In Defense of Sarah Palin (Sort of)
For the past six months or so, the presidential election hasn’t ceased to provide me with story after story that I find deeply disturbing or upsetting. I’ve been particularly struck by the absolute about-face McCain has made from his independent stances in the past. With his acquisition of Sarah Palin as a running-mate, I’ve become certain that the awful, crippled monstrosity that is the US election system has done the unimaginable and provided us with a ticket even more harmful to our nation then the drooling sack of ineptitude currently occupying the White House. I’ve thought of at least a dozen blog posts that I haven’t had the time to write concerning this dismal state of affairs in the last few weeks alone.
I saw something today, though, that was the proverbial last straw. It may be surprising, but what upset me was actually an attack on Palin. I read it in this Huffington Post article. Under the heading On Abortion, the author explains Palin’s (quaint, yet terrifying) views on abortion. She doesn’t believe in abortions even for rape victims, AND, writes Mr. Walls, (you can practically hear a scandalized whisper) she makes no exceptions, even for her OWN DAUGHTER.
It’s not just Mr. Walls and the Huffington Post, though. I’ve seen this played as some sort of trump card by many liberal blog sites and in many of the political stories I’ve read. In only the past few days I’ve seen at least five references to this fact.
It’s certainly true that this is Mrs. Palin’s position. She stated this in a response to a question during a debate in the 2006 gubernatorial race. It’s clearly on the record, and I feel confident that she would still back that statement completely.
Guess what? It doesn’t matter. It’s completely irrelevant.
It doesn’t mean anything if she opposes her own daughter getting an abortion if she were a rape victim if that’s her official political stance. It’s not draconian. It’s called having integrity.
In fact, I take issue with the person who asks such a question. There is absolutely nothing of political relevance that can be gleaned from her answer that couldn’t have been revealed by asking a question such as “Do you think that a teenager who has been raped should be permitted to get an abortion?”. The only difference in these questions is in the emotionality and sentimental weight they place upon her response.
This is a problem because emotion and sentiment are precisely what this country’s election system needs less of right now. We have reached a point where logic and level-headed reasoning plays almost no role in voters’ decisions, and each time non-issues like this one are paraded around it adds to the problem.
Interestingly, this is certainly not the first time this kind of thing has reared its ugly head in our elections. In 1988 Dukakis lost 7 precious poll points in a single night following a debate in which he was asked if he would support the death penalty for a person who raped and murdered his wife. His response? No. He wouldn’t support the death penalty in this case because he’d always been an opponent of the death penalty. This was an utterly useless question, yet it was one that probably cost Dukakis the presidency. All subsequent presidential nominees by the major parties have supported the death penalty in at least some cases.
What can we do about it? Don’t propogate irrelevant stories like this. Focus on the issues. Don’t vote without having logical reasons for your choice.
In the end, I hope Palin keeps sticking to her guns. When politicians are honest and give us straight talk (think McCain, but 10 years ago), we don’t have to analyze the nuances of their speeches and engage in endless political punditry. They’ll tell us what we need to know about them, we’ll be able to compare that to our own ideas, and then we’ll make informed decisions.
Like not voting for a right-wing nut job.
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