I'm Scottish, a resident alien, and have lived in the states for about twelve years - so I have a unique perspective, being simultaneously an outsider, and someone with a deep interest in the outcome of this race. If I could vote - I'd vote Obama. An impartial appraisal of the issues allows no other choice.

But the rural vote is only partially about issues. Some people will vote for him just on the issues - because some people do actually try to make informed choices. Many others will 'vote with their gut', and unfortunately - their gut is still telling them that he is different.

My work takes me all across the states, and I get to work with, and meet, people of every social and economic background. What I've found is that rural people are curious about 'strangers'. But what they seem to want is the ability to 'tag' the stranger as 'same enough' or 'different'.

If you are tagged as different - you face a huge uphill battle to gain trust or acceptance (just as the 'eastern churches' found when competing with stump-pulpit baptist preachers).

This is Sen. Obama's challenge. He is less different to these folks I've met, than I - he had very similar upbringing (single mom, food stamps, mid-western grandparents lending a hand with his rearing). But he has black skin, he is urbane, and he is educated.

He can do nothing about his skin color. Racists are not going to change their stripes, and they're never going to vote for him. They are not the target.

He *can* address their perception of his fundamental 'difference' - that he is a 'snobby intellectual' by showing that he does identify closely with them. His family, his upbringing, his roots in Kansas -- these are the personal things he needs to amplify to reach these people.

Until he does - he'll just be another one of 'them rich folks'.

I cannot vote.

I can only hope that America votes correctly on my behalf.

Sarah Palin rode into town on a wave of populist rhetoric and snappy one liners that simultaneously disparaged the opposition while raising her stature as a feisty 'regular jane'.

Well - it's time to pay the piper.

Is she 'over-prepared'? Probably.

Will she succeed in the debate? Probably not.

There are many reasons for this, but the primary is that she will dig her own hole. She has demonstrated that she is simply too incurious and too wedded to her far-right evangelical agenda to learn any other behavior - and make it believable.

In person she may be a very nice, pleasant person. You might well want to share a pot of tea with her.

But this is the 21st century. If she wants to play in the big league - she needs to be able to play at that level.

I could care less that she is a woman, an evangelical, that her politics are from the far-right, that we disagree on many 'value' questions.

I care greatly that she is completely out of her depth and completely incapable of performing at the level we should expect of a VP - never mind POTUS.

Her candidacy exactly mirrors the kind of political rationale that has so damaged America's reputation in the rest of the world.