Levi Vs. Palin

Levi posing nude for Playgirl? I didn't even know Playgirl magazine still existed. Can you imagine if this reality show nonsense was going on as Palin was trying to assist John McCain in leading the nation? Scary stuff. How can anyone possibly consider Palin a candidate for president? Apparently, people are thinking less of her. Her approval ratings, 27%, might be lower than Cheney's.
But it's wrong for the media to exploit Levi Johnston because they can. Johnston is immature right now and the media ought to consider that.

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Can't Keep Levi Johnston Down

Levi just keeps spreading more dirt on Sarah Palin. Not very classy, or wise. But it sure is interesting.

He almost became a member of the Palin family, but Levi Johnston — who fathered former Gov. Sarah Palin's grandchild with her daughter Bristol — isn't holding back when it comes to spilling the Alaska clan's secrets.

"There was a lot of talk of divorce in that house ... times when Sarah and Todd would mention it and sound pretty serious," says Johnston, who turns 19 this year. (Last month, the couple denied Internet rumors of a pending divorce.)

But that wasn't all. In a wide-ranging interview with Vanity Fair in its October issue, out nationally Sept. 8, the teen says that the onetime vice-presidential nominee's frequent self-description as a "hockey mom" who put family above career was far from the truth. MSNBC

Sarah Palin is a Granny

In between the SNL shoots, shopping sprees, campaign stops and a mother-in-law busted for drugs, a baby is born. Happy birthday Tripp!

People: Bristol Palin, the 18-year-old daughter of former Republican vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin, gave birth on Sunday to a healthy 7 lb., 4 oz., baby boy in Palmer, Alaska.

"We think it's wonderful," said Colleen Jones, the sister of Bristol's grandmother Sally Heath, who confirmed the news. "The baby is fine and Bristol is doing well. Everyone is excited."

The baby's name is Tripp Easton Mitchell Johnston, according to Jones.

Baby Tripp takes his surname from his dad, Levi Johnston, an apprentice electrician and former Wasilla High School hockey player who has been dating Bristol for three years.

Bristol Palin is currently residing in Wasilla and completing her high-school diploma through correspondence courses.

Johnston is studying to become an electrician. He told the Associated Press in October that he and fiancée Bristol plan to wed in 2009 and raise the child together.

McCain Opposed Funding for Pregnant Teens

Teen pregnancy happens and then something worse: marriage. Levi apparently didn't want kids or marriage (how many teen boys do?). It doesn't look like Sarah Palin's daughter has a choice.

Here's what else happens with teen pregnancy, the financial burden of raising a child is placed on the mother. Often, the father bows out leaving the mother alone to fend for herself. But if you're a teen who belongs to a loving wealthy family, the challenge isn't as great. The family will financially support the teen, and care for the child, and in Sarah Palin's case, have the daughter marry.

Republican blogs are selling this as "an American story."

If they'd stop with the glorifying, bloggers wouldn't feel so compelled to blog. Palin has introduced a good reason to talk about how to reduce teen pregnancy so that it works for everyone, not just the wealthy. 

CBS: Republican John McCain, whose running mate disclosed that her unmarried 17-year-old daughter is pregnant, has opposed proposals to spend federal money on teen-pregnancy prevention programs and voted to require poor teen mothers to stay in school or lose their benefits.

Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin's announcement Monday about her daughter, Bristol, was aimed at rebutting Internet rumors that Palin's youngest son, born in April, was actually her daughter's. Palin said her daughter intends to raise her child and marry the baby's father, who was identified only by his first name, Levi. The baby is due in late December.

McCain's record on issues surrounding teen pregnancy and contraceptives during his more than two decades in the Senate indicates that he and Palin have similar views. Until Monday, when the subject surfaced in a deeply personal manner, teen pregnancy and sex education were not issues in the national political campaign.

Palin herself said she opposes funding sexual-education programs in Alaska.
....
In Senate votes, McCain has opposed some proposals to pay for teen-pregnancy prevention programs. In 2006, McCain joined fellow Republicans in voting against a Senate Democratic proposal to send $100 million to communities for teen-pregnancy prevention programs that would have included sex education about contraceptives.

In 2005, McCain opposed a Senate Democratic proposal that would have spent tens of millions of dollars to pay for pregnancy prevention programs other than abstinence-only education, including education on emergency contraception such as the morning-after pill. The bill also would have required insurance companies that cover Viagra to also pay for prescription contraception.

McCain voted for the Family Support Act in 1988, which passed overwhelmingly in the Senate and required teen mothers who receive public assistance to remain in high school and, in some cases, to live with their parents.

RCP: The 2008 Republican Party platform acknowledges that "each year, more than 3 million American teenagers contract sexually transmitted diseases, causing emotional harm and serious health consequences, even death." It expresses support for "efforts to educate teens and parents about the health risks associated with early sexual activity and provide the tools needed to help teens make healthy choices."

