I am certainly not a politician and I have never been very involved politically. I also rarely take part in political discussions nor share my party line with friends and co-workers. Unfortunately that's changed and I just have to share my views this year. Not that anyone is going to read it or care what I have to say. I've been more and more disheartened at the quality of political candidates in the past several elections and had pretty much come to the conclusion of picking the lesser of two evils. This year is a big evil and I can't not speak up.
I am just appalled at the republican nomination of Sarah Palin. I am disturbed that she was chosen as a "token" on the ticket to try and grab the defecting hillary supporters as if all she needed was a set of boobs to guarantee success. If she had been a man, she never would have received the nomination and I resent that fact. A woman is just as qualified as a man and her credentials should be just as good to qualify her for the exact same position. Palin is an evangelical, anti choice, pro-gun, right wing conservative who wants creationism taught in schools. I am a woman and she is not my candidate for the following reasons:
- Because she required the women in her own town to pay for their own rape kit after being traumatized
- She does not support a women's right to choose even in the case of rape or incest
- She cut funding in Alaska for teen moms and sex education and promotes abstinence only (doesn't work does it?)
- She believes the world was created 6000 years ago
- She believes humans and dinosaurs co-existed
- She has no foreign policy experience
- She is currently being investigated by the Alaska Legislature for alleged abuse of office
- She is consistently anti environment
- She opposed banning ariel bear and wolf hunting and enacted a $150 bounty on each freshly killed wolf (paid for by state funds)
- She opposed a bill to increase salmon stream protection from mining operations and it was defeated
- She believes we should destroy our natural resources for economic gain such as drilling in the wildlife preserves of Alaska
- She doesn't believe in global warming
- She sued the Interior Department over its decision to list the polar bear as a threatened species
- http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/opinion/377955_palinenvir07.html (here's a nice article)
- She does not support gay rights or gay marriage, "Pray Away the Gay"
- She only has TWO years of experience in running a state with a tiny population and her only experience previous to that was the mayor of a microscopic town
- Prior to that she was a SPORTS REPORTER!
While I think Obama lacks some experience and I am not sure his answers are clear on issues I hold dear. His voting record certainly leaves much to be desired and I am not overly enamored by him, however....I will be voting for him in November. I'm glad the republicans made the leap to put a woman on the ticket, remembering that the democrats have done it before with Geraldine Ferraro. She's the first woman VP candidate, not Palin. I think a better choice could have been made and am very disappointed in the small minds.
