This is an odd one, Palins 5th child is apparantly her 17 year old daughters?

[jojosmaman]

... according to some reports in the US?

here

I'm actually more angry about this at the moment. It doesn't seem to be of as much interest to the media though.

Bobthebudda.

I should have included a WARNING -the link I gave is very distressing.

Dittany, McCain has, exactly as you put it, been 'questioned about the fatherhood of children in (his) family'
As for you, you have not just criticised behaviour, you have resorted to sexist name-calling on this thread, which nobody had done to you, and I really think that didn't reflect awfully well on you. I'll say it again, while the rumours are mean and untrue, that doesn't mean we all have to believe they are misogynistic, especially given than male candidates do have to battle rumours about lying about mystery children and have done so for quite a while. When someone criticises a woman the criticisms may or may not be misogynistic, just as when someone (eg: you) criticises a black person (eg: Obama) that doesn't make them automatically racist.
And yes, sometimes people feel that someone is so dangerous it would be good to get rid of them by any means necessary. And frankly, I feel like that about Palin, and I feel like that about McCain, and I certainly felt like that about Bush. I also think it would have been good if Hitler had been more effectively blown to smithereens by his own high command in the 30s. I'm not saying Palin, McCain and Bush are equivalent to Hitler, and I'm certainly not saying Obama is perfect (I think, and have posted to say so, that he talks anodyne rubbish and I have no idea what he really stands for) but sometimes a politician's beliefs are so nasty and dangerous that the most important thing is not their temporarily hurt feelings, but that they don't get into power.

Dittany, Palin is on record as saying she is open to creationism being taught in schools. That is enough to make her a creationist in my opinion, otherwise why should she support such a ridiculous proposal. I can find no record of Obama saying anything of the kind. Perhaps you would like to supply a link.

Good for Obama. Here is his response when asked about Palin at a press conference today:

"Back off these kinds of stories. I have said before and I will repeat again: People's families are off limits," Obama said. "And people's children are especially off-limits. This shouldn't be part of our politics. It has no relevance to Gov. Palin's performance as a governor or her potential performance as a vice president. So I would strongly urge people to back off these kinds of stories. You know my mother had me when she was 18 and how a family deals with issues and teenage children, that shouldn?t be a topic of our politics."

You need to check the latest news, it's not the daughters baby, however, she is pregnant.

You need to check the latest news, it's not the daughters baby, however, she is pregnant.

American politics have always been pretty dirty. It's not a modern phenomena by any means. Mainly because American politics is very much about individuals, not party, so it is felt to be fair game to pull candidates apart on the basis of character, family background etc.. Partly because policy appears to be a minor factor, partly because corruption seems much more normal (or perhaps more open) so there is always plenty to dig up, and partly because of the first amendment, so less worry about being brought to court for slander. I wonder how much of the nature of presidential elections being so light weight on policy is because although we think of the president as being very powerful, in fact (at least on the domestic front) they are very much held in check by Congress (even when Congress is held by the same party as the President) due to the separation of the legislature and the executive. In the UK the winning party and therefore the Prime Minister is much more powerful, and so Manifestos are much more real.

Re the Mumsnet interest in the conspiracy theory it seems to me quite like the speculation about Tom Cruise's daughter being his, and I didn't see anyone claiming that was misogynistic, even though clearly Katie Holmes would have had to be in on any cover up (not saying anything about the veracity of the speculation btw).

I don't see any particular evidence that the Democrats were behind any of the rumour mongering in any case. Of course everyone is going to be digging about Sarah Palin and seeing if there any dirty secrets in her cupboard. Prior to McCain's announcement she was an unknown outside of Alaska and today she is front page news. That's what happens when you decide to enter the political limelight in the US (one reason why the quality of candidates at this level is not perhaps the highest).

Is it misogynistic of me to point out that getting on a plane while leaking amniotic fluid, and not arriving at a hospital until nearly 24 hours after the leaking started, when the baby's 4 weeks early, shows very bad judgement and could have had awful consequences for the baby?

Am also very uncomfortable with the return-to-work-after-72-hours thing, wouldn't want her making decisions about maternity leave entitlements... but I think in the end that one has to be her choice.

