Leadership and Sarah Palin

To the people I love and those I don’t know who will strongly disagree with this blog, please comment and share your perspectives, too! At this same site, you have learned that I a) don’t believe any individual has the corner on the correct perspective and b) believe that through sharing our perspectives, we can build understanding, which is more important to me than agreement. See A New View.

Within moments of hearing John McCain had chosen the governor of Alaska as his running mate, I jumped to my verb of choice—googling! All I could really find were photos of Sarah Palin as a beauty queen contestant and a girls’ basketball player. I was stunned.

Now, I will say, I was very disappointed in Barack Obama’s pick of Joe—I use lots of words and I’m not sure which are really mine—Biden. I had every hope that Kansas’ Gov. Kathleen Sebelius would be in Washington in January. But still, I could see the rationale of adding Biden’s foreign policy experience and years of navigating the shark invested waters of our nation’s capitol to the Democratic ticket.

When it came to McCain, I was initially just concerned that Mitt Romney might make it onto the ticket…s-c-a-r-y! So, I initially thought “Whew” until 10-minutes later when I thought “WHO!”

I want to share two sources that I think do an excellent job of summarizing some of my greatest concerns regarding McCain’s judgement. The first is courtesy of a fellow blogger and wonderful woman named Marcia Reynolds, PhD. Marcia’s doctoral research focused on high achieving women. Read what she had to say about Palin’s “achievements” in her post The Mind of a Woman.

More information came to me this morning via email, and I’m going to share it here as well. Not only do I want to include Republicans in my corner of the blogosphere, I am a Republican! I am also Anti anti-abortion, an advocate for gay rights and I believe that stewardship of this earth and its resources must be approached with a balance between the needs of the moment and the needs of my grandchildren’s children.  No “political party” represents me, and I should probably admit that I’m an Independent. But I’m sentimentally attached to pachaderms. Honestly, that’s more about my politics than any of you need to know.

My fear is that we have become a political system more about sound bytes and public opinion polls than statesmanship. I gave my father (my favorite statesman of all time) a sweatshirt years ago that proclaimed, “A politician thinks of the next election. A statesman thinks of the next generation.” John McCain has proven to me that he is no statesman.

I am On the Road to Change!

Please read some facts about John McCain’s VP candidate below. It came to me via email initially created by Moveon.org.

Yesterday was John McCain’s 72nd birthday. If elected, he’d be the oldest president ever inaugurated. And after months of slamming Barack Obama for “inexperience,” here’s who John McCain has chosen to be one heartbeat away from the presidency: a right-wing religious conservative with no foreign policy experience, who until recently was mayor of a town of 9,000 people.

Huh?

Who is Sarah Palin? Here’s some basic background:

• She was elected Alaska’s governor a little over a year and a half ago.
• Her previous office was mayor of Wasilla, a small town outside Anchorage. She has no foreign policy experience.1
• Palin is strongly anti-choice, opposing abortion even in the case of rape or incest.2
• She supported right-wing extremist Pat Buchanan for president in 2000. 3
• Palin thinks creationism should be taught in public schools.4 (Mimi’s note: remember I lived in Kansas when the State Board of Education adopted this idea. Ask me how that worked out!)
• She’s doesn’t think humans are the cause of climate change.5
• She’s solidly in line with John McCain’s “Big Oil first” energy policy. She’s pushed hard for more oil drilling and says renewables won’t be ready for years. She also sued the Bush administration for listing polar bears as an endangered species—she was worried it would interfere with more oil drilling in Alaska.6
• How closely did John McCain vet this choice? He met Sarah Palin once at a meeting. They spoke a second time, last Sunday, when he called her about being vice-president. Then he offered her the position.7

We also asked Alaska MoveOn members what the rest of us should know about their governor. The response was striking. Here’s a sample:
She is really just a mayor from a small town outside Anchorage who has been a governor for only 1.5 years, and has ZERO national and international experience. I shudder to think that she could be the person taking that 3AM call on the White House hotline, and the one who could potentially be charged with leading the US in the volatile international scene that exists today. —Rose M., Fairbanks, AK

She is VERY, VERY conservative, and far from perfect. She’s a hunter and fisherwoman, but votes against the environment again and again. She ran on ethics reform, but is currently under investigation for several charges
involving hiring and firing of state officials. She has NO experience beyond Alaska. —Christine B., Denali Park, AK

As an Alaskan and a feminist, I am beyond words at this announcement. Palin is not a feminist, and she is not the reformer she claims to be.—Karen L., Anchorage, AK

Alaskans, collectively, are just as stunned as the rest of the nation. She is doing well running our State, but is totally inexperienced on the national level, and very much unequipped to run the nation, if it came to that. She is as far right as one can get, which has already been communicated on the news. In our office of thirty employees (dems, republicans, and nonpartisans), not one person feels she is ready for the V.P. position.—Sherry C., Anchorage, AK

She’s vehemently anti-choice and doesn’t care about protecting our natural resources, even though she has worked as a fisherman. McCain chose her to pick up the Hillary voters, but Palin is no Hillary. —Marina L., Juneau,AK

I think she’s far too inexperienced to be in this position. I’m all for a woman in the White House, but not one who hasn’t done anything to deserve it. There are far many other women who have worked their way up and have much more experience that would have been better choices. This is a patronizing decision on John McCain’s part- and insulting to females everywhere that he would assume he’ll get our vote by putting “A Woman” in that position.—Jennifer M., Anchorage, AK

So Governor Palin is a staunch anti-choice religious conservative. She’s a global warming denier who shares John McCain’s commitment to Big Oil. And she’s dramatically inexperienced.

In picking Sarah Palin, John McCain has made the religious right very happy. And he’s made a very dangerous decision for our country.

In the next few days, many Americans will be wondering what McCain’s vice-presidential choice means. Please pass this information along to your friends and family.

Thanks for all you do.

—Ilyse, Noah, Justin, Karin and the rest of the team
Sources:
1. “Sarah Palin,” Wikipedia, Accessed August 29, 2008 en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarah_Palin
2. “McCain Selects Anti-Choice Sarah Palin as Running Mate,” NARAL Pro-Choice America, August 29, 2008 www.moveon.org/r?r=17515&id=13661-10097511-QvyJBfx&t=10
3. “Sarah Palin, Buchananite,” The Nation, August 29, 2008 www.moveon.org/r?r=17736&id=13661-10097511-QvyJBfx&t=11
4. “‘Creation science’ enters the race,” Anchorage Daily News, October 27, 2006 www.moveon.org/r?r=17737&id=13661-10097511-QvyJBfx&t=12
5. “Palin buys climate denial PR spin—ignores science,” Huffington Post, August 29, 2008 www.moveon.org/r?r=17517&id=13661-10097511-QvyJBfx&t=13
6. “McCain VP Pick Completes Shift to Bush Energy Policy,” Sierra Club, August 29, 2008 www.moveon.org/r?r=17518&id=13661-10097511-QvyJBfx&t=14 “Choice of Palin Promises Failed Energy Policies of the Past,” League of Conservation Voters, August 29, 2008 www.moveon.org/r?r=17519&id=13661-10097511-QvyJBfx&t=15
“Protecting polar bears gets in way of drilling for oil, says governor,” The Times of London, May 23, 2008 www.moveon.org/r?r=17520&id=13661-10097511-QvyJBfx&t=16
7 “McCain met Palin once before yesterday,” MSNBC, August 29, 2008 http://www.moveon.org/r?r=21119&id=13661-10097511-QvyJBfx&t=17

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