BUT, the reason he lost is because Presidential Nominee McCain is a completely different person than AZ Senator McCain. He's completely changed and pandered to the wrong groups since becoming the republican presidential candidate. Senator McCain would have never chosen someone like Palin, but Prez Nom McCain did.

He gambled that she could bag a big swatch of disgruntled Hillary Democratic women, rev up the Christian fundamentalists,

Only a fool would believe one person could bag both those groups*. Moderate/right leaning indie woman and Republican women crossed over to Hillary, maybe, but not Democratic women. McCain had a better shot at them without Palin. She secured that he was willing to go that far right. She helped Obama with women that don't believe he is strong enough on women's rights. Remember, they didn't go flooding over to either side after Palin. She secured the fundie base and that same large percentage of undecided Hillary voters moved slowly to Obama. Once he started pulling in front, the economy tanked and she also started getting more exposure. She's a good scapegoat for some of those later movers though  ;)

Regardless of how one might feel about Sarah Palin's candidacy, she did something that Mitt Romney -- a.k.a., "That man on the Clairol Just for Men box", according to David Letterman -- could never have done. She fired up the GOP base, and gave John McCain traction at a time when his campaign was in the doldrums.

Nevertheless, history will reflect that John McCain himself fatally wounded his own campaign when he had that momentum Palin had given him, by channeling the late but still hapless President Herbert Hoover on the morning of September 15, 2008, as Wall Street began its steep descent into economic chaos:

"Our economy, I think, is still -- the fundamentals of our economy are strong, but these are very, very difficult times."

Almost immediately, Barack Obama pounced on the gaffe, blistering the Republican for being "disturbingly out of touch" with reality:

"I just think he doesn't know. He doesn't get what's happening between the mountain in Sedona where he lives and the corridors of Washington where he works. ... Why else would he say, today, of all days -- just a few hours ago -- that the fundamentals of the economy are still strong? Senator -- what economy are you talking about?"

McCain tried to walk back his ill-considered comment that very afternoon, but his hesitancy and sudden lack of confidence in his own message was quite palpable, which only made matters worse for him:

"And my opponents may disagree, but those fundamentals -- the American worker and their innovation, their entrepreneurship, the small business, those are the fundamentals of America, and I think they're strong. I know Americans are hurting. The fundamentals of our economy are at risk. ... And those fundamentals are threatened, they are threatened and at risk because some on Wall Street have treated Wall Street like a casino. ... Our economy is at risk today, have no doubt how serious this problem is. We've got to fix this economy, which the fundamentals of are at great risk right now. ... I want to promise you that it's my highest priority."

I don't think Palin is the reason for McCain's failure, and all in all anything she does reflects more on him than her because he chose her.  His choice of Palin reflects on how seriously he takes this election and these times for our country.  He wasn't able to see, gee, probably need someone who's good on the economy, because we are headed for trouble?  It wasn't lost on anyone that bad economic times were going to get worse.

if picking someone as veep, who is unutterably unqualified to succeed you, should you be unable to perform your presidential duties, is "mavericky", then i guess mccain qualifies.

to most thinking people, it was just another display of his historical lack of judgment. perhaps a romney veep might have overcome this, i doubt it.

The continued presence of that seemingly solid base of about 25% hardcore element in the US population keeps me awake at night.  They seem to function in some parallel universe that has no resemblance to my view of reality.

To that end, imagine what might have been if the "maverick" genuinely went maverick on the base and partnered with Lieberman.  No doubt about it, the base would have probably stayed home, and good riddance anyway -- go find another party to take hostage; you and George have damned near brought about our demise anyway, McCain could have said.  

The political climate was ideal this time to once and for all wrestle the republican party away from the tight grip of the evangels.  I think it reasonable to believe that such a ticket could have been engineered to be extremely competitive in this year's polictial climate and draw centrists of both parties and most likely enough to offset the lost base. Let's face it; the 18 million that supported Hillary were not quick to embrace Obama and might have looked considerably closer at that model of McCain ticket.  It was only after Palin arrived on the scene that so many took a closer at Obama, hell, they had no choice.  Had McCain not forced them to look the other direction, well, who knows what might have happened.