"MsDemeanour the only reason that McCain had that said about him was because they were using racism against him."
That's what YOU say. I'd say an allegation of a secret extra-marital affair in which a child was born, an allegation of a fake adoption, an allegation of lying about that affair, and an allegation that the wife was complicit in that lie not only sounds like an allegation of SEXUAL misconduct to me, but it also sounds very much as if they were questioning the true parentage of McCain's child.
As for the fact that no father has ever been 'accused' of not being the father of his claimed bio child....well, we have been over that one. It's because men and women have babies differently. Of course Obama couldn't actually be accused of faking his pregnancy with the connivance of his wife in order to cover up the underage pregnancy of their own teenage daughter in order to save his political skin - for very obvious reasons!
To accuse Michelle of having been unfaithful to Obama and passing off another man's child as her husband's in order to cover up her own infidelity, is a total different sort of smear. That's an allegation of sexual misconduct by a woman. And how accusing a woman of having an affair, and secretly bearing two children over a period of years from that affair as less misogynistic than saying that a woman lied to protect her and her teenage daughter's reputation, I'm really not sure.
This rumour/smear was the result of a very specific set of circumstances. Sarah Palin was not known so there were at first no pictures of her pregnant. There was the fact that her teenage daughter has been taken out of school for months. The fact that Sarah was back at her desk three days after the birth of a baby also seemed strange, and the fact that there was clearly something up with the teenage daughter, who appeared on the podium holding the baby, looking nervous, and concealing her billowing figure under a giant baby blanket added to the sense that there could be something in the rumour. Even I realised there was something going on with the daughter, though I couldn't work out what it was. I even mentioned to my husband that it was strange the way she stood there so glumly covered in baby blanket. Now we all know why there was a sense that something was being, quite literally (!) covered up in the Palin camp - and that it was her daughter's teen pregnancy, not a baby switch.
As for the 'unique' nature of the allegations (which I dispute), Obama has however, been accused of being the Anti-Christ. I don't think I've ever seen a woman candidate of any colour be accused of that one. Nor have I seen a female candidate be accused of conceiving a secret love child with a party worker.
As for the 'any means possible' - yup, I think the huge danger which I believe is posed by Sarah Palin and her like means that if a false rumour puts her out of the running (which it hastn't) that is by far the lesser of two evils.

What REALLY pisses me off is that the first woman to get near the White House is a pro gun, pro life, anti environmental, Creationist Neo-con. Not that is the real problem - not who is the parent of which child. That's all campaigning nonsense. It's what she believes in and stands for that's important. And the fact that she is probably the only sort of woman that the red-necks would vote for - and therefore the only sort of woman that has the remotest chance of making it to the White House.

seeker, despite actually quite liking the woman (although not so big on the neo-con thing) I agree with you. Drives me absolutely barking mad that we're not talking about what policy issues she stands for, we're talking about all this gossipy crap.

I feel sorry for Palin's daughter, having her private business splashed all over the media. And for being in a position where, whether she wanted to or not, she's pretty much forced to keep the baby and marry its father.

I feel sorry for her daughter too, edam. But we are talking about a woman who may soon be the "leader of the Free World"

We should be talking about politics, not personalities, policies not gossip.

Quite, seeker.

"One of the biggest difficulties for feminism is getting women to realise when they are being insulted because most of the time most women pretend that it isn't happening."

Wow. I get it now. It's misogynistic, but we're all too stupid and unenlightened to realise it.

That's just balls.

Of course Palin feels hurt, upset and angry about the rumours. That's because they're nasty and vicious and low.

But that doesn't make them misogynistic.

It makes them nasty and vicious and low. Full Stop. End Of.

Practically speaking, it seems pretty clear to me that the Democrats are going to be incredibly wary of any attacks on Palin that could in any way be construed of being sexist. Even if (as has been argued on here), they are nasty bigoted sexists then it would seem utterly insane to pursue this line of attack when they're currently trying to woo back the female Clinton voters.

What is equally clear is that, in addition to the usual mud-slinging, they've fervently adopted a couple of standard tactics out of the Karl Rove playbook.

1. Find your opponents' weaknessses and exploit them mercilessly (e.g. Troopergate, supporting drilling in protected areas)

and

1. Take your opponents' strengths and try to take them apart using whatever it takes(e.g. she presents herself as a good Christian rightwinger with strong family values, let's find anything that shows she's not). This is exactly where they're at at the moment.

If the latter fails, then the next one will be to use her perceived strengths against her (e.g. Obama is very popular with the masses = vacuous celebrity.... Palin has strong Christian values = she'll ban abortions).

All very unpleasant, but not sexit.

Too true, cestlavie. I have to say, the US elections do invite personal attacks (this doesn't mean they're justified) by the way they like to drag their whole religion/family into the election.

You make your personal life part of your campaign, then people are going to dig away at it. It's not nice, but it's true.

I know, and Palin would clearly have known this when she accepted the ticket.

It is appalling though, that in the self-professed home of democracy that so little of the campaigning is about politics and so much about personalities. Although I've feeling following the campaign fairly closely I'd still struggle to tell you much of Obama/ McCain's policies beyond their foreign policy - I may just be a naif but hell, as far as I can tell the first detailed policy speach Obama made was when he took the nomination last week!

Like you say, it's all about image and personality, not actual policies. Trouble is, we're getting like that over here, too! Look at poor old Gordon, suffering dreadfully from not playing the PR game.