A Mommy Story

Those of you who follow me on Twitter are probably getting tired of the political tweets this week. Sorry, I got a little fired up over the past few nights. And some may know I don’t usually talk politics, mostly because I know others are very sensitive about the subject and quick to go off the deep end if you don’t believe exactly the way they do. (Those would probably be the ones who unfollowed me on Twitter.)

I have never been into politics as much as I have this year, because so much is at stake. The two parties are so radically opposite, and it shows the deep division of ideology in this country.

I watched the DNC, and now I’m watching the RNC this week, to continue educating myself on the candidates. I’ve watched the selection of Sarah Palin as John McCain’s VP candidate, and I then went to work learning as much as I could about her, ending with watching her speech last night.

The result? After that speech I was so inspired I made my first ever direct donation to a presidential candidate’s fund.

Obama’s fund.

I’ll admit, I wasn’t that keen on Obama at first. I was a Hillary Clinton supporter early on, and continued to admire her through the primaries. As it became evident that the nominees would be Obama and McCain, I started to research each more. I’ll admit I worried Obama was more into hope than action. And while I’ve always loved watching McCain on TV (he cracks a good joke!), I don’t like many of his policies. I can accept more of Obama’s plan for the future.

And then McCain picked Palin. I was really surprised by this choice. My gut reaction was that he picked a woman to try to win over the Hillary Clinton supporters. Only he picked a woman who is the ideological opposite of Clinton. (Gloria Steinem gives great overview here.)

I’d like to believe he didn’t think he could convince women to vote in solidarity for a fellow woman just because of our gynecological similarities. Because while I think we’re long due for a woman in one of the top 2 government positions, I still have a brain, and I will look deeper than a double X chromosome to see what this woman really stands for.

And I’ve got some major issues with Palin. I don’t like her anti-choice stance, and I worry she wants to bring religion into government and schools when the constitution clearly spells out that religion has no place there. I disagree with her on global warming and drilling everywhere you can for oil. Oil is not an answer to the energy crisis – renewable energy needs to be developed further as a replacement. I think she lacks national experience, and wonder how much experience can be gained from being governor of a state that has a smaller population than the city of Columbus, Ohio.

Her daughter’s pregnancy is not an issue for me, although I do wonder if Palin is still a believer that abstinence-only sex education works. Her son having Downs Syndrome is also not an issue for me, as I’d imagine she has plenty of help to raise him. Those are her issues to deal with, not mine, and they don’t affect my voting choice.

Sarah Palin doesn’t represent me as a woman, and she won’t be getting my vote. I don’t think she’s the everyday “hockey mom”, “PTA mom” or “insert-adjective-here mom” that she tries to portray herself as. I won’t vote for a woman just because she’s a woman, just like I won’t vote based on a single issue.

Others will disagree with me, and that’s OK. That’s the beauty of this country – we have the freedom to share different opinions. Yes, you’ll find “liberal” leanings here at my blog – I’ll fully admit to being a Democrat. I ask only that you respect my opinions just as I’ll respect yours. I know I’ve already lost Twitter followers because of my liberal comments. Yet I have many conservative friends – we participate in good-natured debates and in the end, agree to disagree.

And I hope that anyone who goes to the polls will take the time to do their full research and make sure the candidates they’re choosing are really the people they want to stand behind. I’m sure more than a few are regretting they ever voted for the candidate that they would most like to share a beer with eight years and four years ago.

And finally, I’ll end with a lot of humor and a dose of truth, as is often the case with The Daily Show: