Sarah Palin, the Nutroots, and National Media "Doing Our Job"

Regarding treatment of Sarah Palin over the weekend, I was going to write something excoriating the Leftist press over this, but Megan McArdle beat me to it. I'm not going to bother with the idiots who accused Sarah Palin of faking her most recent pregnancy to cover for her daughter - that was so mind bogglingly stupid I couldn't believe people were wasting pixels on it.

The dragging through the mud of a 17 year old girl who has not campaigned, not given any speeches, not sought or been pushed into the limelight by her mother is slimy. I said this when it was Chelsea Clinton (before she started campaigning). I believe once they voluntarily step onto the campaign trail (e.g. Laura Bush and Cindy McCain, Michelle Obama) they make themselves fair game, but until that happens, leave them the heck alone. They didn't choose for their famous relative to run for office. They have a life of their own. Let them live it.

I see nothing wrong - and plenty that's praiseworthy - in how Sarah Palin has handled her family. Yeah, it'd be better if her daughter hadn't gotten pregnant, but short of locking her her up 24/7 - something I'd suggest would be evidence of character shortcomings - the girl is going to make her own choices, and 17 year olds are not as level-headed as thirty year olds. But in both the case of her own fifth child (born with Down's Syndrome) and her oldest daughter's pregnancy, she has done exactly the right thing. I've seen the phrase "shotgun wedding" applied more than once to the daughter's upcoming nuptials - but no evidence presented that the young man in question is in any wise being coerced into the marriage. Throughout most of human history, girls of fifteen to eighteen and boys of similar ages have been getting married and starting families. Yeah, it's probably smarter from a standpoint of the young folks not to start quite so early in our modern society, but it's still the right thing to do for the baby. They're accepting a lot of extra problems they don't have to in order to preserve an innocent life and care for it. Isn't that the sort of things those leftists praise working mothers for doing? I agree - it's heroic, not in the military risk your life sense, but in the sense of people who are going to do an awful lot of work they don't have to, over a period of time at least two decades in length, to make certain that child has the family life it deserves. And Sarah Palin, who taught her daughter well enough to take responsibility for the mistake that resulted in the pregnancy, even when they could get out of all of it in several ways? That's the sort of person I want to vote for, a sort of leader who is in far too short a supply in our government at any level.

I've also seen leftists telling Gov. Palin she should become a stay-at-home mom and give up her career, because she's got a special needs child. Say what? NOW may have gone overboard in the last twenty years ago, but that was one thing they accomplished that I agreed with even as young kid whose mother worked. A woman is not a life support system for her ovaries and womb, nor should she be expected to do more in the way of child care than men. Biology already forces her to spend nine months carrying the baby and she's the only parent who can lactate. Sarah Palin is the sort of person the feminist movement was all about in the beginning, the mother who wanted a career as well, and if the leftists who've been criticizing her for having and continuing her career had any conscience whatsoever, they'd appear before her to apologize, metaphorical hat in hand. Or is it that they just can't believe the Republicans have gotten past the 1950s, so they're hoping to peel off some Republican supporters? And for the left to sell out its supposed principles of female economic liberation in order to peel off a few votes in one election should have honest feminsits crossing party lines to vote McCain/Palin, because their own side has certainly demonstrated more than once in the past couple of weeks that when it comes to actually doing the things they say are praiseworthy, the Democrats have not come as far as the Republicans.

As for troopergate, where Gov. Palin tried to get her ex-brother in law fired from his job as a state trooper, that began well before she was elected governor, and if your governor was personally aware of a rogue, out-of-control law enforcement officer, wouldn't you want them to try to do something about it? This clown was guilty of abuse of authority, using it to harass non-police, tasering an 11 year old boy, poaching major game animals, and several other offenses that should cause a law enforcement official to lose his job. I'd prefer the louse was in prison, but having his ability to abuse the law removed might be sufficient for some people.

If this is all the leftist media has on the lady (and it appears to be) than the "revelations" we've seen thus far, then yes, I'd have to agree that the McCain campaign vetted her well, and there's nothing here that should be harmful. It has been reported that McCain himself knew of everything true that's been reported thus far, and chose Governor Palin anyway - something that says quite a bit in favor of his judgment. I'd say that if some people think there was anything wrong in the above actions, that's more a commentary on those particular people than on the Palins. Just because I think abortion should be an available option, and women should have the ability to choose to terminate their pregnancy, does not mean I think that doing so is in any way admirable, nor that doing so should be something anyone should encourage. In fact, if you've got the personal fortitude to deal with an unwanted pregnancy, an unplanned child, or a special needs child by keeping that child and bringing it up in the best way of which you are capable, that is what says something very admirable about you.