My Antithesis

Anyone who knows me even a little bit would tell you that I am not a political person. For a while now I've been somewhat disillusioned by our political system and have chosen to just ignore it altogether. I'm not out breaking laws or anything like that, but it's been some time since I've even considered voting. Enter Sarah Palin. You see, I've not voted in the recent past because I really had absolutely no feeling for any of it. Now, I am so frightened at the very real prospect of Sarah Palin running our country that I not only will vote against McCain-Palin, but I am going to try to convince everyone I know to do the same. I live in Obama's home state, which is typically democratic anyway, so I'm pretty confident Illinois will step up and do it's duty by rejecting McCain-Palin. It will be a sad day if the "swing" states go the other way.

The past few years, it seems we have become attuned to moderate candidates from both parties. Some election specialist I'm sure has done studies on exactly what to be for or against in order to get the most votes, and candidates on both sides tried to model that. My take was that for the most part they were the same person, so what did it matter if I voted. Then I started thinking about families who have lost loved ones in Iraq. Would we even be there if Gore or Kerry had won? Would 9/11 have happened with Gore as the president? It's impossible to know, but it certainly underscores the importance of who is at the helm.

That is why Sarah Palin scares me. For there to be a candidate whose ideals I agreed with as much as I disagree with Palin, I'd have to be running for office myself. Right on down the line I am on the completely opposite end of the spectrum, and I suspect that I am far from being the only one. How can less than two years of being guv of the least populated state qualify you for the presidency? How can you be anti-abortion and call yourself a feminist? Do you think your pregnant 17 year old benefited from your policy of only teaching abstinence in schools or do you think she could have benefited from learning about birth control? Even the hockey mom thing annoys me. I love hockey, but for you (or anyone) to wear the moniker of hockey mom, or baseball mom, or soccer mom or whatever, you are taking the spotlight off your kids and putting it on you. Your kid plays hockey; that's great for him or her. It's not an opportunity for you to develop an identity. You should go there and cheer when they do well and be there for them when they don't go so well. That's it.

McCain is an old man, and at the risk of sounding cold, old people die way more often than young people. If he's president when that happens and Palin becomes president, there won't be enough planes, trains, and automobiles to accommodate the people who want to leave this country.