Wednesday, November 18, 2009

Defending Sarah Palin

This isn't what you think it's going to be. No, I'm not going to bash those defending Sarah Palin's self-serving, ghost-written memoir. Nor am I going to comment on her book, or the controversy it's stirring up at all (beyond that first sentence). I'm actually going to defend Sarah Palin against an unfair attack myself. (Pause for the gasps from the readers).

The group American Right to Life (ARTL) has claimed that Palin secretly supports abortion rights based on her having appointed to the Alaska Supreme Court a judge who has served on the Board of Directors of Planned Parenthood. On their Prolife Profiles page on Palin, they have archived the press release about Judge Christen's appointment. The press release details many of Christen's qualifications, but makes no mention of her service to Planned Parenthood. But, what I did find very interesting, was the last sentence of the press release:
Under current judicial selection procedures, the Alaska Judicial Council received applications from six Alaska attorneys, winnowed the list to two names, and forwarded them to the governor.
So, only six people wanted the job, only two were qualified, and Governor Palin selected one of those two. Without knowing who the other candidate was, and what their "prolife profile" would say, how can ARTL crucify Palin for the selection she made?

Learning that Palin may have actually, in some cases, put her duties as Governor ahead of her personal agenda is something knew and interesting to me. Good for her!

It should come as no surprise to any of my regular readers that I do not support ARTL's mission, but clearly these people are out of line and way overboard when they describe Judge Christen as "an abortionist" (she's not; she's a lawyer who served on a nonprofit Board), and just as wrong when they use guilt by association (and a rather tenuous association at that) to try to discredit Palin (and here's where I get in my digs; Palin does enough to discredit herself).

Okay. So don't let it be said that I'm a hypocrite of an independent who only sticks up for the liberals and leaves the conservatives out to hang when unfairly attacked. Now, excuse me while I go scrub my hands.

2 comments:

  1. Good for you Ken, for being balanced.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Mrs. Palin decided that her personal and political views against radical environmentalism were more important than her moral convictions regarding the defenseless unborn. One judge was an environmentalist and the other a proabort. If one was a committed abolitionist, would one choose a slaver holder to be a judge? Doubtful. Very.

    True leadership would have been telling the candidate selection committee to bring new selections for consideration.

    You can't just say you are prolife or pro-environment, you have to act on those convictions.

    ReplyDelete

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