I consider myself American first, Alaskan second, and I can’t stand Sarah Palin. She’s so annoying. She talks about her “special needs” child and “diverse family” and “maverick” status like they’re going out of style. Give me a break! She’s not a maverick–she’s a typical Republican, only she’s from Alaska and wants to “tap” (i.e. exploit) our resources so we can get a big fat check and 2,000 tons of pork.

I watched the veep debate with a room full of other UAA (University of Alaska Anchorage) students and most of the people around me either groaned or laughed every time she said something.

Alaska has the highest rate of rape in the country, especially in the rural areas. You can read the real story behind the rape kits here, but . She didn’t directly force victims to pay for them, but she didn’t really try to do anything about it, either. Basically, when she was mayor of Wasilla, she fired the chief of police who included rape kits in the police budget. She hired a guy who removed the cost of rape kits from the police budget, and she also signed the budget that did not include the rape kits.

Basically, the victim’s insurance company would be billed for the cost, which suggests that those without health insurance would have to pay themselves. This was done in order to decrease the “burden” on taxpayers.

There are plenty of people in Alaska who are pissed off about this, but there are probably also a lot of assholes who don’t even care. After all, Gov. Palin isn’t exactly unpopular here. Gag. Well, considering all the crap that’s been dug up during this election, she’ll have a lot to answer for when she does get back to her office in Alaska (I’m going to be optimistic and say I think McCain’s going to lose).

Needless to say, I don’t agree with her positions on, well, anything. Even if it weren’t for everything else I said, I still wouldn’t like her.

P.S. I’m also glad that so many of my fellow feminists are calling people on their sexist statements against Gov. Palin. Just because she sucks doesn’t mean people need to make “NOT Sarah Palin” blow-up dolls and share their fantasies that involve screwing her on their Barack Obama sheets while their wives read from the U.S. Constitution (yes, sadly, I did see a post about this).

Not sure where this fits in with the argument, but there’s also the consideration that it’s easier to /start/ talking to your kid about sex after they’ve got the basics from school. The combination is better than either/or, IMO.

Good point.

Let’s say Palin gets the VP job and she uses her power to make that nightmare a reality (and we can only guess at the strings Cheney has been able to pull from his VP seat over the last 8 years), would you not want to clear up a few issues with your children? It would be irresponsible, imho, to let my kids be indoctrinated with an ideology that I don’t subscribe to and that in fact I think is 100% false.

Well yeah, obviously if I had kids I’d talk to them about sex. But then there’s all those other kids whose parents DON’T talk to them about sex or fill them full of misinformation, like that condoms don’t prevent STIs and that sexual harassment is a compliment. I’d like some kind of safety net in place to hedge some of that. ‘Cause see, I grok the fact that my awareness doesn’t transfer to every other person in the world and that screaming “parents should give their kids factual information about sex!” over and over won’t make it happen. People have been making that same argument for decades, yet there are still kids who think pulling out is an effective form of birth control and that drinking bleach will prevent HIV.

But, there’s evidently potential for the next Great Depression, and who knows how crippling it will be this time.

Sure, if unemployment triples then we’d be looking at GD conditions, and remember, we’re currently in “a crisis.” Also, God Bless the 22nd Amendment! without which “þá cyningas” could pull some FDR type shit.

And for the whole collapse of the Wetern world thing, modern democracy an improvement on ye olde bloodsoaked tyrannies (even if there’s a touch of the old imperial swagger here and there). But, there’s evidently potential for the next Great Depression, and who knows how crippling it will be this time.

“IF the whole Western world isn’t in the tubes in five years time (and so it should), I’ll eat my ex-rat chapeaux.”

Why? I mean, there is alot to complain about, but that’s hardly unusual. America/The West (not really the same thing, mind) has survived until now.