My favorite political writer Fred Kaplan has a view of the Sarah Palin interview that seems spot-on to me.
It will be interesting to see if a lot of people this time vote for Vice-President. There have been some elections where it felt like a ticket could have had Bozo the Clown on it and it wouldn't have made a difference as long as he was in the second position. I think a lot of folks who voted for Bush-Quayle or Gore-Lieberman felt that way. But maybe McCain's age plus Palin's unfamiliarity with foreign affairs makes it more of an issue this time than usual.