Teenaged Pregnancy and the Vice Presidential Candidate

[fabrisse]

As far as I'm concerned, Bristol Palin is off limits. I think it took a certain courage for her to tell her family she was pregnant, and I have the same admiration for her that I do for kids who tell their parents they're gay.

This is a tough gig for a seventeen year old. I went to summer camp many years ago with Eleanor Mondale. I'm a couple of years younger than she is, which put her in a different unit, but we knew each other well enough to cordially detest each other. (She and my sister actually got on very well especially during the second year we spent at camp when Mondale was a rookie counselor.)

One night during the Carter administration, my family went to the movies. It was a theater we didn't go to often, but the film had been in town awhile and this was the only place that had it. Eleanor was there with a Secret Service detail. Sis saw her when they were both getting popcorn, and Eleanor wasn't allowed to say much more than "Hi" before the Secret Service agents moved her back into the theater. She didn't even get to sit where she wanted to.

Presidential and Vice Presidential security is tough on the family. The spouses are adults and have a choice in the matter. The kids don't.

Bristol Palin is having to live out a teen nightmare in the full glare of a national and highly contested campaign.

There are issues this brings up that pertain to Sarah Palin, but, I think it would be better if the Democrats left them alone. While the shots might be easy, I think it will deepen the rift between the perceived elitism of the Democrats and the heartland if they were to take them.

Sadly, this includes the value of "abstinence only" sex education. Go after McCain, but leave Palin out of it.

(For the record, I've been a registered independent since my first election at age 20. I have, depending upon the candidate and the office, voted Libertarian, Green, Republican, Democrat, and Independent as identified on the tickets in Massachusetts and California -- the only two states I've ever voted under.)

Besides, there are so many other legitimate issues to attack her on. Leaving this one alone should be easy.

Comments

[thorbol.livejournal.com]

Good points! From what little I've heard so far, people seem willing not to make Bristol's pregnancy a big deal--except maybe the "conservative" types who clamor that Sarah Palin should have spent all her time home with the kids. (I sure hope I'm right that this probably won't carry much weight with the Republican activists these days: whatever their other "faults," taking this in stride would signal that our culture has improved somewhat.

I think abstinence-only is certainly a fair battlefield, but probably not one worth bothering with much unless that's McCain's position as well. That almost certainly shouldn't even be a federal issue at all, but that can't logically or morally be avoided if it plays a part in where federal dollars go.

[eanja]

I completely agree with you- I can think of a whole list of reasons to dislike Palin, but her daughter's pregnancy is irrelevant. And really, I have the sense that most people don't care anyway. If her daughter was out randomly screwing around (which would still be no one's business) conservatives might be upset; as is, I have the impression nearly everyone is just looking at this and saying, "OK, so they get married before and not after high school graduation. So what?" I don't have any sense that either kid is being coerced into anything here, which would be the only possible way it could be an issue.

[eanja]

Forgot to add that I have big problems w/ abstinence only sex ed plans, but I don't think that a high school senior who's sleeping with someone she's planning to marry says much about it. If you're pretty much planning to get married and have kids at 18 or so you're in a completely separate category than what we typically think of as unwanted teen pregnancies. And there's also a big difference between people not using contraceptives because it goes against their personal religious beliefs, and not using them because the government decreed they never be told anything about the subject.