Then it adds, "Abstinence from sexual activity is the only protection that is 100 percent effective against out-of-wedlock pregnancies and sexually transmitted diseases."

Yes, but talking about abstinence turns out to be easier than abstaining. More than 60 percent of high-school seniors report having had sex at least once. The message that every family should take from Bristol Palin's pregnancy is: It can happen here.

Wasilla

McCain Doing More Vetting on Palin

They're making up for a rash decision. All of a sudden, "Sarah Barracuda" doesn't seem so cute anymore. But she's still hot and she still kills moose with her own gun and makes them into mooseburgers.

The McCain camp should be vetted on their reckless vetting. I love the spin that Sarah Palin is a hero because her daughter is pregnant by an 18-year old boy named Levi, and she's keeping the baby. I would also argue that keeping the baby isn't so extraordinary. They've made it out like abortion is the common choice. The conservative wingnuts have no other choice but to rally around their gal because they forced McCain to choose her.

I've posted this before but this is my theory: McCain wanted to pick Joe Lieberman, his best bud, but he was getting shaped and molded by radio talk show hosts and republican wingnuts. McCain the "maverick" was being tossed around by the right of right. He finally threw up his hands, picked Palin and said: Happy now. After all, it was the lowly Rush Limbaugh, who pushed for Palin, whom he called a "babe."

NYT: On Monday morning, Ms. Palin and her husband, Todd, issued a statement saying that their 17-year-old unmarried daughter, Bristol, was five months pregnant and that she intended to marry the father.

Among other less attention-grabbing news of the day: it was learned that Ms. Palin now has a private lawyer in a legislative ethics investigation in Alaska into whether she abused her power in dismissing the state’s public safety commissioner; that she was a member for two years in the 1990s of the Alaska Independence Party, which has at times sought a vote on whether the state should secede; and that Mr. Palin was arrested 22 years ago on a drunken-driving charge.

Aides to Mr. McCain said they had a team on the ground in Alaska now to look more thoroughly into Ms. Palin’s background. A Republican with ties to the campaign said the team assigned to vet Ms. Palin in Alaska had not arrived there until Thursday, a day before Mr. McCain stunned the political world with his vice-presidential choice. The campaign was still calling Republican operatives as late as Sunday night asking them to go to Alaska to deal with the unexpected candidacy of Ms. Palin

Here's more that the McCain camp should've discovered about Levi:

He also warns that if anyone messes with him, "I'll kick ass."
The Web site, before it was removed, appeared not to have been accessed for a year.
On it, he admits to having a girlfriend.
On the part where it asks about children, he wrote, "I don't want kids."
Mark Okeson, the assistant principal at Wasilla High School, told the Chicago Tribune that Bristol started her junior year last fall, in the town where Sarah Palin grew up.
He said Bristol inexplicably transferred to an Anchorage high school midyear, leaving Levi behind.
"I never heard the story why," he said.

McCain's Camp is Outraged at Democrats

Outraged they are.
McCain spokeswoman Nicolle Wallace was on all the morning "news" shows responding to the rumors that spurred the announcement that Sarah Palin's daughter is five months pregnant with the help of, and we may as well call out Levi Johnston, the father.

Wallace blamed the liberal and democratic blogs. She called the rumors "lewd" and the most disgusting ever, "the ugliest of politics as usual." I admit I read the rumor but knew better than to repeat it here, but the republicans have no room to talk. There are wingnuts out there who are still trying to prove that:

1)Obama is a secret terrorist Muslim
2)Obama wasn't born in the US
3)Obama was an "illegitimate" child
4)That he's a drug addict.

The smears against Obama are the ugliest of politics as usual. Despicable. I haven't seen the McCain camp come out against these smears. There has been an all out campaign to smear Obama. Meanwhile, Obama told the media to back off the Palin story. He reminded them that his mother was 18 when she had him. He said families are off limits.

So for the McCain camp to throw the blame at the democrats for outing Sarah Palin, when the McCain camp should've let the public know up front, is an outrage. Their excuse is they couldn't let the public know upfront, Palin was introduced on Friday and she couldn't announce it in her speech.

Well, if they hadn't been so intent on politicking and announcing the day after the democratic convention, they could've allowed time to let the public know.

Here's why it matters: If a poor teen of color gets pregnant it's a scurrilous event but when it's a rich white family, it's the best thing since sliced bread. Sarah Palin is practically a hero at this point.

Here's another reason why it matters:
Palin and McCain believe in abstinence-only education. While she may be able to support her daughter's child, there are poor teens who aren't able to do that. So what's good for her family isn't necessarily what's good for America.

It's hypocrisy at its ugliest.

Palin Sure Did Spice Up Election

A hot governor and mooseburgers and a pregnant, unmarried teen daughter. It doesn't get any better. You wonder: Why didn't McCain pick Bobby Jindal?

