*** 10 Things to KNOW about Vice President Nominee Sarah Palin ***
Sunday, August 31, 2008
Posted in In The Readers Den
Gov. Palins Biography
REASON #10: PALIN’S YOUTH COMPLEMENTS McCAIN’S EXPERIENCE
For months, Obama’s supporters have touted the Senator’s youthfulness as one of his qualifications for office (a strategy they’re apt to scale back on, given their selection of a Vice President nearly as old as McCain). If youth is seen as a plus by voters, then Alaska Governor Sarah Palin fits the bill. At 44, she is 3 years younger than Barack Obama, and the youngest person ever to be elected Governor of Alaska. Palin is also the state’s first Governor to have been born after Alaska achieved statehood, as well as Alaska’s first female Governor.
REASON #9: PALIN PUTS PRINCIPLE AND THE PEOPLE FIRST
After her initial, unsuccessful, run against him for the Governor’s office, former Alaska Governor Murkowski appointed Palin Ethics Commissioner of Alaska’s Oil and Gas Conservation Commission. If Murkowski figured this appointment would pressure Palin into overlooking misbehavior by her fellow Republicans, he figured wrong. Within a year, Palin resigned in a very public protest over the ethics displayed by Alaska’s Republican leadership, filing a formal complaint against Randy Ruedrich, who was not only a fellow Oil and Gas Commissioner, but also the chairman of Alaska’s Republican party.
If Senator McCain wants a running mate willing to be a maverick to Party, but never to Principle, he need look no further than Sarah Palin.
REASON #8: PALIN KNOWS HOW TO RUN, AND WIN, AGAINST TOUGH ODDS
To become Governor, Palin had to defeat both a former Democratic Governor and the incumbent Republican Governor – which she did, and won. Palin defeated Murkowski in the Republican primary, and then her Democratic opponent in the election. She knows how to campaign successfully, against seemingly impossible odds.
REASON #7: PALIN IS A REFORM GOVERNOR WITH BIPARTISAN APPEAL
Palin doesn’t just criticize pork-barrel spending – she slashes it. A few days after she assumed office as Governor, she put the Westwind II jet her predecessor had purchased up for sale, on eBay. The jet eventually sold, in 2007, for $2.7 million, slightly above its 2005 purchase price. Palin canceled roads and construction projects designed to benefit friends of the prior administration.
REASON #6: PALIN IS A FEMININE FEMINIST, WITH HOMETOWN, NOT HOLLYWOOD, VALUES
1960s feminists regarded men as oppressors, and considered marriage a state akin to slavery or rape. They struggled to convince each other, and often themselves, that “a woman needs a man, like a fish needs a bicycle.” They treated with contempt women who married, had children, or violated their strict dress code (no heels, no makeup, no dresses, no color that mud doesn’t come in).
Palin’s is a feminism of a different, newer sort – call it ‘Feminism 2.0’ – a feminism that is not hostile to men, and that respects and honors women who work hard to balance a traditional home life with professional ambitions. Palin works hard to achieve such a balance: three days after giving birth to her fifth child, for example, she conducted a meeting concerning a proposed natural gas pipeline.
Palin met her husband, Alaska’s First Gentleman Todd Palin, at Wasilla High School, where she was point guard for her basketball team, the year they won the championship. A feminist who also enjoys being feminine, she ran for, and won, the “Miss Wasilla” beauty pageant, a race in which she also won “Miss Congeniality,” an award unlikely to be awarded to many feminists of earlier vintage. She is, similarly, a member of Feminists for Life, an organization whose mission would have been inconceivable twenty years ago.
REASON #5: PALIN IS UNAPOLOGETICALLY PRO-LIFE
As the mother of five children, ranging in age from 19 years to 4 months, Palin brings a kind of authority to her pro-life stance that will complement well Senator McCain’s pro-life position.
Palin has also risen courageously to the challenge of having a child diagnosed with Down Syndrome. Her commitment to the sanctity and value of every human life helps highlight concerns regarding Obama’s position on late-term (actually, post-natal) abortion.
REASON #4: PALIN IS COMFORTABLE WITH AND LOVED BY BLUE-COLLAR VOTERS
Though Joe Biden talks a great deal about his blue collar roots (and about pretty much every else), any claim he may have to being just one of the people fell away years ago. Biden’s been a Beltway insider since Nixon was President, having been first elected to office in 1972.
