here – the left has criticized John for everything, but they can’t criticize his gene pool – he lived through five years of torture, his mother is still alive and vibrant at 95, and I’m confident that John will be alive long after his presidency. That said, questions were raised about my qualifications and I need to respond.

The American people understand this - the American President is not fact finder in chief – he – or she –is Commander in Chief and our nation’s Chief Executive. Like any CEO, the President defines strategies, rallies the country behind them, and tries to get those strategies implemented, for all issues facing the country – agriculture, economics, foreign policy, and whatever else. No one expects Steve Ballmer, Microsoft’s CEO, actually to write the software or even to know how all of it actually works. No one expected Jack Welch, former CEO of GE, to actually build the toasters or know how all of GE’s products actually worked. A CEO does not typically get into that level of detail with a project. CEOs are typically not very helpful or very qualified to help out at that level. A CEO is, however, required to have the judgment to pick the right people – subject matter experts – on each issue that a company faces and let them run those areas, consistent within the CEO’s strategy. Good Presidents are those who put good people – hopefully brilliant people – in charge of issues in their respective areas of expertise and take a leadership role in those areas, consistent with the President’s strategy. It’s just plain silly to think that the President needs to know personally how to run and implement every aspect of American society. I don’t have that knowledge, and neither do any of the other candidates for President or Vice President.

The President needs to know the right people to trust, who is a legitimate expert and who isn’t, to have the judgment to review recommendations of Cabinet Secretaries and to do the right thing. So, I may not know whether Pakistan or Uzbekistan has a larger GDP – and to be clear here, I don’t – but I know the right people to ask. A McCain-Palin State Department will be staffed with experts from Rand, the Kennedy School, and others – people with decades of experience on each country in the world. When my kids are sick, I don’t diagnose them – I take them to an expert, a doctor. When the economy is sick, we are going to consult our economic experts. And when there is a crisis in Georgia, we are going to consult our Georgian experts. Whether I’m qualified to be this country’s chief executive is not about sound bytes or name dropping – it’s about having the sound judgment to put the right experts in the right places, to assess what they report back, to consider the options proposed and choose what’s in the best interest of the American people. And, the American President must have the intestinal fortitude to execute on these recommendations, the courage to stand behind them when it makes sense, and the intelligence to change direction if a plan isn’t working. What the American people are buying when they select a president is the candidate that they believe will have the best judgment to deal with whatever comes up during the next four years – both dealing with national crises and proposing a direction for the nation to keep our country growing and strong.

I have been a CEO. I am one right now. I am the chief executive of the great State of Alaska. Although the Alaskan economy is not the country’s largest, it has grown under my administration. When Bill Clinton, Jimmy Carter, and Ronald Reagan were elected president, their only real experience was as a governor. I am not comparing myself today to Bill Clinton or Jimmy Carter, and I’m not yet any Ronald Reagan – yet – but then I’m not running for President. John McCain’s health is fine, and this question is largely moot. But, I am currently the chief executive of a state and, if I needed to step into the role, I could be chief executive of the nation – not because I have decades of experience, but because I know how government organizations are supposed to be run, I have the judgment to pick good people, and I know how to lead. Period; end of story. And let’s be clear here – neither Barak Obama nor Joe Biden has ever been CEO of anything. In fact, neither of them has any executive experience. They have not run anything other than their political campaigns.

So, let’s talk about judgment. Everyone talks about how good their judgment is, but let’s look at what they’ve done, because that’s where character is revealed. Joe Biden, for example, has repeatedly shown poor judgment. When he was recently running for President, he stated clearly that Barak Obama was unfit to lead. He also stated that an Obama administration would be an exercise in on-the-job training. That’s not inaccurate. But, now that he is on the ticket, Senator Biden has flipped his position 180 degrees and expects the American people to believe him. Clearly, he was right the first time, and he’s lying now. Expecting to sell this lie to the American people, however, shows poor judgment.

Senator Biden also recently stated that paying taxes is patriotic. Taxpayers in the highest tax bracket, when all taxes are accounted for, are already paying more than 50%. Just think of it – you start working in January, and it is July before you have earned enough to pay the government its share. And that’s today. Senator’s Biden and Obama want the American taxpayers at the high end to pay even more than that. This country was founded, in part, on outrage over high taxes. Now, Joe Biden thinks that if you already pay taxes in excess of 50%, you are unpatriotic if you don’t want to pay more. Again, this is poor judgment if Senators Biden and Obama think that the American people aren’t going to see through their scheme of wealth redistribution.

Joe Biden also recently asked for 51 million dollars in pork barrel spending for Delaware. While the country’s economy was melting down, Joe Biden was still pandering to his constituents. Apparently, Senator Biden didn’t think that the 700 billion dollar bailout was offensive enough and that he and his colleagues on the left should try to soak the American people for another 50 million or so. The American people overwhelmingly do not support the Wall Street bailout, however, and Senator Biden’s adding insult to injury here will not be well received.

