Sarah Palin: Yeah, I’m Going There

August 31, 2008

Filed in: Alaska, The Way We Live Now

UPDATE: And the New York Times weighs in on the same topic. Only with, like, more reporting and analysis and stuff like that.

Normally I don’t wade into political waters, especially when so vastly many other writer/bloggers are already peeing in that pool, but as the writer of the definitive (cough cough) pre-convention examination of the fate of the Soccer Mom, I feel obligated to weigh in now that Soccer Mom is suddenly back in the news full-force, in the body of one Sarah Palin.

(And hey, everyone, she’s from one of *my* states! Add in Obama’s Hawaii and Kansas connections and only poor North Dakota is being left out of The 50th State’s Election 08 Special Coverage.)

Others have summed up way better than I can just how many ways Plain is a joke candidate (my two faves so far: Gail Collins’ McCain’s Baked Alaska in the NYTimes, and handy summary of her sins from MoveOn), but here’s what I’ll add to the discussion: What about the kids?

I know I’m being a bad, bad feminist for even bringing this up, for letting these traitorous thoughts so much as cross my brain pan. We’ve all been trained to not judge one another, to respect every working or SAH mother’s choices no matter how crazy they might appear, to never never never wonder if any single human can still be a good parent while fill-in-the-blank—scaling Mt. Everest, CEO-ing a corporation, running for Veep, whatever.

But I’m going to go there. Reading her bio, her kids were the No. 1 thing that crossed my mind. FIVE kids, including a Downs infant, and a husband that works on the North Slope oil fields, so it’s not like he’s a SAH dad with the apron and the kids’ schedules all computerized on his Blackberry.

Sorry, but how is this going work again? Massachusetts has already been down this road, with a young, underexperienced Republican governor mom-of-young-children. It was a disaster, and it was over in very short order. 

It’s none of my business what kind of a mother she is, or what kind of a parent her husband is, that’s not why I would vote or not vote for anyone. But I know firsthand, as do all working mothers, what it’s like to bring only half your head to the game after a night of puking kids, or emo kids, or homeworked-out kids, [UPDATE: or pregnant kids] or whatever domestic disaster you’ve spent your physical and emotional capital putting to right.

It’s one thing to take your eye off the ball if you’re writing computer journalism or running a small biz that sells sustainable something-or-other or middle-managing in some vast corporation. The world will not screech to a halt thanks to your fuzzy thinking. But I’d like my vice-president to bring her A game to the table each and every day of her term, especially with a boss who’s entering the Dangerously Decrepit territory. And I just don’t see that happening with five kids in Palin’s picture, not with all the nannies in the universe.

Plus she’s anti-polar bear. No. Just no.