Eight years of a Republican president have brought record deficits, the biggest economic collapse since the Great Depression and a quagmire in Iraq that costs us $10 billion a month. So what does Sarah Palin want to talk about? Abortion.
You know it's been on your mind. You know abortion is what you think about when you dig deep to pay for that prescription, when you sweat your company's latest round of layoffs, when you look at the eroding balance in your savings account. Yeah, right.
When a candidate has no solutions for America's problems, all she can do is change the subject. So Palin is talking abortion. But it wouldn't be folksy Sarah without distorting reality, no sirree. In Johnstown the other day, she claimed Barack Obama's position is way out of the mainstream: "He hopes that you won't notice how radical, absolutely radical his idea is on this."
In fact, Obama's pro-choice position is so radical that most Americans agree with him. Just look at the results of the latest Pew survey. In August, 54 percent of Americans polled said abortion should remain legal in all or most cases. Barack Obama, in sync with 54 percent of the country. Sure, Sarah, that's radical.
Palin and McCain are getting so desperate that she's not just keying on abortion but she's also trying to twist Obama's statement from last March, also made in Johnstown, about teaching his two daughters, ages 9 and 6, about morals and contraception. Voicing the fears of all concerned parents, Obama said, "But if they make a mistake, I don't want them punished with a baby." Palin is so mindlessly and ideologically "pro-life" that she can't imagine "punished with a baby" applying to a pregnant teen. She whipped up a crowd against Obama on Saturday, distorting his remarks: "...(H)e said that a woman shouldn't have to be 'Punished with a baby.' Ladies and gentlemen, he said that right here in Johnstown. 'Punished with a baby.' It's about time we called him on it."
No, it's time we called Sarah Palin on wanting to turn back the clock on a difficult issue that most Americans have made peace with. She and McCain would do that by stacking the Supreme Court with activist conservatives. Now that's radical.
I'll tell you what else is radical. Elevating teen pregnancy almost to a virtue. Using an infant as a prop on political stages all over the country. If a Democratic candidate did that, "pro-family" Republicans would be seeking custody. You betcha.
Posted
Oct 12 2008, 08:56 PM
by
Tom Waseleski