U.S. Presidential Election 2008

Maybe she doesn't want an abortion? No law preventing her from scraping her mistake out in Alaska.

Yep, us poor dumm non-colleg graduates is just strugglin thru. Good thing we has all yu smarter tan us to run stuff for us. Where is my gun and religion.

Arrogant.

If her mom has anything to say about it, there will be. I'm also sure her mother is very capable of preventing her from having one if she does want it. Obviously Sarah Palin will not support that choice.

You're correct. And as long as she's 17 or above she doesn't need parental consent.

So we really should give her the benefit of the doubt on her decision.

So she is ruining her daughters life on the speculation that 1) her daughter wants an abortion and 2) she is actively blocking it. Yes, I agree, if she did that she is even more of a bitch than I previously thought.

Damn it, why isn't adoption even considered! That's choosing life. That's another problem here. Did not the McCain's adopt? There are no babies for couples that can't have them because the friggin grandparents say - we'll ALL raise this child. And you wonder why so many have to go to China or Russia to get babies. And saying oh this teenage couple is getting married is justified pre-marital sex. Ya, I'll give it 3 yrs before they are in divorce court fighting for custody.

Oh, come on. She has no choice. Her mother is on the record of being adamantly against abortion. She's 17 and dependent. What's she going to do? A runner while surrounded by Secret Service men? And if by some miracle she's successful in getting the abortion, what then? Will her family welcome her home again?

Edit: moctoj2 - you're welcome to go through a pregnancy with a baby you don't want. I have two daughters I love and wanted, thank god, but I would not go through pregnancy if I didn't. It's awful, debilitating, hurts like hell, and is very psychologically changing (read, damaging, if the end is only heartbreak)

Find where I ever demanded Palin show such proof. McCain's camp decided the rumors must be quashed. Since McCain more or less owns Sarah Palin, the Palin family obliged.

But not with a birth certificate, which would have been definitive proof AND left their daughter's privacy intact.

I'm sure the Palin family thought they were prepared to deal with the Trig rumors, which were rife in Alaska before anybody in the lower 48 had ever heard of Sarah Palin. Obviously, they weren't.

You didn't demand it Cinzia. But you're suggesting she should have done it. If some wackos questioned the maternity of your child, would YOU feel obliged to prove they're lying?

Maybe she share's her mother's superstitions about an egg being a person? You are just projecting your views on someone you know nothing about. The law protects her right to an abortion. She could have gotten one without her parents knowing she was ever knocked up.

Lets stick with criticizing her inexperience and lack of qualifications. (Okay, okay, i made a cheap shot a few pages back I think but it was brief)

Pregnancy is the easy part. Raising the child (when you are just a child yourself) is the harder part. That's why I waited until I was nearly 40, so I could actually have a life of my own first.

Hey, she could always put it up for adoption!

No. But Sarah Palin and the McCains did. Obviously.

I'm not suggesting she should have addressed the rumors. Find where I did.

I'm suggesting that a better parent would have quashed the rumors, since they decided they must be quashed, without bringing the 17-year-old daughter's pregnancy into the picture as proof.

What has this got to do with anything? Just feel like attacking me personally today again?

So...who's disappointed that Gustav didn't bring the destruction and loss of life that could lead to blaming Bush and McCain? Show of hands.

Absolute bullshit. When your daughter gets to that age, you will probably find that she is not talking to you anyway, so whatever you have to say on anything relating to her sex life will either be received by shrieks and slammed doors, or comments of "whatever" or "duh" or "f off". You do keep plugging away at it but believe me it is HARD WORK. A girl getting pregnant does not reflect her parents' influences or upbringing. That is totally simplistic. Ever heard of teenage hormones??


Another case of BS. One of our daughter's schoolmates became pregnant, stayed at home to study, and passed her International Baccalaureate with the highest grades just a couple of weeks before giving birth. That is really a sweeping statement, that only the "dummies" get pregnant. She is now studying in Finland (where baby's dad comes from).

What I'm beginning to feel about this lady is total relief that I was never on a PTA with her. One or two a bit like her perhaps, but that sort of "the world is perfect and just look, so am I" attitude gives me the creeps.

Thats why I qualified it with the words "most" and "of the girls I knew".

Gustav did just what the Democrats hired him to do. Blew the first day of the RNC all to shit.

Obama said he wasn't going to go to New Orleans at this time because there isn't enough water there for him to walk on!

