From Sam Tomaino…
I have never harassed you about political statements, but I have this question. You say that if Sarah Palin want the media to lay off her family, they should stop parading them around. Didn't Barack Obama put his family on display at the Democratic Convention? And wasn't it he who said that kids are off limits? Must Sarah Palin hide her children away just so they won't get picked on?
To some extent, yes…and even that wouldn't stop it altogether. Remember back when John McCain and Rush Limbaugh used to make jokes based on the premise that Chelsea Clinton was ugly? You're always going to have a certain amount of that. When you go into public life, you drag your family along with you.
Now, there are degrees of how much you're inviting folks to pay attention to your kin. Certainly if you claimed your son is a straight-A student and then reporters got hold of his report card and it was full of Ds, that would get mentioned. And certainly if the kids don't trot out on stage or pose for pics, it's a little more inappropriate to focus on them. But it's going to happen either way and those who enter public life need to just accept it.
A lot of it is like actors or performers who struggle to become famous and to enjoy all the perks and rewards and ego gratification that come with fame…and then complain about the downsides. There are many: You get pestered for autographs when it's inconvenient and you get hate mail and stalkers, and there are other drawbacks. But you can't have it both ways and you also can't erect a little firewall around yourself that keeps both away from your friends and family. It would be nice if you could but it doesn't work that way.
Yeah, Barack Obama rolled his kids out for inspection, too. I would have admired him if he hadn't but I guess that wouldn't have spared them from the spotlight…merely caused his opponents to suggest he was hiding them because he was ashamed of them or they weren't really his or something. I think one of the stupider things we consider at election time is whether the candidate can line up his or her family and look like a Norman Rockwell painting for twenty minutes. Not to belittle the "values" those photo-ops are supposed to represent but a lot of those portraits are illusory and even when they aren't, so what? It would be quite easy to be a good parent and still be a lousy or corrupt president or senator or whatever.
Sarah Palin's kids seem quite happy and/or willing to be used as campaign props. So were Obama's daughters and of course, so is his wife. I don't like the term "fair game" because I don't think it's a game…but as far as I'm concerned, when a candidate says, "Leave my family alone," what they're really saying is "Don't interfere with the image we're trying to sell of my home life." Similarly, when they say, "Leave my opponent's family alone," they're being gracious…and maybe distancing themselves from comments they know are inevitable. They're probably also positioning themselves to say "Leave my family alone" when applicable.
By the way: I corrected a typo in Sam's message when he referred to "Sarah Plain." Make up your own comment about that one.