Sarah Palin has no idea what a vice president does

Palin's literal inability to describe the duties of the office she seeks should be the biggest story of the day.

And yet, all anybody seems to care about this morning is how much her clothes cost.

This is at least the third time that Palin has demonstrated a fundamental lack of understanding of the constitutionally defined duties of the vice president of the United States. She actually seems to think that the VP has legal authority to influence or even control the agenda of the U.S. Senate. I suppose she reached this conclusion by observing the way Dick Cheney has operated, and not knowing any better, thinks this is the what the constitution says. But she is wrong. Journalists should be saying she is wrong.

Instead, I heard Tamryn Whatever-her-name-is on MSNBC describe Palin's answer as not exactly accurate.

No, it's completely wrong. It is not possible to be more wrong than that.

The subsequent discussion was about the politics of Palin's latest gaffe.

But it's not a gaffe. It's a wrong answer. And she should know the right answer. We have a right to expect her to know the right answer.

Sarah Palin is running for vice president of the United States, and she literally has no idea what a vice president does.

I would think that repeatedly failing to correctly describe the duties of the office you seek would disqualify you from that office. I would think that journalists would be sufficiently alarmed by Palin's repeated inability to describe those duties that they would explicitly question her qualifications for the job.

But I guess that's expecting too much. After all, she wears really expensive clothes.

[Cross-posted from comments at Life's Journey]