Wee!

I really need to do this more often.  As it is, I'm getting out of practice.  But then again, I always tend to find that I'm much more on my game when we are in a political midwinter, rather than when the campaign season is in full swing.  After all, while there is something to be said for widespread involvment in politics, it's much easier for me to focus on the innanities of the crypto-fascism which has been passing itself off as reasonable conservativism in America when the news media isn't playing convention hilights 24/7.

Anyway, today's column is from regular Bryan Fischer who is going to explain to us why exactly the news that Sarah Palin's 17 year old daughter is five months pregnant with a boyfriend who describes himself on his mypsace page as "a fucking redneck" totally proves that sex-ed loving liberals are totally out of touch with the salt-of-the-earth, plainspoken people who make up the "real America."  One can only imagine what the pundits would have to say if Chelsea Clinton was in her shoes.  Let's give it a looksee.

When left-wing bloggers began to spread the malicious and unfounded rumor that Sarah Palin had faked her pregnancy with her recently born son Trig in order to protect her 16 — year-old daughter, Ms. Palin and her husband released a statement revealing that their now-17-year-old daughter is five months along in an out-of-wedlock pregnancy.

Fears that the son's name was actually, in fact, "Trig" proved to be entirely justified, unfortunately.

Prior to this announcement, Alan Colmes, Sean Hannity's counterpart on Hannity & Colmes, suggested that Palin herself was to blame for her son's Down syndrome condition by failing to give him adequate pre-natal care.

While I certainly do applaud Mr. Colmes for raising the issue of inadequate pre-natal care in the case of Sarah Palin, the fact is he forgot to raise the possability that Trig's mental retardation is perhaps hereditary.  Either that or his mom made the inexcusable mistake of watching too many George W. Bush speeches while pregnant with the young master Trig.

I've received some snarky emails over the weekend about this latest revelation, including one compassionate liberal who referred to the "bastard grandchild" that the Palins' daughter now carries.

Wow.  You can almost hear the painin Fischer's voice.  Tell me, Bryan.  Are our blast-faxes holding a better batting average over at snopes.com than those that come out of your camp?  Or is the spelling just better?

We will watch with interest to see if the senator's self-identified paragons of compassion in the blogosphere follow their leader. The Idaho Statesman has shown its willingness to hit below the belt by going after a pro-family legislator for decisions made by his 28-year-old son. We'll see whether its editors follow Obama's advice and show restraint in this circumstance.

I know!  It would be just like those fiendish LIEberals to go after the innocent children and families of thier political opponents in an attempt to derail their campaign.  Good thing Senator McCain has never been known to do such a thing.

              
Say what you will, but only one of these pictures screams out "Prison Beauty Pageant"

Several thoughts:

All right!  This makes my job easy!

Christians aren't perfect, just forgiven. The Judeo-Christian tradition teaches us that all men are fallen creatures, with a built-in tilt toward sin and self-destructive behavior. Christians know this better than anyone; why else would we acknowledge our need for a Savior? In fact, you can't even become a Christian without passing through the doorway of repentance, which is a confession of personal failure and moral weakness.

Which means that it''s ok for them to spend thousands of dollars on hookers to indulge in their diaper fetishes, shoot up meth and have gay sex with male prostitutes while condeming such practices from the pulipt, soliciting sex from undercover cops, abusing children, and sending raunchy IMs to their interns.  So long as they remember to genuflect on the way out the door.

Sure, we libs fuck up all the time.  At least we don't go around blaming satan or the lack of 10 commandments monuments for our own personal failings.

And besides, our scandals usually involve consenting adults of a hetero disposition.

When a Christian fails, he is faced with a fresh set of choices and what counts is whether he chooses to do the right thing at that point.

As opposed to atheists who...you know...lack options and stuff.

The Palin's daughter is not denying her failure, is not justifying her behavior, and is doing the right thing by carrying this baby to term and giving it life. Gov. Palin made the McCain campaign aware of her daughter's pregnancy in her first interview with them about the vice-presidency. The family has done all that they should do to deal with the hand they've been dealt in an honest and honorable way.

Well at 5 months into the pregnancy, you're going to have a hell of a time getting an abortion anyway so the whole "she made a tough choice" meme isn't really gonna cut it.  I mean, sure, I suppose she could have done what countless of other unwed redneck mothers do and dumped her fetus in a dumpster behind the local Wal Mart for the sled dogs to eat and no one would be any the wise, but COME ON.

The Palins can only be accused of hypocrisy if they had taught their daughter that sex outside of marriage is o.k. But they didn't.

Technically.  Charges of incompetence on the other hand are entirely justifiable.

Gov. Palin has been an unapologetic advocate of abstinence education. Teenage children possess the most precious of God's gift, the gift of free will, and can use that priceless gift to either follow or reject the counsel of their parents.

So much for the effectivness of their own regimen.  Maybe if she'd been taught to use a condom or something, this whole messy situation might have been avoided ya know?

(On another note, does it seem like Bryan is ever so quietly trying to shift the blame onto Bristol?  I mean, what he's arguing here is analogous to a parent telling their child not to play in the pool unsupervised, and then washing their hands of the whole affair when the kid drowns instead of, you know, covering the damn thing up.)

The Palins' daughter is old enough to be responsible for her own decisions. Her parents can hardly be blamed for a near-adult daughter who is morally responsible for her own life choices. In the Jewish tradition, a boy becomes a "son of the law" (the literal translation of "bar-mitzvah"), at age 12 or 13, meaning that from that point onward he is considered an adult when it comes to his personal responsibility to obey the moral standards of his tradition. Jewish daughters go through a "bat-mitzvah" at the same age for the same reason.

Translation: If girls and boys were considered fully-fledged adults at age 12 or 13 hundreds of years ago in the near east, then it's only right and fair that Sarah Palin and her husband be absolved of all responsibilities for their daughter's life choices at age 17.  Tag no tagbacks double backsies olly olly oxenfree!

As a pastor for 25 years, I had a number of opportunities to assist families with this exact scenario — a young girl, still living at home, the daughter of parents who had taught her that sex was reserved for marriage, pregnant out of wedlock. My counsel was always the same: Your daughter needs your unconditional love and support, the child she carries has a right to life, and the priority after the child is born is to make sure that he is placed in a loving home with two parents who are married to each other. The Palins are taking that exact course with their daughter.

So in other words, parents, you followed my exact instructions and taught your kids that sex was bad without going into the details about how to have safe sex and make informed decisions if they CHOSE to have sex, so if your kids ignored you and got themselves in trouble...well now let's just move on with our lives and make room for the $80,000 investment that's going to be coming down the road in a few months.  Hope you have a crib picked out.

The family needs our prayers. I know from my personal experience with families who have faced this circumstance that it is a challenging and stressful one even when the circumstances are known only to a few. For a family to have to walk through this in the painful glare of the national media and vicious left-wing critics is not something we would wish on our worst enemies.

Unless your worst enemies are liberals (viz. Bill Clinton or John Edwards), in which case, bring on the popcorn!
See you next time!