Republicans at the convention are saying Sarah Palin's daughter's pregnancy is a private matter. They aren't the least bit dissuaded in their support of Palin. Why should they be? A teen girl is keeping her baby and marrying the father, who by the way, is named Levi (they are refusing to give any other details) --These are all things that conservatives stand for.

They believe there is no other way. They believe they are the moral compass of America. They don't realize that there are teens out there without the support of a loving family (and conservatives don't support those kinds of families). They believe in marriage. A teen at 17 getting married? How sad. Sad, sad, sad.

Who is going to take care of Sarah Palin's children and grandchildren if she's vice president? Did she think of the ramifications of her teen daughter being in the spotlight? Did John McCain really know? Here's another thing to think about. It's okay for a white family to have hordes of kids. But what if Obama's daughter was in the same situation? Can you imagine the stoning?

With the Palin pick, it's apparent that the evangelicals are once again poised to come out and vote in large numbers for McCain. We'll have a Bush repeat if Americans aren't wiser.

The wingnuts have begun casting stones at the Obama camp. But it is the wingnuts who preach sin and abstinence to the rest of us.

Just more hypocrisy. More of the same. I wonder what else Sarah Palin has to offer. She's turned out to be a beautiful distraction, just what McCain needed-relief from his dismal, dusty, old man campaign. 

Bristol Palin Pregnant

After rumors on the Internet that Bristol Palin, Sarah Palin's 17 year old daughter, was really the mother of Trig, Sarah Palin has announced that her daughter is 5 months pregnant and will keep the baby and marry the father, who we only know as Levi. I'm sure the wingnuts will swing this into a terrific thing. The left will say this is an example that abstinence education doesn't work. Mostly, I feel for her daughter. 

It sounds like Sarah Palin has a lot of things going on in her life. I wonder if John McCain was aware of this before he chose Palin. I'm sure he'll say he was.

Politico: Besieged by blog rumors about her 17-year-old daughter, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin — named Friday as running mate of Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) — released a statement Monday saying her daughter is pregnant and plans to marry the father.

The governor and her husband, Todd, said their daughter, Bristol, plans to keep the baby.

"Our beautiful daughter Bristol came to us with news that as parents we knew would make her grow up faster than we had ever planned," the Palins said in the statement. "As Bristol faces the responsibilities of adulthood, she knows she has our unconditional love and support."

Liberal bloggers have speculated extensively about the possibility that Palin's fifth child, born this spring, was actually her daughter's.

Palin's presence on the ticket has thrilled evangelical conservatives - many of whom are strongly opposed to premarital sex. But Palin also is revered by the conservative base for her fierce opposition to abortion and the her family's decision to keep an unplanned baby likely will only bolster those credentials.

More on the spicy governor.

Palin Never on Meet the Press

She poses for Vogue

But she made the cover of Alaska for being hot and she likes moose burgers and her nickname was Sarah Barracuda. Maureen Dowd puts her lovely snarky twist on the Palin story. She also explains the meaning behind each of her kids' eclectic names: Trig, Bristol, Willow, Track, Piper.

NYT: It’s easy to see where this movie is going. It begins, of course, with a cute, cool unknown from Alaska who has never even been on “Meet the Press” triumphing over a cute, cool unknowable from Hawaii who has been on “Meet the Press” a lot.

Americans, suspicious that the Obamas have benefited from affirmative action without being properly grateful, and skeptical that Michelle really likes “The Brady Bunch” and “The Dick Van Dyke Show,” reject the 47-year-old black contender as too uppity and untested.

Instead, they embrace 72-year-old John McCain and 44-year-old Sarah Palin, whose average age is 58, a mere two years older than the average age of the Obama-Biden ticket. Enthusiastic Republicans don’t see the choice of Palin as affirmative action, despite her thin résumé and gaping absence of foreign policy knowledge, because they expect Republicans to put an underqualified “babe,” as Rush Limbaugh calls her, on the ticket. They have a tradition of nominating fun, bantamweight cheerleaders from the West, like the previous Miss Congeniality types Dan Quayle and W., and then letting them learn on the job. So they crash into the globe a few times while they’re learning to drive, what’s the big deal?

Obama may have been president of The Harvard Law Review, but Palin graduated from the University of Idaho with a minor in poli-sci and worked briefly as a TV sports reporter. And she was tougher on the basketball court than the ethereal Obama, earning the nickname “Sarah Barracuda.”

The legacy of Geraldine Ferraro was supposed to be that no one would ever go on a blind date with history again. But that crazy maverick and gambler McCain does it, and conservatives and evangelicals rally around him in admiration of his refreshingly cynical choice of Sarah, an evangelical Protestant and anti-abortion crusader who became a hero when she decided to have her baby, who has Down syndrome, and when she urged schools to debate creationism as well as that stuffy old evolution thing.

Check out Palin's resume.
How Palin is polling.