As John McCain inches closer to the 1,191 delegates he needs to secure the Republican nomination, attention has turned to the vice presidential sweepstakes. Who should McCain pick as his running mate? The answer will be especially important if the aging four-term senator’s general election foe is a youthful freshman agitating for change.

Sarah Palin, the beautiful conservative Republican governor of Alaska, would be an ideal choice to help McCain slay this unholy ObamaOprah beast which is set to rake in nearly $50 million a month in campaign donations alone, and has intense auxiliary support coming from the unions, George Soros’s billions-infused Democracy Alliance organization, and other rich Democratic networks.

Mrs. Palin is one of conservatism’s own, and would be the first female vice president. She’s young being only 44 (two years behind Senator Obama), she is wildly known to despise government corruption. She defeated a horribly entrenched and corrupt Republican political machine in Alaska. She has a son in the U.S. military. She’s strongly pro-life, belonging, in fact, to Feminists for Life.

Gov. Palin could become the Republican Party’s Segolene Royal, the French Socialist Party’s glamorous leader known for her heels and political bite. She is the perfect antidote to Sen. Obama’s cheap thrills, and would help rejuvenate conservatism.

If Camille Paglia or the huffers on Huffington Post are anything to go by, the standard line that will be repeated often against John McCain will be that he’s an “old coot”; a vintage George C. Scott-style warmonger; old; hypocritical; and just plain odd.

As McCain’s advisers most surely know, the best way to combat that line of attack is to choose a running mate who in no way can be seen as old or as a “coot.”

MRS. PALIN IS most certainly not an “old coot.” She has enchanting, fresh charisma and the credentials, too, to win back and motivate a lot of conservatives, disaffected Republicans, and independents tired of government corruption and Republican degeneracy and sheer idiocy.

McCain needs someone who like Sen. Obama physically represents a departure from the past, who also oozes vibrancy and intelligence, will motivate die-hard conservatives, but what’s more, who will also let the Arizonan take advantage of his age and enable him to be the playful and charming Reagan-esque grandfather figure that Americans always fall in love with. In other words, Sen. McCain, like President Nixon in the 1968 election, needs an opposite number — that’s Sarah Palin in the flesh.

President Nixon’s opposite number was Spiro Agnew, then the Governor of Maryland. It worked fantastically. Gov. Agnew was the gregarious and boastful conservative Greek who contrasted very well with the inherently shy and calculating Nixon. Choosing Agnew not only reassured and motivated conservative Republicans but also added a nice touch of Greek pizzazz that competed well against Hubert Humphrey’s Midwestern sparkle.

Barack Obama is the raffish 46-year-old, witty, and charming who is magnificently skilled in making himself appear inclusive, open-minded, and not at all prone to socialist-thinking. What’s more, Sen. Obama is the George W. Bush of this election. Like President Bush in 2000, Sen. Obama is the candidate with less experience but tons of charm. If history is anything to go by, Americans always pick the charmer.

Under the “anti-coot” rubric Senator McCain has few available options — and that’s perhaps being too extravagant. The beautiful young conservative female governor from Alaska really is it. What’s more, Mrs. Palin is in Washington, D.C. this week. She is “hoping,” according to the news reports, “to meet with the presidential front-runners while in Washington to discuss Alaska’s role in the new administration.”

Doubtless, many patriotic Americans want to know: What time will she and Sen. McCain be meeting for dinner?