What makes Bristol Palin's pregnancy a legitimate political issue

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

(Reposting in corrected form to fix an error, and because the original OP was not being read to say what is intended, doubtless due to my own communicative deficiencies.)

Bristol Palin the young woman is not a real issue. Her moral failings (if any) or level of intellect (if any) should not be at issue, if for no other reasons than because 1) she is an inherently sympathetic figure, and 2) our best interpretation of things politically is that she is a victim, not a villain.

But the fact of her unplanned juvenile pregnancy and her supposed "Godly choice" are well within political bounds to whatever degree they reflect on Sarah Palin.

SARAH Palin's approach to the matter is at issue because she is a crusader for a specific social and governmental approach to precisely the situation she finds in her own family.

Bristol Palin is being used, politically, as an example of someone who made a Godly choice and will do the right thing by getting married and thus making an honest woman of herself. That is the POLITICAL argument.

Palin is reaping praise for raising her daughter to make a certain choice that Bristol could not make under Alaska law, except for the fact that the courts had struck down the law; a decision Sarah Palin personally fought against and threatened to over-turn by constitutional amendment.

So we have the crazy circumstance where Bristol Palin is being praised by her mother for making a choice of which her mother fought to deprive her.

And that a legitimate issue any way you look at it.

Until a few months before Bristol Palin got pregnant Alaska law said she did not have a legal choice to terminate the pregnancy, so there would be no "choice," Godly or otherwise. It would have been Sarah and/or Daddy Palin's choice, not Bristol's choice.

The Alaska parental consent law was struck down by the Alaska Supreme Court less than a a year ago. Here was Palin's take on that law (and potential judicial review) back in 2006 while running for Governor:

Palin Said She Supported a Constitutional Amendment To Enforce Parental Consent Law if Supreme Court Declared it Unconstitutional. Asked if she would support a Constitutional Amendment to overturn the Supreme Court and allow a parental consent law to be enforced if the Alaska Supreme Court declared the parental consent law unconstitutional, Sarah Palin responded, “yes.”
Council Voter Guide, 8/22/06]

________________________
BACKGROUND:

Alaska teens can make own abortion decision
3-2 VOTE: State Supreme Court justices say notification is OK.

By SHEILA TOOMEY
[e-mail]
Published: November 3, 2007

The Alaska Supreme Court threw out an embattled state law Friday that required parental or judicial consent before a teenager can have an abortion.

In a 3-2 decision, the court said the consent requirement robs a pregnant teen of her constitutional right to make such an important decision herself and transfers that right to her parents or a judge.

However, a law that required parents to be notified of a juvenile daughter's plan to have an abortion would probably be all right, said Chief Justice Dana Fabe in the majority decision for the court. It's a option many other states use, she noted.

As illustrated by the vote, the decision was a close call. Both sides agreed that the state has a compelling interest in protecting juvenile girls against their own immaturity and that parents have a constitutional right -- a duty -- to guide their children. They differed over whether giving parents veto power over a pregnant juvenile's abortion decision went too far.

http://dwb.adn.com/news/alaska/story/9426719p-9338863c....

[greenvpi]

1. Her daughter could always just travel to another state..

to get this done...

Just kidding. She's in Alaska! That isn't an option.

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

2. Abortion is readily available in Russia, which we know is super close

Too bad they don't have passports!