If Bristol Palin were black

The Republican Party has circled the wagons around Sarah Palin and her pregnant daughter, Bristol. There are so many directions to go in here: a discussion of the merits of abstinence only sex education; why I think condoms should be made available in public school bathrooms; the hypocrisy of a woman clamoring to revive the concept of privacy, when she would like to tell the rest of us what we can and cannot do with our bodies; the sympathy I feel for Bristol, presumably not the driving force behind her upcoming wedding to Levi Johnston, a self-professed hockey playing redneck who never wants kids; and the general invalidity of the Republican party's privacy rubric---i.e. we can tell you what your options are if you become pregnant, as well as who you are allowed to marry, but you may not ask us questions about whether Bristol Palin's pregnancy reflects on her mother's politics. 

I'd like to know if Republicans would be so smitten with Bristol and her situation if she were a pregnant black teenager?

There exists, of course, no historical precedent for comparison. 2008 is the first year either party has nominated a black member for president or vice-president. But I think it is safe to say that if a black politician's teenage daughter found herself pregnant and unmarried, neither party would parade the girl around on the convention floor. She would be the unravelling of her parent's political career, proof that unmarried, pregnant teenagers are usually black. 

Barack Obama has taken the high-road on this issue; he pointed out that his own mother gave birth to him at 18, and adamantly insisted that families are off-limits. Good, that's what he should do. The candidates should not drag each other's families into the debating arena. But the rest of us not running for president have every right to discuss what it means when the Republican party introduces Bristol to the world as one of the five reasons Sarah Palin is qualified to be president, should John McCain only reach his life expectancy. 

I feel sorry for Bristol that her fate is inextricably bound to her mother's. It is unfair she has to live out what is likely the most difficult period of her young life in the media spotlight. But the blame for that rests with the Republican party for choosing a candidate they thought would appeal to the "soccer moms" credited with sweeping Bill Clinton into office***, and then placing the candidate and her children on the world's largest stage, all for the purpose of making ornery, distant John McCain's candidacy seem family-friendly and relatable. 

They chose fertile Sarah Palin, a "pistol packin' mama with five children", and then she proceeded to devote a significant portion of her acceptance speech to talking about her kids. Which is fine, if that's what she chooses to do; but she can't have it both ways. The kids are either in or they're out, and she should be the one to decide. But she cannot be allowed to say "These are my children: Trig, Piper, Willow, Bristol, and Track. Track enlisted in the army last year on September 11th, and he will deploy to Iraq this year on September 11th." Wait a second...does it sound like Sarah Palin wants to garner favor by using her son's military service to remind us of September 11th? Maybe Rudy helped her write her speech. 

Sarah Palin's dearth of qualifications to be president is what led John McCain to wax poetic about her PTA involvement, her basketball stats, and how, like many a lady before her, she popped out some kids. Which makes her an interesting, politically active, ambitious person, though not qualified to be president. 

If Palin is such a huge hockey fan, she should note: nobody respects a player who goes around antagonizing everyone, only to throw herself on the ice screaming PENALTY the second the other team looks her way. If she wants to be an agitator, she better be prepared to fight. 

***Republicans found "soccer moms" too effeminate, and decided "hockey moms" are really the image America wants for its mothers: ass-kicking, cross-checking, high-sticking pitbulls with lipstick.