Palin, on the other hand, is blue collar to the core. A life member of the NRA, she hunts and fishes, and the man she loves is an oil rig worker and commercial fisherman, who races snowmobiles for fun.
REASON #3: PALIN IS UNASHAMEDLY PATRIOTIC
Palin loves this country, and has cultivated such a love in her children. Her eldest child, Track Palin, joined the Army last year, at 18. When this fine young man learned that his mother had given birth to a child with Down Syndrome, he sent her a text message, expressing his joy that he finally had a brother.
REASON #2: PALIN SUPPORTS TRADITIONAL MARRIAGE, BUT DEFENDS GAY RIGHTS
Palin supports the traditional definition of marriage, and opposes same-sex marriage. Unlike many conservatives, however, she is sensitive to gay concerns about discrimination. Palin’s is the first administration in Alaska’s history, to provide benefits to the partners of gay and lesbian employees.
AND THE #1 REASON SARAH PALIN WOULD BE THE IDEAL RUNNING MATE FOR SENATOR McCAIN?
TWO WORDS: RICK LAZIO
Joe Biden was chosen to be Obama’s VP, because of his “attack dog” reputation. Biden can get away with that kind of nonsense if his opponent is a man, but if he goes after a woman, especially a woman 20 years his junior, he’ll lose blue-collar men and every woman to the right of Nancy Pelosi.
Remember the Rick Lazio/Hillary Clinton senatorial debate, back in 2000, how outrage erupted among the Democrats, when Lazio stepped over to Mrs. Clinton’s podium, and tried to hand her a piece of paper? (“Brandished” was the verb used in Salon.) Lazio was accused, baselessly, of trying to intimidate Mrs. Clinton.
Biden has a history of getting himself into trouble by speaking without thinking, and is proud of – and knows he was chosen in large part for – his ability to treat his opponents with abuse, including those who, when convenient, he calls his friends. Biden is a one-trick pony – he’s a bully – and he lacks the intellectual detachment and self-discipline to keep his mouth shut, when the cameras are on him. If he tries to bully the small-town beauty queen young enough to be his daughter, the blowback in an age of Youtube will be impressive.
In 1980, many Democrats crossed party lines, and helped elect Ronald Reagan President. Palin would encourage such a move, on the part of disaffected Democratic feminists.
By selecting Joe Biden as his running mate, Obama energized rather than neutralized, Hillary Clinton. We can feel sure that, when “Don’t Stop Thinking about Tomorrow” was played tonight at the Democratic Convention, Hillary hadn’t. She will almost certainly make another run for the Presidency, irrespective of the outcome of the 2008 race. We can expect to see Mrs. Clinton’s name on the ballot again.
Were John McCain to choose Sarah Palin for his Vice President, and were he to win the election, we could well soon witness the first Presidential race in American history between two women – between Hillary Clinton and Sarah Palin, feminists of distinctly different generations, experiences, and values.
Thomas R. Marshall, who served as Vice President to Woodrow Wilson, once observed, “There once were two brothers. One ran away to sea. The other was elected Vice President, and neither was heard of again.”
If Sarah Palin were chosen to be John McCain’s running mate, she’d be a Vice President who didn’t disappear. One way or another, we’re sure to hear more from her in the future.
source: Democracy Project
Comments
Monday, September 1, 2008 - <em>Untitled Comment</em>
Posted by hopeofheaven
11) She is under investigation for corruption in Alaska.
12) She has a new baby, a special needs baby, who needs its mother full-time right now. How can she be a good mother when she's campaigning constantly?
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These are my concerns with her. Like all politicians, she is a "what you see is not really what you get" candidate.
Edited by hopeofheaven on Monday, September 1, 2008 at 06:49
Monday, September 1, 2008 - Messages
Posted by shekinah
Hi Rebecca How are you both doing?
I am not sure if you are getting my messages, can you message me or email me your home address and phone number again please as I thought I had these but dont.
I really miss talking to you
Hugs big time
Page
Monday, September 1, 2008 - Sarah Palin
Posted by Anonymous
Hey Rebekah its Cemomster. I just wanted to add my 2 cents. Yes she is a mother, but some of us have a calling from God to do other things. Sarah Palin's may be to reform our gov't. Her children travel with her, her husband travels with her. Her children have something most do not, BOTH of their parents day in and day out.
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