LETTER TO THE EDITOR:

Don’t always put blame on parents

Sandra Novelly, Las Vegas

Sun, Sep 7, 2008 (2:06 a.m.)

Regarding Florence Petris’ Friday letter to the editor in which she wrote that maybe Sarah Palin prefers politics to educating her children about the facts of life:

How can one automatically blame every teen pregnancy on the parents? For that matter, how can any teen screw-up automatically be blamed on the parents? Even excellent parents can have a child who, in a moment of personal weakness or as a result of peer pressure, makes a mistake.

Politics lays bare personal things in a candidate’s life that are better left to the privacy of the family and should not be dissected by those who do not know, and are not part of, that family.

I dare say if all the lives of all Americans were laid bare, the dirty laundry would reach from here to the moon and back again. Is anyone pristine enough to cast the first stone?

Discussion: 3 comments so far…

By mschaffer

9/7/08 at 7:18 a.m.

Suggest removal

Given that until Sarah Palin's failure as a parent came to light Bill O'Reilly put the responsibility completely on the parents as did most conservatives can we say hypocrisy?
By seasinger

9/7/08 at 8:17 a.m.

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mschaffer: you beat me to the punch. Unfortunately these days, once you put yourself in the public light, your life and your family's life become public fodder - rightly or wrongly. Did Palin not know that? If she did then I'm sorry she chose to let that happen to her family. If she didn't, she is remarkably naive.
By seasinger

9/7/08 at 9:02 a.m.

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And as a follow up: See http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cg...

"It hardly mattered that Obama so quickly and gracefully declared Palin's family life off limits to political posturing, or that it was an announcement from the McCain campaign that vaulted Bristol Palin's pregnancy from a buzz in the blogosphere to a Page 1 story in newspapers across the land."

No one to blame here for her personal business being on the front page but Palin, really.

As far as her daughter's pregnancy, of course kids make mistakes, but perhaps kids with access to complete information make wiser choices.