The Pointer Sisters' "Yes We Can Can"

The Pointer Sister's "Yes We Can Can"

I've ben trying to get a larger context of where Republican Vice Presidential nominee Sarah Palin is coming from and why the "Religious Right" who weren't previously impressed with John McCain are so very enthused about her. (Yeah, yeah, some women identify with her and some men are fantasizing... I mean, besides that.) Her religious affiliation is the key, and the larger, underlying theme is "dominionism."

One of the declared aims of the Dominionists is the overthrow of the division between Church and State: Biblical law would be the law of the land.

A group called Theocracy Watch has been tracking the political influence of the Dominionists - you can find more about this at

http://www.theocracywatch.org/

An extract from Theocracy Watch:

“...The theocratic right seeks to establish dominion, or control over society in the name of God...

“Twenty-five years ago, dominionists targeted the Republican Party as the vehicle through which they could advance their agenda. At the same time, a small group of Republican strategists targeted fundamentalist, Pentecostal and charismatic churches to expand the base of the Republican Party. This web site is not about traditional Republicans or conservative Christians. It is about the manipulation of people of a certain faith for political power. It is about the rise of dominionists in the U.S. federal government...

"...The American people need to maintain vigilance and understand the history of how dominionists came to political power. And we need to embrace democracy with a passion -- for it was voter apathy that allowed leaders like Pat Robertson to get so many dominionists elected to Congress in the first place...

"...Today's hard right seeks total dominion. It's packing the courts and rigging the rules. The target is not the Democrats but democracy itself..."

One heartbeat from the president? No thanks.

Plenty of women and girls experience unintended pregnancies and deal with them as best they can. They should be able to reach their decisions privately.

The same should apply to Bristol Palin, of course.

But how does that get her mother off the hook, or the general issue of contraceptive freedom off the table?

Palin claims she's proud of her daughter and standing by her. That's great. But what parent plops their pregnant child directly into the brightest imaginable international spotlight? What kind of good judgment is this? Given the choice of creating a supportive atmosphere for a child in crisis versus a shot at a prominent job - when the two issues are on a collision course - what responsible parent picks the job?

This is NOT a sexist question, it's a human one that should as reasonably be asked of a father. For this to get dodged for fear of... what? Implying that women with families can't also hold office? totally misses the point.

Surely the Republican Party doesn't plan to give ALL unwed and pregnant teens such a warm and rousing welcome. Bristol Palin isn't just a pregnant teen, she's also a pawn to her parent's ambition.

And we're all paying the price, thanks to what passes for "journalism" these days, in that no one seems able or willing now to even raise the crucial questions: What IS Palin's stand on contraceptive freedom, sex-ed versus abstinence-only classes, abortion rights? These are legitimate questions for a VP candidate, and yet - by throwing her daughter into the limelight - Palin seems to have escaped them.

Palin advocates abstinence-only, but now has front row seat on how ineffective that can be.

Abstinence-only is fine as a personal commitment but it's lousy as public policy. The issue here isn't Bristol Palin's pregnancy, it's her mother's advocacy of abstinence-only. It's like legislating mandatory spinach for all children while admitting her own kids won't eat the stuff.

Make knowledge - about reproduction, STDs, scientific views of the creation of the world - wide-spread. Make sure contraception and abortion are legal and readily available. Don't laud your own brood for "choices" that you would legally eliminate as options for others. By attempting to legislate morality for the rest of us, Palin et. al. would deny us the privacy they seek for themselves.

If politicians want us to stay out of the private lives of their kids, they should return the favor.

Internet rumors - chain-letter emails, whatever - are the modern equivalent of a whispering campaign. It's insidious, slippery and wonderfully deniable, since it's hard to prove that it even exists, let alone that it's organized and intentional. How handy for anyone with a dirty-tricks agenda...

"...When Barack Obama was 22 years old, just out of Columbia University, he took a $10,000-a-year job as a community organizer on the South Side of Chicago. It was a shrewd move for a young black man with an interest in politics..."

For the author to suggest that shrewdness was a factor in Obama's move is pretty cynical. Community organizing is no picnic anywhere, and likely to be far harder for the new kid in town who doesn't know the turf. The South Side is no place for poseurs and it would take plenty of nerve to make that move, to that job, in that location, and then hang in there. To have that as a 22 year old - even with the whopping incentive of $10G - says something.

This sounds more like clear-eyed idealism to me. If the experience helped shape him into a better person and more effective politician, so be it.