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Two inspired young women in New York feel so strongly against John McCain's VP Pick, Alaska Governor Sarah Palin, that they started a blog, Women Say No to Sarah Palin. They sent the following email to friends and colleagues:
Date: Saturday, September 6, 2008, 4:18 PM
Hello there list— Friends, compatriots, fellow-lamenters,
We are writing to you because of the fury and dread we have felt since the announcement of Sarah Palin as the Vice-Presidential candidate for the Republican Party. We believe that this terrible decision has surpassed mere partisanship, and that it is a dangerous farce on the part of a pandering and rudderless Presidential candidate that has a real possibility of becoming fact.
Perhaps like us, as American women, you share the fear of what Ms. Palin and her professed beliefs and proven record could lead to for ourselves and for our present or future daughters. To date, she is against sex education, birth control, the pro-choice platform, environmental protection, alternative energy development, freedom of speech (as mayor she wanted to ban books and attempted to fire the librarian who stood against her), gun control, the separation of church and state, and polar bears. To say nothing of her complete lack of real preparation to become the second-most-powerful person on the planet.
We want to clarify that we are not against Sarah Palin as a woman, a mother, or, for that matter, a parent of a pregnant teenager, but solely as a rash, incompetent, and altogether devastating choice for Vice President. Ms. Palin's political views are in every way a slap in the face to the accomplishments that our mothers and grandmothers and great-grandmothers so fiercely fought for, and that we've so demonstrably benefited from.
First and foremost, Ms. Palin does not represent us. She does not demonstrate or uphold our interests as American women. It is presumed that the inclusion of a woman on the Republican ticket could win over women voters. We want to disagree, publicly.
Therefore, we invite you to reply here: womensaynotpalin@gmail.com with a short, succinct message about why you, as a woman living in this country, do not support this candidate as second-in-command for our nation.
Please include your name (last initial is fine), age, and place of residence. We will post your responses on a blog called "Women Against Sarah Palin," which we intend to publicize as widely as possible. Please send us your reply at your earliest convenience. The greater the volume of responses we receive, the stronger our message will be.
Thank you for your time and action.
VIVA!
Sincerely,
Quinn Latimer and Lyra Kilston
New York, NY
womensaynotpalin@gmail.com
PLEASE FORWARD WIDELY! If you send this to 20 women in the next hour, you could be blessed with a country that takes your concerns seriously. Stranger things have happened.
I applaud these young women for caring enough to undertake this enormous task. If you visit the blog, you will see that they are working very hard to keep up with the huge number of replies they are being deluged with. Pass this information on, and urge your local media to cover this very valid topic.
In 1986. Apparently his campaign maintains that the people that all heard it had a collective hallucination.
I hope Sarah Palin and all Republicans are satisfied by the media's apology for their coverage of Palin and her family. This may be my favorite sarcastic published piece of all time!
Amid the cries of "Leave Bristol alone, she's a kid!", I have to point something out:
Bristol is five months pregnant. Her parents were aware of this when her mother decided to become McCain's running mate. If Palin really wanted privacy for her daughter, then perhaps choosing to run for such a high political office wasn't the best move. Has she learned nothing from seeing other political scandals in the news? Look at John Edwards - an affair that ended a few years ago just recently came to light and hurt his credibility, and aired his marriage's dirty laundry very publicly. Yet Palin chose to become McCain's running mate. How could she not see that people would be asking if she still supported abstinence only sex education until marriage, since her own 17 year old, unmarried daughter, who hasn't finished high school, is five months along with an unplanned pregnancy? Some people say that's a cheap shot, but it's not. The personal is political. So having a 17 year old high school student daughter that has an unplanned pregnancy - does that change Palin's views on sex education in schools? It's a valid question. McCain's campaign aides say that Bristol "chose" to carry her pregnancy to term and marry the boyfriend who described himself as a "fuckin' redneck" who didn't want kids on his MySpace page (it's no longer up) - as if Bristol would have truly been able to choose anything OTHER than carrying the pregnancy and making everything all better with a shotgun wedding now that her family is thrust into the international spotlight?
Same with John McCain, who during the 2000 primary McCain said that if his daughter got pregnant it would be a "family decision":
"The final decision would be made by Meghan with our advice and counsel," McCain said, referring to himself and his wife, Cindy. When reporters suggested that this view made him, in fact, pro-choice, McCain became irritated. "I don't think it is the pro-choice position to say that my daughter and my wife and I will discuss something that is a family matter that we have to decide."
So, his daughter and family deserve the option to even MAKE a choice, other than the default response of "Of COURSE she'll carry the pregnancy to term!", but other women and families don't deserve the ability to make that choice. Nice.
Hey Bristol - I know this sucks for you and we can't even begin to comprehend what you are going through, now that your sex life and personal choices have been made public fodder. But really - your mom signed you up for this. And maybe the two of you should discuss teaching kids the facts about sex, so that they can prevent unwanted pregnancy and infections. You know, since clearly it's not true that not telling kids about sex will stop them from having it.
