The Ticket: McCain- Palin

Jonathan Martin, Tim Grieve

DAYTON, OHIO, — In one of the most shocking vice-presidential selections in political history, John McCain has tapped Sarah Palin, the 44-year-old first-term governor of Alaska, to be his running mate.

Praising her “strong principles, fighting spirit and deep compassion,” McCain told a noontime rally here that Palin —who only two years ago was mayor of Wasilla, Alaska — could help him take on the political status quo in Washington.

“She’s exactly who this country needs to help me fight the same old Washington politics of me first and country second,” McCain, 72 today, proclaimed to about 15,000 flag-waving onlookers who crowded into a college basketball arena here to see the surprise pick in person.

Palin, wearing a blue suit with an American flag pin and a Blue Star broach indicating a child in the military, accepted McCain’s offer with her husband, Todd, and four of her five children looking on.

Noting that the day fell almost 88 years to the day after American women gained the right to vote, Palin won loud cheers from what was McCain’s largest rally yet by highlighting her gender.

She paid homage to Geraldine Ferraro , as well as to Hillary Rodham Clinton.

“It was rightly noted in Denver this week that Hillary left 18 million cracks in the highest, hardest glass ceiling in America,” Palin said. “But it turns out the women of America aren’t finished yet, and we can shatter that glass ceiling once and for all.”

Palin began to tell the crowd and the stunned political class watching on TV about her unlikely rise from small-town Alaska to the national stage, with flourishes that could never be made up…..

Her husband and high school sweetheart, she said, is a lifelong commercial fisherman who works in the oil fields on Alaska’s North Slope and is a member of the US Steel Workers in addition to a world champion snowmobile rider.

A mother of five, Palin pointed out that their oldest couldn’t be present.

“On September 11th of last year, our son enlisted in the United States Army,” she shared, sparking a deafening ovation and chants of “USA.” “He now serves in an infantry brigade, and September 11th, he will deploy to Iraq in the service of his country.”

In selecting Palin, McCain counters the historic nature of Barack Obama’s candidacy. She’s young —three years younger than Obama — and she’s a woman, the first to land a spot on a major-party ticket since Walter Mondale picked Ferraro 24 years ago.

Disheartened Clinton supporters who were thinking about crossing over to vote for McCain may now have one more reason to do so.

Voters on the right will like Palin’s conservative credentials: She’s opposed to both abortion rights and gay marriage, supports increased domestic drilling for oil, is a lifelong member of the National Rifle Association and has a son in the U.S. Army.