(I just made that up, really)

Just read they knocked Guiliani off as the keynote speaker at the RNC and now have Thompson and Lieberman speaking.

well, i have this theory that if my kids feel like they can talk to me or my wife about anything at all no matter what it is, if we keep active in their lives rather than get all hung up in our own lives and talk with them about sex and you name it, that urge to sneak out with boys wont be a problem.

two things are well known:

1) The idle mind is the devil's tool
2) If its allowed, its no fun

actually, we already do talk with my daughter about boys and sex and what-not. something i suspect most americans do not do. i know my parents never did that with any of us! and i had a hell of a time!

we have every intention of getting her taking birth control as soon as that time comes...

might also be a good point to add that kids with a healthy self-esteem dont go out looking for love in all the wrong places or find themselves hanging out with other kids with poor attitudes - and that's up to her parents to make sure she feels good about herself, too!

hope that helps!

I'll give it to Palin, her daughters are a hell of a lot better looking than the Bush brats. Palin's daughter Willow is beautiful.
Hopefully she and the smaller one will learn from their parent's mistake. I agree with whoever said that the mother is exploiting her daughter for gain. It would have been much easier to produce Trig's birth certificate than drag the poor girl out into the open. Imagine that, one week noone knows you, the next week the entire world is Googling your name. Sad and unfair.

Now I feel a bit guilty for posting the girls pic. Palin strikes me as a narcissist. She's like a female George Bush.

The problem with that theory is that you don't really know if they feel they can talk to you about anything until they've done something so fucked up that they really don't want to talk to you about it. Bizarre isn't it?

just never know! all boils down to how she really feels about herself...

Well, Hopefully they can grow up without ever having the kind of problems that require that test. I know I hope that with my daughter, who just happens to be 17 and starting her Senior year of high school.

Wait ... I thought the Republicans hired Gustav to give them 1) a fleeting "Republicans are people, too" moment fussing about showing everybody how ready they were for Katrina redeux and 2) an excuse to keep Bush and Cheney off the stage ;)

well, if she's not a devil worshipping teenage mother then you musta done something right, ey?!

Win-win for everyone, then, eh Expaticus?

Word around here is that Gustav was a boon to the Minnesota State Fair, too. All those delegates milling around with nothing to do but hit the Great Minnesota Get-Together and eat some stuff on sticks.

I think this is all true. Studies have shown that girls who are active in sports, etc, have a lower chance of getting pregnant. No time for boys when you are on teams, working part-time jobs, doing your homework (and getting good grades), etc. At least that was the case for me. And no, I was not ugly. LOL. While parents cannot control what their daughters are doing, I think their influence plays a HUGE role.

Heavens to Murgatroyd. They don't have to "sneak" out with boys. You cannot ride on their coattails every time they go off to a party or a club, etc etc. Sorry, but it is my experience that the sweet pre-teenager turns into a very irate hormonal female when she hits about 13 or 14. The point is, unless you are very lucky, and perhaps your daughter will be very calm and rational like you, most female teenagers do not want to discuss anything with their parents if they can avoid it.

We have three gorgeous girls, no they did not get pregnant, and yes I did put them all on the pill when they reached sixteen. They are not tarts - I am proud of them and I like the friends they choose, they do seem to have good sense in that direction. But thank heavens we are through it - I would not go through those years again for all the tea in China.

My point is, that however "perfect" Mum might imagine herself to be, (and of course Dad is in the equation too), if your daughter is rebelling, it's a bit like going through a storm in a small boat. Hang onto the sides, row like mad and hope for the best. Whether Mum is the "perfect political hockey mum" as Sarah Palin projects herself, or your average parent trying to do their best according to their beliefs and hopes, the outcome is not always as you might hope for when you consider the imput.

so you have no evidence to prove your theory that teenagers just rebel for no reason at all?

kids have low self-esteem, get pissed-off and rebel because they're bored, being ignored and being treated unfairly...

i have no doubts about that at all... and this case with the Palin daughter is no different.

how many ex-pats in here are in Germany because they wanted to escape their shitty-ass environment back home? (that was rhetorical btw)

EDIT: ooh, actually, i just saw that youre from East England... those kids are exempt! most of them eat their parents!

I'm here for the beer!

and a good job so I can buy that beer!!

And the Palin family is proposing that Bristol either stays in Alaska to finish up high school with a baby, a teenaged husband who doesn't want kids, and Mom in DC, or she moves to DC herself with the family. DC is a little bit different from Alaska, I've heard.

Actually yes there is evidence to prove that teenagers just rebel, but not quite for no reason at all. The BBC did an indepth study of teenagers about 3 or 4 years ago. Trying to find the link, will put it up if I can find it. Anyway, basically studying girls and boys (but of course I found the girl study v interesting). Basically when the hormones kick in, that's when the little sweeties go sour. An interesting part of the programme was with twins - one of them was obviously a bit ahead, developmentally-wise, than the other. So one was still sweet and as she always was, and the other one was basically kicking ass. That changed just a few months later when sweetness caught up with her twin.

