1 Boring Old Man

Palin: wrong woman, wrong message
Sarah Palin shares nothing but a chromosome with Hillary Clinton
By Gloria Steinem

^…

^{So let’s be clear: The culprit is John McCain. He may have chosen Palin out of change-envy, or a belief that women can’t tell the difference between form and content, but the main motive was to please right-wing ideologues; the same ones who nixed anyone who is now or ever has been a supporter of reproductive freedom. the same ones who nixed anyone who is now or ever has been a supporter of reproductive freedom. If that were not the case, McCain could have chosen a woman who knows what a vice president does and who has thought about Iraq; someone like Texas Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison or Sen. Olympia Snowe of Maine. McCain could have taken a baby step away from right-wing patriarchs who determine his actions, right down to opposing the Violence Against Women Act.}

^{Palin’s value to those patriarchs is clear: She opposes just about every issue that women support by a majority or plurality. She believes that creationism should be taught in public schools but disbelieves global warming; she opposes gun control but supports government control of women’s wombs; she opposes stem cell research but approves "abstinence-only" programs, which increase unwanted births, sexually transmitted diseases and abortions; she tried to use taxpayers’ millions for a state program to shoot wolves from the air but didn’t spend enough money to fix a state school system with the lowest high-school graduation rate in the nation; she runs with a candidate who opposes the Fair Pay Act but supports $500 million in subsidies for a natural gas pipeline across Alaska; she supports drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Reserve, though even McCain has opted for the lesser evil of offshore drilling. She is Phyllis Schlafly, only younger.}

^…

^{Being a hope-a-holic, however, I can see two long-term bipartisan gains from this contest.}

^{Republicans may learn they can’t appeal to right-wing patriarchs and most women at the same time. A loss in November could cause the centrist majority of Republicans to take back their party, which was the first to support the Equal Rights Amendment and should be the last to want to invite government into the wombs of women.}

^{And American women, who suffer more because of having two full-time jobs than from any other single injustice, finally have support on a national stage from male leaders who know that women can’t be equal outside the home until men are equal in it. Barack Obama and Joe Biden are campaigning on their belief that men should be, can be and want to be at home for their children. This could be huge.}

Why did McCain pick Sarah Palin?

V.P. selection brings Focus on Family on board

^{James Dobson went from not supporting John McCain to becoming an enthusiastic cheerleader for the Republican presidential ticket in six short months. What happened? Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, that’s what.}

Sarah Palin was a good pick. It wasn’t the feminist vote McCain was going after. Steinem is absolutely right about his throwing that vote to the wind. It was the Religious Right [both men and women] he was aiming for. Will it work? Well, it has worked in the last two elections. McCain has made a choice that has leveled the playing field. Are Americans going to go for this view of America – white people with good old time religion, a gun-toting pioneering spirit, and yankee doodle dandy warrior patriotism? Or will they finally accept the world of Separation of Church and State, Equality under the Law, Globalism, Brown vs. The Board of Education, and Roe vs. Wade? But the fulcrum is not in these lofty issues. It’s in the felt economic pinch.

So I think that the only way McCain can bring this off is to blame the economy on the Democrats. Neither Clinton is a good target for such a claim, so he’s going to have to blame it on Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi, and the 110th Congress. It’s an absolutely absurd premise, yet the harbingers of that claim are already in every speech at the Convention. They’re running on the Republicans taking back the power from the Republicans. And there’s only one person in America who could frame things this way with a straight face…