Part of the freakshow aspect of last night in St Paul was the focus on Bristol Palin in her maternity outfit and her boyfriend alongside. What is she wearing? Is that a designer outfit? How pregnant is she? How tightly is he holding her hand? What are his eyes saying? Has he ever worn a blazer and tie before? And so a 17-year-old girl is suddenly the most famous unwed mother in the world, and two kids who wanted just to be left alone as they figured things out are made into a political tableau. I feel for those kids.
We can talk about John Edwards's decision to run while his wife has cancer, or Sarah Palin's decision to run with a Down's baby and three other young kids, but I'm on the side of ambition and careerism, even for smalltown people; and so I say, Let 'em run, let 'em put family second.
But having put family second, why didn't she anticipate this? Why didn't she go out there the first day in Dayton and say, "And you'll notice that my daughter Bristol is not here today. Bristol is 17 and pregnant, and believe me, she's upset I'm telling you that much. But I'm going to do my utmost to protect her privacy as she and her boyfriend work through these very adult issues, and I am asking the media and the political world to show her some common decency." She didn't do anything like that, she let it flop out later, a big surprise, and so Bristol is right out in the spotlight, and the shotgun wedding is fair game… Any male politician could of course have anticipated the same exposure, and that's the point. I thought the McCain people were pros. They're amateurs.
