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[rewhite]

Apologies for spelling mistakes. I'm writing this very late and I hardly have time to go over the whole thing. It'll probably be edited some time tomorrow.

Even though I'm not the sort to ever shy away from politics, this election has given me pause. While I chide myself for not having posted this earlier I am relieved to see how many people remain

Comments

[morbidelirium]

eh, we can go back and forth all day on abortion. at the end of the day, my opinion isn't going to change. it's just one of those things I feel wicked strong about.

okay, okay. what's scary about palin... hm. well, one of the things i find most disgusting about her is the whole rape kit mess. rape kit =/= the morning after pill, abortion, birth control. a "rape kit" is the thing the cops use to to test a woman to gather DNA evidence against the rapist--purely a legal tool. she might claim to not know about this, whatever whatever, but it still happened in her town and even when it came to light and surface, she didn't fix it until the state made regulations against it. and she HAD to have known--the police budget she signed off on did not include rape kits as part of its expenses. therefore, they billed victims or their insurance companies for the cost of a purely legal tool in a state that has the highest rates of rape and sexual assault in the nation. fucked up? yup.

there are other things, too--selling that big old corporate Alaskan jet for a $600,000 loss and bragging about it, meanwhile attempting to get government travel reimbursement for something like 312 nights she spent in her own home, as well as carting her fucking tard-o children around with her everywhere and using tax money to pay for their airfare, hotel, whatever.

as far as her worldwide experience, she didn't get a passport until 2007, and therefore could not have traveled out of the country until 2007. i mean, i GUESS you don't have to leave your cozy little cold state to explore the world, but I suppose it helps. whatever whatever on that bridge to nowhere, she might have decided suddenly she is against it, but she was very much for it, and even if not--alaska kept the $400 some odd million for transportation.

she is still somehow manages to support abstinence-only education when her own daughter is knocked up and unmarried. she has the evidence that shit doesn't work right in her face--and yet still supports abstinence-only sex ed.

obama's not a perfect candidate, nobody is, but if I cast a vote for nader, who is probably my favorite, i feel almost like it's a vote for mccain. a vote for someone other than obama--who is most likely to beat mccain--is pretty much wasted. -shrug- i know it's not the best way to consider voting, but come on. an indy candidate isn't going to win the election. a state hasn't even turned a color other than red or blue. more or less, my vote is for who I DON'T want in the white house--which is mccain. i'm not so attached to obama that someone couldn't convince me to vote otherwise (not mccain, but otherwise) but still.

[rewhite]

While you do bring up some interesting points, you must keep in mind that sex crimes are (except for certain exceptions) not handled at the federal level, nor is sex education something that's handled at the federal level. It's like voting based on pro-life/pro-choice at the municipal level: it makes no difference. Still, here's the most even handed treatment of the rape kits controversy I found. It doesn't show it to be the non-issue I hoped it would be, but it's hardly the issue you think it is. http://jezebel.com/5054308/debunking-the-sarah-palin-rape-kit-debunkers

As for the jet, she did save the state money. Do you have any idea how expensive it is to operate those things? Fuel alone is incredible, and maintenance is beyond belief. I see it was 20-years old, as well. The older a plane is, the more expensive its maintenance. There's also insurance, storage, paying to keep a crew on hand at all times. Jet pilots have an income in the $60k range. Assuming a pilot and copilot, I'd say that in five years the difference would be covered on their salaries alone.

As for the 312 nights, that's patently wrong. It was a per diem allowance. That only covers day expenses, such as food and transportation. It might be noted that she charges for less than she is entitled to under the rules. When you live 600 miles away from your job, it makes sense. As for taking her family with her, as her spokeswoman Sharon Leighow said, "As a matter of protocol, the governor and the first family are expected to attend community events across the state. It's absolutely reasonable that the first family participates in community events."

[morbidelirium]

even so. the fact that she forced victims of rape (WOMEN, like me, like her [maybe, I don't think she should have the right to own a uterus and call herself a woman, honestly; she is so overtly anti-woman it sickens me]) to pay for shit that should be used for the capture and conviction of the perpetrator of a crime (and a heinous crime at that; no one can argue that point without seeming like a completely insensitive raging prick) is sickening. even if only one woman had to pay out of pocket expenses for a rape exam, that's still too much. -shrugs- even if she is not handling things like this at a federal level, it's still... wrong. very wrong.

but as far as sex ed goes, the government decides how much funding goes into different forms of education. even if you're not outright banning other forms of sex ed, you can easily shift the funds to the abstinence-only freaks and effectively diminish other forms of sex-ed.

she might have saved them money in the long run, but she still champions it like it was the best decision ever. i think it would've made a lot more sense to buy a much smaller, newer plane with smaller crew, smaller cost to operate. alaska is far from the rest of the country, and the alaskan governor does live extremely far from where she needs to go, and she should have some form of reliable transportation. :/ it seems to me like it would cost way more money in the long run to pay so much to cart them around with public airfare and such, especially when one lives in a state so far away from the rest of the country.

eh... it might just be me, but I really don't like the way she parades her children around. I don't give a fuck if you've had five kids and one of them is a Downs baby. it means absolutely nothing to me other than that your ovaries are in working order, which is absolutely no big fucking deal because women have been having children for thousands of years. seriously, your kids are not an amazing achievement--srsly, not that special. your family is your family, and that's YOUR business, not american public business.

one of the other things I forgot to mention was that Katie Couric interview where she asked Palin what newspaper she read, and she couldn't even name a single paper or publication--just a bubbly "Oh, ALL of them!" without citing even ONE example. what's that supposed to mean? I'm gonna elect someone who doesn't even bother to browse papers to check out what's going on in the world? it's one thing for the average asshole to ignore the world around him or her, but this woman will literally be steps away from the presidency if mccain is elected. mccain is old. 71 years old, for exacts. indisputable fact. there is the very real possibility that he could die in office. by the end of his term, he'll be what--75 fucking years old? the average lifespan of an american man is roughly 78 years, so we're putting someone basically three years from the usual age of endgame into the white house. so... say whatever you will about mccain--really, aside from his pro-lifery and other little things I dislike (untreated PTSD, anyone?) about him, he's not the problem. sarah palin is. defend her if you want to, but really... i do not want to see that woman in control of this country.

[rewhite]

Actually, they were trying to set it up that the rapist would pay the $5000 for the rape kit, but it didn't work out.

Flying on public, even as much as she does, costs far less than a private jet.

She's showing off her family because she's showing off that she's managed to be two things at once: a mother and a politician. Frankly, I rather like the concept. Government office, especially at the state level, was never meant to be the lifestyle it is today.

Who reads papers anymore? Even if you disagree with me, I doubt you'd say that I'm uninformed. I rely on a combination of radio (WCBS, WOR, and WABC, in that order, if you're wondering) and the internet for my news. Almost all newspapers exercise an insidious bias with the majority being left-leaning.

I don't delude myself into thinking that I could sway you into voting for the McCain/Palin ticket. Honestly, I think we have four flawed candidates, and I'm not fond of any of them. I've brought myself to vote for McCain because I doubt he will make the fatal mistakes Obama will make. It's elections like this, where nobody is running on what I hold dear, that make me feel obligated to enter politics.

One last thought: McCain, or even Palin, are very unlikely to have anything resembling a majority in the Congress. As a result, their hands will be tied. Essentially, they will prevent any weird things from escaping Washington. If Obama gets elected, he will have a majority in the Congress, and will put through radical redistributionist and socialist 'reforms'.