When the senator from Illinois announced his vice presidential pick, Joe Biden, a little over a week ago, he was met with mixed reactions. A man campaigning on “hope” and “change” tapped the entrenched Washington veteran with boatloads of foreign policy experience. Was he kowtowing to his critics, who said he didn’t have enough experience? Was he trying to please his Democratic base? Was he just falling into politics-as-usual?

So when Sen. John McCain announced Thursday that his running mate would be Sarah Palin, the Republican governor of Alaska, he really nailed the shock-and-awe factor.

After that honeymoon period, that’s about where the glow with Palin’s pick ends.

Call us young, call us naive, call us idealistic. This is not a move to improve the country — it’s a move to win the election.

It’s flash and show, a great story to compete against a campaign that has a great story. McCain, too, has lived a Hollywood life, but apparently after so many years in public office and campaigning, we’re tired of hearing about it. But what it doesn’t have is substance, a backbone. Sure, Palin knows first-hand about domestic energy production — although increasing domestic production, her answer to America’s energy crisis seems awfully short-sighted.

But what about other qualifications? Cindy McCain’s assertion that Palin is qualified to deal with international relations because “Alaska is the closest part of our continent to Russia” may well be the highlight of her foreign policy experience. Her pregnant 17-year-old daughter might be fine with her family’s support and resources, but what about those girls even younger, without the family or financial support to deal with children? Her anti-abortion and abstinence-only education views belie her experience in dealing with grander issues. And what of the economy, the war on terror, immigration and the other big issues we expect a vice president to be able to face? Where’s her experience there?

The McCain campaign’s move is politically smart. McCain and Biden have been in the news forever, and Obama has garnered an enormous amount of national and global media attention in the past five years. Palin, though, is the Hollywood story we haven’t seen since “Legally Blonde 2.” She’s going to keep the McCain ticket in the media till November, and the choice should galvanize the anti-abortion and pro-gun factions of the Republican base.

That’s well and good, but it’s not going to do anything to help the country.

Sure, politics is all about gamesmanship — and McCain’s going to have to do a lot of spinning on this one, what with his attacks on Obama’s experience and his statements that the No. 1 quality in a VP should be his or her ability to take over for the president — but hopefully two months will prove enough time to vet what substance there was in this decision.