the underwear drawer

i know how much you love it when i talk about politics




I'm no political pundit, nor will I be the first (or last) to say this, but as someone who would have voted for Hillary Clinton--though I will now gladly vote for Barack Obama--McCain's choice of VP strikes me as calculating and, frankly, insulting to the woman voters to whom he is attempting to appeal. It's as though in their play for the disenfranchised Hillary voters, they are presenting the idea that all female candidates for high political office are basically fungible, and that women will vote for women regardless of the platform upon which they are running. "Hey look, another chick! You like to vote for chicks, why not vote for ours?"

I do think, however, that Palin is a great move to appeal to the conservative base that's still leery of McCain's loose cannon history, though, because man, is she a conservative's wet dream. A gun-toting, anti-choice, former beauty queen, multiparous hockey mom, who also has a dash of "naughty librarian" about her. Take off those glasses, shake your hair down, and man! In the words of Rush Limbaugh, "Yeah, plus she's a housewife, before that, she's a babe. I saw a picture." Making a great case for your own candidate there, Rush. I know she's supposed to be a good governor (of Alaska), and very popular to boot (in ALASKA), but forgive me if I can't help but to think that the reasoning behind her selection was a little more calculating than that.

Anyway. I will leave punditry to the experts. I just had to get that off my chest. Moving on.

Edited to add: Posted in the comments, but wanted to add it as an addendum here too...The "beauty queen, multiparous" etc. qualifiers I included were not meant to be pejorative (though "gun-toting, anti-choice" were kinda, but just because I disagree with her on those issues)--I certainly don't think that physical attractiveness or having kids takes away from your intelligence or professional qualifications, whatever they may be. Rather, I was trying to point out why certain people find Palin to be much less "threatening" than some other powerful women in politics and in other realms, who tend to get more of the "cold bitch" label.