September 09, 2008

Commentary on Sarah Palin

US Republican party nominee John McCain's choice of a woman as his running mate has 'energized' the party's Christian fundamentalist right-wing. Many columnists have their own messages on this choice.

Sarah Palin and the Wrong Way to Battle Sexism
By Rebecca Hyman, AlterNet. Posted September 16, 2008.
..."There's a big difference between identifying sexist acts and undermining patriarchy, the system of power and privilege that reinforces and grounds particular stories about how men and women should behave, how sex and gender should be expressed, about who is rational and who is emotional, who's a "fighter" and who's a "babe." These narratives are refracted and reinforced by the media and by people speaking from podiums, most certainly, but they aren't the work of a few bad eggs..." (read full story in title link)http://www.alternet.org/reproductivejustice/98342/sarah_palin_and_the_wrong_way_to_battle_sexism/?page=3

Palin v. Palin
McCain's running mate has offered mixed message on climate change
Kate Sheppard,  12 Sep 2008
"Sarah Palin, in her Sept. 11, 2008, interview with ABC News: 'Show me where I have ever said that there's absolute proof that nothing that man has ever conducted or engaged in has had any effect, or no effect, on climate change.' "

A Palin Theocracy
Thursday 11 September 2008
by: Marjorie Cohn, t r u t h o u t | Perspective
..."  Palin is a radical, right-wing, fundamentalist Christian who would love to create a theocracy. She believes we are living in the "end times" which will result in a bloody inferno from which only true Christians will be saved..."

Sarah Palin: A Gidget for God's Truth
Tuesday 09 September 2008
by: Steve Weissman, t r u t h o u t | Perspective
"The Constitution established the United States of America as a Christian nation," declared John McCain back in September 2007. With his vice-presidential pick of Governor Sarah Palin, he has found a winsome soul mate who is even more of a Christian nationalist, eager to use government to impose her religious views on the rest of us..."

An Open Letter to Sarah Palin
Elayne Clift
"Sarah Palin, Vice Presidential nominee of the US Republican Party, a staunch supporter of abstinence-only sex education and against abortion for any reason, recently stated that her 17-year-old daughter was pregnant. A member of the conservative party, Palin wrapped her announcement of the pregnancy with remarks on "privacy" and "family values". In reaction to what she terms 'astounding hypocrisy', the writer, a supporter of Barack Obama, a feminist, and an adjunct professor of gender studies, writes a stinging open letter to Palin..."

Drill, Drill, Drill
Eve Ensler, Posted September 8, 2008
..."I don't like raging at women. I am a Feminist and have spent my life trying to build community, help empower women and stop violence against them. It is hard to write about Sarah Palin. This is why the Sarah Palin choice was all the more insidious and cynical. The people who made this choice count on the goodness and solidarity of Feminists..."

Palin: wrong woman, wrong message
Sarah Palin shares nothing but a chromosome with Hillary Clinton. She is Phyllis Schlafly, only younger.
By Gloria Steinem, September 4, 2008
"Here's the good news: Women have become so politically powerful that even the anti-feminist right wing -- the folks with a headlock on the Republican Party -- are trying to appease the gender gap with a first-ever female vice president. We owe this to women -- and to many men too -- who have picketed, gone on hunger strikes or confronted violence at the polls so women can vote. We owe it to Shirley Chisholm, who first took the "white-male-only" sign off the White House, and to Hillary Rodham Clinton, who hung in there through ridicule and misogyny to win 18 million votes..."