Red Menace Meets Blue Noses
After yesterday's mention of Michael Kinsley's comparison of the new Reds and old-style communists (incidentally I've always felt they just hated the competition) it's only fair to pass on Megan of Jezebel's reminder that we progressives can be surprisingly Blue-nosed.
When we waste our time and energy rooting around in someone's personal life for John McCain's next black baby, we are conceding to conservatives that they are right. They have spent the last couple of decades saying that the gender of the person one chooses to love should be grounds for discrimination at work, in housing choices, in marriage rights and whereever else a little homophobe's heart desires. They have said that the government should be able to limit (and to know) what woman does with the contents of her uterus based on what they wish to make a government-sanctioned religious conception of when life begins. They use their power in government to limit children's access to age-appropriate sex education in schools in the name of teaching children their religious-inspired world view on sexual behavior. I could keep going, but you get the point.And when liberals and progressives pounce on rumors like this one about Trig's "true" parentage — whether or not it is true, which I'm pretty sure it's not — or rumors about Republican politicians' sexuality (in the absence of crimes committed) we are conceding that conservatives are right, and personal choices do qualify or disqualify one for certain aspects of participation in public life and this democracy. We are accepting their terms, their definitions of appropriate private behavior, and attempting to use those definitions to defeat their candidates. And once we do that, even if we do "take down" Sarah Palin or whatever Republican candidate in order to protect gay rights or reproductive rights or educational rights, then we've lost on those issues anyway because we've conceded that the underpinnings to the Republican positions on those issues is valid.
So, please, stop.
I mean *seriously,* when ultimate-70's-style-Democratic-Party-splinter-group-of-one and sewage-connoisseur Mickey Kaus sounds like the voice of reason it's time to stick with the, um, issues.
I guess in this case it was the same as seeing the hypocrisy in the family values folks. Why wait four days to announce your daughter five months pregnancy? A lot of women were wondering what kind of superwoman she was to travel 8 hrs and more after her water broke, if the story were true; something stunk. I would not have been impressed with her heroic decision or bothered by the fact her daughter was pregnant. My concern would be that if her ticket won, would there be more stealth in changing policies that fit her beliefs. Seeing how important it was for her to prove something to(deceive)the religious right, I am now more inclined to believe that would be part of her agenda. Perhaps if I believed that John McCain would live longer, I wouldn't be so uneasy.
[Yeah, the story about the daughter's pretty odd. Why wait? In particular, given the current spin why not brag about it beginning with the introduction? And yeah, my own experiences being around the end of pregnancy and the beginning of labor it's *very* peculiar -- not bad so much, just peculiar -- when people are so focused on work they treat stuff like their *water breaking* that cavalierly. *If* you're pro-life, and not just anti-abortion it's a little odd. Thanks, Five. --fl]
I don't think Palin was a superwoman - I think she was *nuts* to get on that airplane without even seeing a doctor first. Palin ran a serious chance of her baby being born four weeks premature with complications of unknown severity from Down syndrome. I'm afraid it reveals the kind of cowboy, bring-it-on recklessness that has given us the past eight years.
So, while Bristol Palin just needs to be left alone, I think it's perfectly reasonable to ask if her mother's conduct shows prudence and good judgment. Then again, her positions on the issues are reactionary enough that I wouldn't vote for her, regardless.
[Leaving incipient labor decisions for other venues, what does it say about someone's judgment that they *accept the position* with so few qualifications? Someone crazy enough to do that is capable of any number of other reckless decisions. Thanks, Sungold. --fl]