A campaign double standard, compliments of the Pentagon

Sarah Palin returned to her home state of Alaska last night so she could see her son Track before he leaves for deployment in Iraq. Palin is set to visit Track's military base in Fairbanks today with cameras in tow. That's right, despite the Pentagon's policy of not allowing political activities and news media to be present on military bases, the Pentagon said they would allow Palin to go to the base along with the media.

This is the same Pentagon who told the Obama campaign in July that his scheduled visits to the Ramstein and Landstuhl U.S. military bases in Germany would be viewed as a campaign event.

Certainly Palin should be allowed to visit her son, and technically, the Alaska National Guard is under her domain. But allowing her to bring cameras to the base is the equivalent of tossing her a football after the opponent's defense has been cleared off the field. With campaigning at a frenzy, and a mere week since Palin's debut at the convention, this seems to be quite unfair and hypocritical on the Pentagon's part.

You can only imagine how loudly the McCain-Palin camp would cry foul if the tables were turned.