THEY’RE SAYING THAT MCCAIN HAS PICKED SARAH PALIN. The Insta-Wife is ecstatic, which may bode well for that demographic. I’d like it if she had more executive experience, but to be fair, she’s got more than anyone else on either ticket. Is she too liberal on gay rights? Not for me, but maybe for some people.

UPDATE: Sissy Willis has more, including video of an interview of Palin by Larry Kudlow.

ANOTHER UPDATE: Judging from SayUncle, Palin will play well among the crucial bitter gun-clinger demographic. [They prefer to be called ‘blasty-Americans’ now — ed. Oh, good grief.]

Plus, the WaPo’s Ben Pershing on Sarah Palin’s Porkbusting.

The pick is getting good marks from Geraldine Ferraro.

And, Palin as the anti-Ted Stevens.“In an election where the Republican’s biggest liability isn’t Iraq but Ted Stevens and the Alaskan Bridge To Nowhere, McCain took his maverick mantle by the reins and just signed up the Anti Stevens to help him root out the corruption endemic in DC.”

This rather churlish response from the Obama campaign won’t help them — dissing small towns doesn’t fit well after Biden’s “nobody is better than anybody” talk. [LATER: McCain response: “I’d think the Obama people would have learned by now not to belittle the experience of women.”]

By contrast, I just saw Palin praise Hillary Clinton and Geraldine Ferraro as pathbreakers. And that “18 million cracks in the glass ceiling” line was delightfully sly.

MORE: Reader Kyle Griffin emails: “Did the Obama campaign just accuse the Republican campaign of having a VP with insufficient experience? Was that really smart? Will we see an ad about that tomorrow from the McCain youTube team?” Yeah, it did seem like an unforced error.

An “I told you so” from Katie Granju. [LATER: Granju emails: “I’m telling you. She’s got the goods. Of course, I disagree with her on, well, mostly everything, but she’s super impressive.” Yeah, I’d never seen her speak before, and I was wrong to discount her, though I thought she’d said she didn’t want the job.]

More on Geraldine Ferraro on Palin.

Roger Simon: Obama the stodgy, McCain the Maverick.

An interesting angle from reader Frank Martin:

Question: Which state borders the Former Soviet Union?

Hey, will you look at that?, 2 years of foreign policy experience.

Well, maybe. And reader Joel Mackey writes:

As a conservative, disenfranchised from the Republican party due to their pork barrel spending, I find myself excited at the prospect of Sarah Palin as VP. Her stands against corruption, her focus on fixing issues affecting America, instead of political manuevers to gain and hold power for power’s sake, make me excited to vote for her.

The only memes that grab my attention with the Obama compaign are when he talks about reforming Washington, but his statements are so vague and his friends are so leftwing, that I suspect his rhetoric is code for changing to a more socialistic model. Whereas Palin would bring reform which would more closely resemble what Reagan would enact.

McCain has hit a homerun, possibly a game winning homerun. Her introductory speech brought a positive emotional response from me, very very rare.

If this reaction is common, I guess it’s a better pick than I had thought. But not everyone’s happy. Reader John Shirey writes:

I just don’t get it – if they were going to pick someone with such limited experience, then why not pick Jindal, who to me is one of the few Republicans I actually like (other than his absolutist stance on abortion), and despite his tender age seems extremely competent and well-spoken. The Palin selection also shows how limited his choices really were in that he couldn’t come up with a Biden-type pick (experienced, ready to lead) that somehow wouldn’t piss of the base (Romney, Giuliani, Lieberman, etc.).

As I mentioned earlier, the GOP has a bench problem. Though the Biden pick wasn’t exactly a game-changer.

Lots of thoughts at Ann Althouse — just keep scrolling as she has multiple posts. I like this: “Earth to nameless CNN website commenter: Women are not a minority.”

From Paul Mirengoff, disappointment.

Beldar put up a big background post in June. Ahead of the curve!

David Post: Sarah Who?

Jeff Goldstein notes a rhetorical snare. Heh.

From Josh Marshall, a Palin scandal. Guess the McCain vetters don’t think it amounts to much, kinda like the Biden thing.

And Col. Douglas Mortimer emails that it’s no big deal: “What’s the point of the being the Governor of a whole state if you can’t even get your sister’s asshole ex-husband fired from a gub-ment job? After all, its not like she’s been caught in a sweetheart real estate deal with a convicted felon, you know.”