Fw: McCain's dangerous choice - facts re Sarah Palin

Yes, I'm spreading it around.......

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Dear MoveOn member,

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
  
• 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

This is information the American people need to see. Please take a moment to forward this email to your friends and family.

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
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarah_Palin

2. "McCain Selects Anti-Choice Sarah Palin as Running Mate," NARAL Pro-Choice America, August 29, 2008
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=17515&id=13661-1414076-3OccGlx&t=1

3. "Sarah Palin, Buchananite," The Nation, August 29, 2008
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=17736&id=13661-1414076-3OccGlx&t=2

4. "'Creation science' enters the race," Anchorage Daily News, October 27, 2006
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=17737&id=13661-1414076-3OccGlx&t=3

5. "Palin buys climate denial PR spin—ignores science," Huffington Post, August 29, 2008
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=17517&id=13661-1414076-3OccGlx&t=4

6. "McCain VP Pick Completes Shift to Bush Energy Policy," Sierra Club, August 29, 2008
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=17518&id=13661-1414076-3OccGlx&t=5

"Choice of Palin Promises Failed Energy Policies of the Past," League of Conservation Voters, August 29, 2008
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=17519&id=13661-1414076-3OccGlx&t=6

"Protecting polar bears gets in way of drilling for oil, says governor," The Times of London, May 23, 2008
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=17520&id=13661-1414076-3OccGlx&t=7

7 "McCain met Palin once before yesterday," MSNBC, August 29, 2008
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=21119&id=13661-1414076-3OccGlx&t=8

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PAID FOR BY MOVEON.ORG POLITICAL ACTION, http://pol.moveon.org/. Not authorized by any candidate or candidate's committee. This email was sent to Kagen Aurencz Zethmayr on August 30, 2008.

Sexual Politics -- or, Don't fall for the woman in red-state red

[X-posted to Hyperlucidity and my other blog; feel free to pass on (w/ due credit/blame of course) if you want, just let me know about it.] _____________________________________________________

Okay, here we are with two things at the forefront, one expected and the other a bit of a twist: A, Barack Obama accepting the Democratic nomination for President, and B, John McCain choosing Alaska Governor Sarah Palin (a real live WOMAN, disgruntled Hillaryites!) as his running mate on the Republican ticket.

Do you think this'll work to steal the feminist vote, this whole "cut off your nose to spite your face" angle to snare in those old-school feminists who are too attached to the idea of a certified woman in the Oval Office (or close enough to it) to care that her politics are the opposite of practically everything that old-school feminism fought for in the first place?

I sure as hell hope that people aren't fooled by this act, and I'm sure as hell going to spread it around every way I know how that this is a trick designed to catch women with estrogen like flies with vinegar (which actually does attract flies more than honey does, but that's beside the point and has nothing to do with human body chemistry...). It's a feint to the left that's a thrust for the right, trying to pull swing voters back into the Republican fold by appealing to that vilest form of sexual prejudice -- the idea that a woman in authority automatically gives a shit about women in general, let alone anyone else in the category of social minority. A token female doth not a kinder+gentler government make -- just ask anyone who lived through the term of Margaret Thatcher in the U.K. Just like a token black+female Secretary of State (or a token Latino Attorney General) does not mean that there is any actual solidarity with those who have the same minority signifiers but lack the political voice and status.

This isn't the first time that Republicans have played identity politics against the causes for which minorities need to gather and remain cohesive. I'm sure that groups who solely see colour, ethnicity or sex as reasons for togetherness applauded the appointments of Condoleezza Rice, Colin Powell and Alberto Gonzales without questioning the intent behind the inclusion. And now the GOP is eagerly anticipating that Hillary Clinton's supporters, pissed off 'cause Barack Obama (a MAN) not only beat her in the primaries but passed her over as his running mate (in favour of another MAN), will turn to McCain out of sheer vitriol and resentment, rather than remember the issues at stake, and the fact that Sarah Palin is one of those religiously-motivated cultural conservatives who have long desired to overturn Roe v. Wade and send other women (just, y'know, poorer women with less power and fewer options in the first place) back to the cultural Dark Ages of illegal abortions, inaccessible birth-control and rescinded autonomy over their own bodies altogether.

Hmm. I wonder how many people will turn their brains off and fall for that? Actually, some comments I've read online say that Palin'll grab the male vote as well, based on her physical attractiveness. So that's two kinds of thinking with the ol' hormones that McCain and his team are counting on.....heck, never mind the whole "college education" split between Hillary and Barack, even -- this one's going straight to below the belt.

Voters, please -- just because a woman's in high political office, or preaching on TV, or on the radio being a pundit, it does not mean that she shares concerns about "women's issues" or will do anything to better the state thereof. Conservative women-in-power care primarily for themselves and their party's (faith's) agenda, and will gladly sacrifice the legal status, socioeconomic conditions and the very lives of women in general, whether to the infallibility of "market forces" or "ad majorem Dei gloriam."

They don't include themselves in the populations they affect, and therefore (like Log Cabin Republicans) will vote against what one would think to be their own interests and concerns -- and which would be, perhaps, were they not insulated from seeing it by their own social position. Because, as much so as celebrities are courted by Scientology, attractive and articulate women are prized by both the Political and Religious Right as figureheads and spokepeople, as proof that can be whipped out to bely the idea that Republicans (or Evangelicals) are systemically misogynistic and anti-female in their policies.

In other words: it's a trap. Don't fall for the stereotype of women caring about women, or caring about anything but what their own actions show as their agenda. Don't assume. Don't assume that seniors care about other seniors, that veterans care about other veterans (or active military personnel), or that anyone cares about anyone, categorically speaking, until and unless their actions prove that it's actually part of their platform.

And that's a point at which "issues voters" on the left(ish) in particular had better keep their eyes on the issues and not let themselves be misled by that purty gun-totin' feminine fly in the ointment.