SARAH PALIN'S DEBATE PERFORMANCE, BEFORE IT HAPPENS

All of a sudden, a lot of people -- a former gubernatorial opponent as well as writers for Politico, The Wall Street Journal, the L.A. Times, and the Huffington Post -- are reminding us that Sarah Palin debated a lot in her 2006 race for governor and often came away from those debates as the apparent winner. No, obviously, she wasn't the candidate who had the best command of the facts -- but she often made her lack of knowledge seem like a virtue, and she worked to simulate a sense of intimacy with the voters.

So what does that mean for tomorrow night? Well, in my last post I gave you the questions from Hugh Hewitt's wet kiss of an interview with Palin yesterday. Palin's going to get somewhat more difficult questions tomorrow night. But I think her answers are a preview of how she'll feint and dodge (without appearing to feint or dodge) when she doesn't know what she's talking about, or when she just wants to go for cheap emotion.

Economy? Talk about herself and Todd:

I know what Americans are going through. Todd and I, heck, we're going through that right now even as we speak, which may put me again kind of on the outs of those Washington elite who don't like the idea of just an everyday working class American running for such an office. But yeah, there's been a lot of times that Todd and I have had to figure out how we were going to pay for health insurance. We've gone through periods of our life here with paying out of pocket for health coverage until Todd and I both landed a couple of good union jobs. Early on in our marriage, we didn't have health insurance, and we had to either make the choice of paying out of pocket for catastrophic coverage or just crossing our fingers, hoping that nobody would get hurt, nobody would get sick. So I know what Americans are going through there. And you know, even today, Todd and I are looking at what's going on in the stock market, the relatively low number of investments that we have, looking at the hit that we’re taking, probably $20,000 dollars last week in his 401K plan that was hit. I’m thinking geez, the rest of America, they’re facing the exact same thing that we are.

Iraq? Talk about Track:

I'm proud that my son made this independent and very wise decision as such a young man at 18, deciding you know, he realized there's something he can do to help, to contribute, to help protect our nation, and I couldn't be more proud of him and all those who choose to serve in our military. They're serving for the right reasons. God bless them, God love them.

Social issues? Talk about religion in a seemingly nonthreatening and tolerant way:

...my personal faith is very, very simple. I don't belong to any church. I do have a strong belief in God, and I believe that I'm a heck of a lot better off putting my life in God's hands, and saying hey, you know, guide me. What else do we have but guidance that we would seek from a Creator? That's about as simple as it gets with my faith... I do have respect for those who have differing views than I do on faith, on religion.

She can fill up a lot of time with this stuff. She can bump the "cares about people like me" number way up.

Will it work? Maybe not -- let's hope the very smart people on Team Obama have a counterstrategy (maybe the plan, reported by Politico, to "keep the focus on the top of the ticket" will pay off, by making it seem as if Palin doesn't want to talk in any detail about the policies of her, er, running mate). But I wouldn't bet the rent money on an utter Palin failure.