Universal Truth

I was struck today by a quote from someone on a blogging forum I frequent. A brief, brilliant, clear, illuminating statement in that, "Well...enough said" sort of way that doesn't roll around very often.

This is what he said: Palin believes a lot of stupid shit.

It was a standalone comment, too. No elaboration, no examples, as if that were all there really was to say.

The author's blog is primarily about atheism. I'm an old school Catholic. The author is a teenage male. I'm a middle-aged mother. In a dozen or a hundred ways our perspectives and foundations and world views differ...and yet, the single sentence is so resoundingly, clearly complete and accurate that both of us can look at it and said, "Yep, that's pretty much all there is to say."

Out of the Mouths of Babes - Sarah Palin

As we were leaving a store this afternoon, my 12-year-old daughter pointed out a headline saying that Lindsey Lohan and her girlfriend were having a baby. Now that I have a 12-year-old, I know a lot more than I ever expected (or wanted) to about teenage celebrities, but when she talks, I listen and engage. She's an adolescent, and opportunities may be limited.

I mentioned that I'd heard Lohan had been blogging about Sarah Palin, and the tone sounded positive.

"Why am I not surprised?" my daughter asked.

That surprised ME. "I'm very surprised," I told her. You know, Sarah Palin is very conservative and religious..."

"But," my daughter cut in, in that well, DUH tone of voice, "she's a wack job.

Identity politics at work again?

Who's Raising that "Perfect Child" Now, Sarah?

In the hours since John McCain announced that Alaska Governor Sarah Palin would be his running mate, there's been a cacaphony of pro and con discourse. Was Palin chosen for her credentials, experience, positions and talents, or was she chosen because she's a woman and McCain hopes to court voters who previously supported Senator Hillary Clinton? Palin is low on experience, but she has a reputation for pulling out all the stops, and just might restore some of McCain's lost maverick image. Perhaps more significantly, she's a good looking woman with the kind of life and history that makes other women nod and say "You go, girl!"

But through all the buzz--positive and negative--one thing has been troubling me: one thing that I haven't heard mentioned by anyone else.

Just this past spring, Palin gave birth to her fifth child, a child with Downs Syndrome. As a pro-life politician, Palin gained points and gathered accolades simply for having her child--after all, many Downs Syndrome babies are aborted. But what is she doing now?

One of the things that has always troubled me about a large sector of the pro-life movement is the idea many pro-life activists seem to have that it's only their business for as long as it takes to make sure that the baby is born alive. Sure, some people active in the movement work to provide support to those new mothers and make it possible for them to raise healthy children, but for many, the victory is achieved and the battle over when a woman safely passes into her second trimester and can no longer obtain an abortion on demand.

It's always seemed to me that if those people were really so "pro life", they'd be worried about the babies and the toddlers and the adolescents, too...not JUST the unborn.

I don't know enough about Sarah Palin to judge her sincerity one way or the other, but her actions right now are reminding me quite a lot of those people who want to bar the doors of the abortion clinic but then consider the child "not our problem" once it's actually born. She's been applauded and patted on the back by all those "pro life" and "pro family" organizations for giving birth to the child, and now she's...going off to run for Vice President. How, exactly, is it "pro family" for a woman with a special needs infant to hit the campaign trail vying for one of the most demanding jobs in the world? Maybe it's just me, but I've always thought that part of being pro family was putting the needs of your family ahead of your own ambitions.