They also proved that teens, up to approx 19/21yrs old have a specific part of their brain that has not fully developed. This is a part that in an adult recognises danger and dangerous situations. The teens tested did not react with the same part of the brain as the adults (at the front) when confronted by, for example, photos of dangerous looking people/anything that might make you step back and pause. They used instead part of the brain that is governed by impulse. So when you have a young guy saying to his friend, let's see how fast this sled will go down this vertical snow slope covered in rocks, the friend's reaction is far more likely to be "yeah, why not" - this reaction produced by the impulse part of the brain that is "standing in" for the part that has not yet developed.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/science/humanbody/min...rebellion.shtml

Sorry the link doesn't look live, you may have to copy and paste. The whole series of programmes was fascinating - a real eye opener, and I think from the page above you can look through the whole of the study. Especially interesting is the sleep segment.

Oh yes, it is live.

Programme was called Teen Species (my brain is a bit slow today )

at the risk of beating a dead horse...

sounds like bored kids to me. and maybe even a contribution of a bad diet and parents who say, "we've tried nuthin' man, and we're all outta ideas!" ~quoting Ned Flanders' parents

or maybe parents the of kids who rebel in a distructive manner should take responsibility rather than hope for a study to be done on it...

i still believe that, for the most part, we create our own problems (or fortune, for that matter), whether it be what our kids do, being at the wrong place at the wrong time...etc

Good luck

quitter!!

Didin't quit honey. I got there. You have it all in front of you!

So let me get this right on parenting...all the kids in High School whose parents say...DON'T smoke,drink,do drugs,have sex...when their kids do it then they are bad parents? So Obama had a Bad mother. Palin is a Bad mother. Bill Clinton had a Bad mother. (Wait he didn't inhale so does that count?) By these standards are there any good mothers out there???

But it's ok if the parent is ok with it? Like I if told my daughter to have safe sex and the codom broke and she had an abortion.(Because why should she be punished for her mistake.) That on the other hand would be good parenting?

Just read up on Palin today: Anti gay, anti sex education, anti womans's right to choose, creationist nutpot.
Mmmm, a real choice vote that is gonna do loads for women.

Why should she be forced to take responsibility for her mistake...it's not a punishment. makes your argument a little better.

actually, its more about taking responsibility for out actions as a parent. there are consequences for everything we do or dont do...

i have no agenda to judge anyone's parenting skills. i know mine leave a lot to be desired.

remember, this initially started out as making a point about this politician's pregnant teenager being used to get McCain into office...

but if you want to get into specifics, you're pointing out leaders... leaders and influencial are born like that. they dont learn it by reading books. thats only the enhancement program...

scheesh, i got too much time on my hands (two weeks vacation, apartment all clean and wife 'n kids on the Baltic Sea for three weeks)... but i am currently ironing my t-shirts, playing doublebass and listening to music! what can i say, multitasking is my life...

sounds like someone who was bound to have a teenage pregnancy at some point...

ignorance = real dumb ass!

Looks like you are playing the devil's advocate. The latter part of your post would depend on whether or not you accept abortion or not. Clearly Mrs Palin does not. Which is perfectly well and good; but insisting that her daughter is going to marry the redneck who doesn't want to have children (and by that one might infer that he may not be interested in marrying little Bristol), sounds like something that came out of an old novel. It seems to me that she is trying to varnish over the muddle, in the hope that if it is glossy no-one will notice what's underneath.

People who have extreme views of life are definitely scary, and, in my opinion, to be avoided. Life is not black and white - but there appears to be no shades of grey in the world of Mrs Palin. The more I hear about her, the less I think about her.

I'm sold...

thats right Emo-man...

Obama will make sure you get the attention your parents never gave you...

and in the words of Chris Rock, "if he calls his grandma, 'mama' and his mama, 'Pam', that kid's going to jail"...

If it were MY daughter, I'd be pushing giving the baby up for adoption and not pushing her into marriage. Does that make me a bad parent, I wonder? Thank GOD I have a son.

It's a sad statememt that you would view a human life as a mistake.

that's the thing see, you never know what you'll do until it happens to you...

if it were me, i hope would be man enough to take full responsibility and do what i can to get used to the idea of having a new baby around...

i dont have a problem with someone wanting to get rid of a baby (abortion or adoption), its just not the way we do things here in my household.

Just discussed this with my 18yr old (childless) daughter. She laughed at the irony of this anti-abortion, anti-sex-education candidate having a pregnant teenager, but surprised me by saying that while she supports a woman's right to choose, she would have the baby as well, if it were her. She's quite certain in feeling that life starts at conception. It makes me all the more glad that I did give her the sex and condom talk, take her to the gynecologist as soon as she got her first period, and raise her to have high self-esteem. I do think the right parenting can prevent most of these cases.