there was a young woman from boobville ...

I think it does have to do with sexism, considering they will argue to high heaven that Palin is capable of being the president in the event of McCain's passing and yet keep asking for all of these silly requests. They're not giving excuses for why they're asking for her to get all of these advantages (which, let's face it, they are when you're trying to lure in low-info voters and Palin comes off pretty well when she's only seen in short sound bites), but what they are doing is assuring the American public that she's capable of doing the job. So which is it? There's only two reasons they could be asking for all of these perks for her -- they know she'll come off as a first-rate nutjob (which is likely, but they won't admit to), or they're doing it because she's a woman. Which is less likely (although with a campaign featuring a man who called his wife a cunt and laughed at Hillary Clinton being called a bitch ... *shrugs*), but if they want to keep telling us it can't possibly be the other one, it means they don't really have a problem letting people leap to the other conclusion.