Who is Sarah Palin?

That was my first question after McCain announced her as his running mate. The little I heard about her left me ambivalent. Basically, she’s a mother of 5 and governor of Alaska. Why aren’t I enthusiastic? This is wonderful. Whatever party wins, this election will be history making.

I tried to sort out my ambivalence. I looked on McCain’s website and couldn’t find out anything about her except her name. I had to go to the State of Alaska’s website to find her bibliography. And fortunately, there were several articles about her in the Globe today.

What does she bring to the ticket? Apparently, Republicans are in love with her because she didn’t abort her son when she found out he had Down Syndrome when she was four months pregnant. Now obviously, I have my own issues with special needs! But I don’t think anyone is really special because they decide to keep a special needs child! I didn’t even have genetic testing while I was pregnant with Lizzy because as I told the doctor – “It doesn’t matter what’s wrong with the baby if you are not going to end the pregnancy.” Does my choice not to have testing make me better than her?

She also brings a level of thoughtless radicalism to the ticket. Apparently, she advocates teaching creationism in school along with evolution. Whose version of creationism would we teach -- a Native American version, a version that the Christians’ who hold snakes advocate? What will happen when non-Christian religions sue for the same right? Perhaps our children can spend the whole day hearing about religion rather than learning math, or reading, or history . . . I respect religion. But it doesn’t belong in public school except as appropriately taught as a part of history. It’s my job as a parent to teach my children about religion. They do not need to be “indoctrinated” about religion by anyone but me. Teaching about a particular religious philosophy in public school is frightening; unless, of course, I get to choose it! What? You’re not comfortable with that? You think that you should be able to make that decision for your own child. I agree!

An article in the Boston Globe called Palin a valentine to the Religious Right. As she doesn’t have a huge list of accomplishments or public service or government service I see where that idea comes from. I definitely want to hear from her about what she stands for, has done and is planning to do.

Why did McCain choose her?

I read that he only talked to her once. What does that mean? Is he going to let her do anything? Or will she be like a beautiful necklace? Something that is worn on special occasions then put back in the jewelry box for safe keeping.

A valentine to evangelical base - The Boston Globe

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