Madame Change
All sorts of information has surfaced about the Republican vice-presidential nominee the past week or so. That certainly isn't surprising. After all, very few people knew who Sarah Palin was when Sen. McCain announced his selection for a running mate. We now know all sorts of stuff about this hockey mom, and much of it isn't very flattering. The latest revelation has to do with her attempt at book-banning while she was mayor of Wasilla, Alaska. Today's Sacramento Bee (a McClatchy newspaper) published an article written by Rindi White of the Anchorage Daily News on the subject.
Back in 1996, when she first became mayor, Sarah Palin asked the city librarian if she would be all right with censoring library books should she be asked to do so.
According to news coverage at the time, the librarian said she would definitely not be all right with it. A few months later, the librarian, Mary Ellen Emmons, got a letter from Palin telling her she was going to be fired. The censorship issue was not mentioned as a reason for the firing. The letter said the new mayor felt Emmons didn't fully support her and had to go.
Emmons had been city librarian for seven years and was well-liked. After a wave of public support for her, Palin relented. [Emphasis added]
Now, I wonder just which books Mayor Palin had in mind. Tropic Of Cancer? Ulysses? Huckleberry Finn? Catcher In The Rye? The Book Of Mormon, or maybe the Koran? The possibilities are endless. Still, to be fair, Mayor Palin did offer a defense of her actions back then:
Palin, questioned at the time, called her inquiries rhetorical and simply part of a policy discussion with a department head "about understanding and following administration agendas," according to the Frontiersman article. [Emphasis added]
Let's assume, if only for the moment, that she was in fact just "vetting" her department heads. Is this what we really want in our White House, especially after the last nearly eight years? Someone who expects appointees to understand and follow the administration agendas?
Been there, done that.
Under George Walker Bush, we've had appointees at the DOJ, Interior, FDA, FEMA, NASA, DHS and most of the other federal agencies whose only qualifications were that they understood and would follow the administration agendas, and look what that got us. Mass firings of those who didn't pass a litmus test, a "Clean Air Act" that wasn't, tainted food, the destruction of a major US city, censored speeches on climate change, and the shredding of the Bill of Rights.
This is the kind of change Sen. McCain and Gov. Palin would bring to Washington, DC?
Why, it almost makes book-banning preferable.
Back in 1996, when she first became mayor, Sarah Palin asked the city librarian if she would be all right with censoring library books should she be asked to do so.
According to news coverage at the time, the librarian said she would definitely not be all right with it. A few months later, the librarian, Mary Ellen Emmons, got a letter from Palin telling her she was going to be fired. The censorship issue was not mentioned as a reason for the firing. The letter said the new mayor felt Emmons didn't fully support her and had to go.
Emmons had been city librarian for seven years and was well-liked. After a wave of public support for her, Palin relented. [Emphasis added]
Now, I wonder just which books Mayor Palin had in mind. Tropic Of Cancer? Ulysses? Huckleberry Finn? Catcher In The Rye? The Book Of Mormon, or maybe the Koran? The possibilities are endless. Still, to be fair, Mayor Palin did offer a defense of her actions back then:
Palin, questioned at the time, called her inquiries rhetorical and simply part of a policy discussion with a department head "about understanding and following administration agendas," according to the Frontiersman article. [Emphasis added]
Let's assume, if only for the moment, that she was in fact just "vetting" her department heads. Is this what we really want in our White House, especially after the last nearly eight years? Someone who expects appointees to understand and follow the administration agendas?
Been there, done that.
Under George Walker Bush, we've had appointees at the DOJ, Interior, FDA, FEMA, NASA, DHS and most of the other federal agencies whose only qualifications were that they understood and would follow the administration agendas, and look what that got us. Mass firings of those who didn't pass a litmus test, a "Clean Air Act" that wasn't, tainted food, the destruction of a major US city, censored speeches on climate change, and the shredding of the Bill of Rights.
This is the kind of change Sen. McCain and Gov. Palin would bring to Washington, DC?
Why, it almost makes book-banning preferable.
Labels: Election 2008
posted by Diane at 3:30 PM
1 Comments:
If only our candidate could be relied upon to raise your issues in public. Instead we have another Kerry with potentially identical results.
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