Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin...The Girlfriend Klatch

This post is in response to the fact that I have had more hits to my blog than I've ever had and that our phone has been ringing off the hook from friends and family (and political action committees) who are wondering about Sarah Palin. Here is an Alaskan mom's opinion.

There is something that happened today that needs to be documented. I was in the middle of the hurricane that is our family getting ready for school when Falcom had earned the right to turn on the computer. I was trying to convince Marina that school was a good idea for today by bribing her with mangoes when I heard Falcom say, "John McCain picks Sarah Palin as running mate".

As the mother of a kid with learning differences, (specifications, disabilities, whatever!) just hearing him read something so bizarre was amazing! But was he reading? That couldn't be happening? Could it? But how would he make that up? I raced over there and it was true.

There she was, our sexy, hair twisting, Safety officer loving and hating, oil money bail out check passer-outer, Sarah Palin, in her standard API picture gracing the headline of MSN.

Since then, I've had more hits on my blog than I've ever had (not to mention phone calls from distant relatives) and I have decided that I'd better talk about the question everyone has on their lips; What the heck!?! Where did that come from!?!


This is a sample from my coffee with Priscilla today, where we klatched about Sarah Palin.

Before you go on, I'd like to explain something about Rural Alaska and Rural Alaskans that I have found true. We can disagree about how things are run, and we often do, but we still like each other and get along. This is not a land of Hatfield and McCoy. This is a place where the winter is hard. The summer is busy. If you are driving down the road and see someone in trouble you stop. You don't look for clues as to whether or not you should stop. You don't stop to consider that you might get robbed. You stop. (If you are a person who does not have people stop for you, you take that as a hint that you have really screwed up in some way and you'd better start flying right.)

We know each other and we help each other because there is not a person here who at some point has not had to lean on neighbors. Sarah Palin gets this concept. It seems people in much of the lower 48 have forgotten that and that is what McCain is hoping she will bring with her.

I believe that common sense is like a foreign language. If you don't use it, you loose it. I love Alaska because you still need to have common sense to live here. I imagine that Sarah Palin is fluent.





I will tell you that although I don't know Sarah Palin, I know that I am sure that she and I have more in common than not. My groovy neighbor has hung out with her and her handsome husband. I may never have had any desire to shoot anything, but I am sure that our shared Alaskan experience has many similarities. And now we both have children that receive special services.

I'm excited or her! How wonderful that she has been noticed. I'm more excited for her to be chosen than I was for Jewel to get a recording contract.

I don't like it that Sarah Palin supposedly endorsed a No Vote on proposition 4. That does not mean that I do not like Sarah Palin. I don't like it that Sarah Palin is so Pro-Life and still probably buys Chinese products from Wal-Mart. (Chinese fetuses don't count?) But that too does not mean that I do not like Sarah Palin.


Here is where I feel the problem with McCain's choice of Sarah Palin. This is the kind of state we are...we had 4 Ballot Measures this election. 4. One was aerial game management and one was setting up a gambling commission. How much is happening in Washington every single day?

The summer she was running for Governor, she marched in the parade at the Kenai Peninsula Fair. Be aware that this is the smallest fair, probably on Earth. My kids had decided they wanted to march for those 35 people standing along the 3/4 mile stretch of highway that runs through Ninilchik. Falcom was wearing an outfit that made him look like Chaka Kahn. He looked fabulous and was sitting in the bed of a pick up. Marina wore her Superman suit and was riding her bike. Sarah Palin came to Falcom and shook his hand as she went around to all of the other 4 parade contestants. When she left there was not a man in the area who did not say, "I am totally voting for her, she is so hot!" And that became the mantra I heard throughout the remainder of the election season. "If we have to look at someone every day, it sure doesn't hurt that she's pretty."
I was voting for her because she was not Murkowski and she was kind to Fal.

And now we have the first woman GOP candidate. So what was the coffee klatch between a Republican and an Independent-ish Alaskan like? Here is how it went:

(warning: some of this is a bit caddy, but after all we said about Hillary Clinton, it's really not that bad.)

• "I date a Mayor. I know what his responsibilities are like. OK, Governor, yes, potential future president, NO!"


• "I feel blatantly pandered to. Obama, hot. McCain, not. Obama young...McCain not pro-life enough for the GOP. I liked him that he was States Rights! We don't need in Alaska what they need in California. That's what it means to be Republican I thought! So, who did they pick? It's pandering! It's not because of actual experience. It's because she gave birth to a down syndrome baby and they want to make the Christians happy."


• "McCain is so old! He's not that healthy! What if something happens to him! Oh, God!"


• "I doubt any news organizations say that we were so pissed at (then Governor) Murkowski after he cancelled our longevity checks to seniors and disabled and then bought himself a jet that we were all going to vote for anyone who was not him and the fact that she is so hot and nice just made her a shoe in!"
  
• "I am going to get so sick of J.H. telling me how hot she is every time he sees her with McCain!"


• "I bet every woman in the country is too be having the same problem. You know, she probably stopped breast feeding in order to campaign."


• "She was working for us! What the heck!"


• "Do you think the media is going to mention that our legislature is only in session, like, half the year?"


• "I did think it was super cool that she didn't tell anyone that she was pregnant until right up to when she had the baby. You know that old boys school would have totally lame ducked her and blamed every decision she made on hormones."


• "You know, I am going to kind of hate to see her get eaten alive by all the media writing shit about her."


• "Yea, Me too."
  
• "Gosh her husband is a good looking man!"
  

She got picked because she is young and pretty and she is so good that she is sparkly. Does she have the experience to lead our country. No, not really. Will she have to lean on the same "old school dudes" because of her inexperience once she gets there because she doesn't know stuff? Yes, I think so.

Did McCain use common sense to pick Palin...I fear not.