sarah palin

McCain's selection of Sarah Palin marks him clearly as unconcerned with our country's future.

McCain's choice of a former pageant contestant whose greatest experience is as a PTA member, denotes at best self-concerned irresponsibility. Should something happen to him, this is honestly who he thinks would be the best leader for our nation? Someone who's even more extreme than him, who disregards separation of church and state in favor of teaching Creationism in public schools, and takes a more radical stance on abortion than a conservative male Republican?

If this VP candidate sways the disgruntled Hilary voters to his ticket, then the women of this country are slumped back not just one century but two - to a time when most women in America were illiterate, lacking any analytical training. And worse, if women blindly support a candidate because of gender, they practice a shallow bigotry. Such support would mean the majority of our U.S. women have either a tragic ignorance or shameful disregard for the sacrifices of all the heroines of the past who gave over their comfort, their safety, and sometimes their lives, so that we would be free to impact our own situation, to realize our potential, to contribute as we choose.

The irony is that while Sarah Palin benefits from these sacrifices now more than most American women, she wishes to stand on the backs of our saviors to keep others down. There is no surer factor for a woman's life to be impoverished than early motherhood.

Instead of progress, Sarah Palin's position indicates women in this country are this very day considered such simpletons that we'd fall for this ploy - that we'd sooner have a moment of false pride at the expense of our daughters' futures, that we're fools enough to prop a crowned Palin up on our shoulders while she whips away our pride and possibilities.