Now let’s talk about Senator Obama – there are many examples of poor judgment there. For example, he sat in Reverend Wright’s church for over twenty years – more than two decades – listening to the most vile, anti-American rhetoric, and he thinks this isn’t an issue. Clearly, this is the United States, and the Senator is free to be any religion he wants – Christian, Mormon, Muslim, Wiccan, whatever – that’s what freedom of religion means. But, to sit in this patently anti-American environment for more than 20 years, to call Reverend Wright his spiritual advisor, and then to feign offense when people want to examine his participation in an environment so troubling that even Oprah Winfrey stopped attending, shows poor judgment. It’s a legitimate issue, and he can’t silence the debate just because he finds it offensive to discuss.

Senator Obama’s association with former terrorist Bill Ayers and his questionable business ties to criminal Tony Rezko also show poor judgment. There is no question that Ayers was an unrepentant terrorist when Senator Obama worked with him. There is no question that Obama received a “sweetheart” financial deal on his home through Tony Rezko. Americans have the right to associate with whomever they want to, and that applies to Senator Obama. To have your sights set on the presidency, however, and to think that these sorts of relationships would never become an issue and should not be examined, shows poor judgment and a real arrogance towards the American people.

These are not the only examples – when named the candidate of his party, Senator Obama could not put his personal feelings aside and select the vice presidential candidate who was best for his party, Hillary Clinton. Even Senator Biden agrees that Mrs. Clinton would have been a better candidate. He did not do what was best for the party and his constituents, but rather did what was best for him – this is arrogance toward Mrs. Clinton’s constituency and poor judgment overall.

It was poor judgment when Senator Obama took more money from Fannie and Freddie than every other U.S. Senator, other than Chris Dodd, of course, who strangely took the most money from Fannie and Freddie and then blamed the Republicans for the financial meltdown and didn’t have the decency to recuse himself from working on the so-called bailout bill.  It was also poor judgment when Senator Obama named former Fannie Mae CEO Jim Johnson to his vice presidential selection committee. It also shows poor judgment – and colossal arrogance – when Senator Obama tries to blame the Republicans for the current economic crisis, when he is so closely tied to Fannie and Freddie himself. The American people aren’t stupid. There is clearly bipartisan blame to go around, but let he or she who is without blame cast the first stone.

And throughout his career, when faced with tough decisions, Senator Obama sat on the sidelines – he voted “present” over 129 times in the Illinois legislature; when asked when life began by Pastor Warren, he stated this was “above his pay grade”; and when asked to help deal with the current economic crisis, he refused to stay and to do his work as a Senator – call me if you need me” he said. These are the actions of a masterful politician to be sure, but not those of a leader. The American people do not want a President who refuses to make tough decisions.

John McCain, however, has shown good judgment. In the Senate, he has often worked with Democrats to get legislation passed, often annoying fellow Republicans in the process. More than half of his political partners in the last two Congresses were Democrats, on controversial issues like campaign finance and global warming. Senator Obama has no such track record. And, the very few bipartisan efforts he has been involved in were non-controversial efforts, like ethics reform. When John McCain was held prisoner in Vietnam, undergoing torture and abuse, and the Vietnamese offered to just set him free – immediately and out of order from other prisoners – he refused because it was dishonorable, even though it meant continuing, unspeakable, physical pain. In the recent economic meltdown, John knew that doing his job as a U.S. Senator was more important than campaigning, and he returned to Washington. He may not have been the lynchpin in getting a deal done – only time will tell. One thing is certain, though – of the over 300,000,000 people in the United States, only 100 are U.S. Senators. The nation is at a turning point, a cataclysmic moment, and John knew that his responsibility to America – and to the people of Arizona who have sent him to Washington time and again – was to do his job and to lend whatever help he could, to once again reach across the aisle and work for the American people. Senators Obama and Biden, however, spent the weekend campaigning.

My history – which is shorter than John’s and Senator Biden’s but almost as long as Senator Obama’s and which has ten more years of executive experience than Obama or Biden – shows that I have done what was right, even at personal expense. For example, I repeatedly cut useless expenses that didn’t benefit my constituents, such as selling the governor’s jet and firing the governor’s cook. These may seem like small things, but they show my character; it would have been fun to have a private jet and convenient to have a private chef. These weren’t necessary, though, and I couldn’t justify asking Alaska’s taxpayers to foot the bill. So, I sold them. It was the right thing for my constituents, but it didn’t benefit me personally. When I entered politics, I also took on corruption in Alaska’s Republican Party. Like John stated last week, I didn’t win any “Miss Congeniality awards” for that one either. But those kinds of actions have brought me an over 80% approval rating – that’s just about the same as the disapproval rating for the U.S. Congress right now. My history shows that I do what’s right, and that’s why John McCain wanted me as his running mate.

Someone once said that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. It is apropos here. Barack Obama and Joe Biden have repeatedly been willing to say one thing and do another. They have repeatedly been either wrong on issues or unwilling to engage on them. If, as the country faces those 3AM crisis moments that Senator Clinton so often talked about, the American people expect Obama and Biden to provide a different result – to show character traits or do anything other than what they have repeatedly shown or done in the past – that is insanity. If, on the other hand, the American people want a statesman in charge – someone who has repeatedly, throughout his political career and his entire life, put his own self-interest on the backburner to do what he thinks is right for his country – they should vote for John McCain. It’s just that simple.