Governor Sarah Palin is famously opposed to abortion - even in cases of rape, and even, as she said in 2006, if the victim were her own daughter. Since then, the governor has walked the walk - unlike the hypocritical Rhode Island legislator I once interviewed who voted to bar abortion counseling in that state, and then arranged for his teenaged daughter to get an abortion in New York.
Two years after Palin delivered that speech, her teenage daughter Bristol is pregnant -- though not as a result of rape -- and she will be having the baby. Palin herself has also faced a situation where many have chosen abortion. Pregnant at age 44, she learned as a result of a blood test that the child she was carrying had Down syndrome. Baby Trig now accompanies her on the campaign trail
Yet according to her standard stump speech, the adamantly pro-life Palin apparently did make a choice when told that the baby would have special needs. She and her husband “talked, prayed, reflected and ultimately decided to have the child,” the New York Times reports. According to my thesaurus, “decide” is a synonym for “choose.” A decision is a choice.
Sarah Palin was still a child when many women in this country fought for the right she would later avail herself of, the right to reflect and then to choose. I wonder whether her daughter was allowed the same control over her own reproductive fate -- since Palin also believes that minors should be required to have parental consent to get an abortion.
In her own life, it seems that Sarah “pro-life” Palin is also Sarah “pro-choice” Palin. I'm all for that. You chose, Sarah, as was your right. Think hard about the justice of denying that right to others.
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Women will always have abortions. The only question is "will they be safe?" And we all know that if men could become pregnant, abortion would be a sacrament.
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