Last week I saw Michelle Obama speak. She's a heck of a speaker, too. Different than Barack, but polished and articulate (and clean). But when she spoke, she didn't have any props. Chris Coleman and Sen. Amy Klobuchar (who I got to meet today!) and then Michelle. What made this different than, say, a Palin rally?
No kids
That's right. After the convention, Sasha and Malia, who could probably charm their father a point or two in the polls, and definitely give him some credibility when people say he is a good family man. But instead of being campaign props, they are, you know, getting an education. That's right, they're in school. They still have to go to bed at 8:30 every night, and Michelle tries to make it back.
But not the Palin kids. Every time you see her, there are her school kids, playin' hooky. Take Piper, about the same age as Sasha and Malia. Here she is at a rally.
She also brings her kids to work.
Well, those Wasilla schools aren't that good anyway. Way to set an example.
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I decided to do some fuzzy math. I went on Google and did some news searches for the last month for some of the candidates' children. I wanted to see how much they are being used as props for the campaign. Here's what I got:
Barack Obama's children:
* Malia (age 10):
12
* Sasha (age 7):
1
* "Sasha and Malia":
81
* "Malia and Sasha":
26
Joe Biden's Children (all adults, and by the way, I can name all of Palin's—Track and Field, Bristol Myers Squibb, Weeping Willow, Pied Pier and Trig and Algebra—weirdly named kids, but don't know Joe's)
* Joe Biden III:
0 (a little harder to search for)
* Robert Biden:
1 (but it's not him)
* Naomi Biden:
0
* Ashley Biden:
3 (wow! three! but only one is actually her)
John McCain's children
* Douglas McCain (first marriage, likely thrown under the
bus Straight Talk Express):
6 (one in Russian, only one mentions him)
* Andrew McCain (first marriage):
13 (although most about a
high school golfer in Colorado)
* Sidney McCain (first marriage): Hard to count. Because Sidney is JSMIII's middle name you get
161. If you do a more advanced search, for
"Sidney McCain" but not "John Sidney McCain" yields 1, but that story references "John “McNasty” Sidney McCain." Let's call it 0.
* Meghan McCain:
355 — oh right, she's the unemployed
blogger on the campaign trail. I'm in my mid-20s, too. But I'm employed. (btw: they sent her to Maine — off the trail — and she wears Uggs. And some cheeky Britain
makes a funny. So…yeah.)
* John Sydney "Jack" McCain IV (22 years old, and, yeah, we searched for Jack):
42
* James "Jimmy" McCain (20, searched for Jimmy):
18
* Bridget McCain (17, adopted, according to Rove "the black one"):
12 (seems to be in school unlike, say, the Palins)
Okay now on to
Sarah Palin's Children, none of which will bother my spell checker:
* Track Palin (19 years old):
32 (remember, he's the on in Iraq, this search would exclude news about the day he was shipped out)
* Bristol Palin (17):
967 (or, more than all the previous children, combined!)
* Willow Palin (13):
21
* Piper Palin (7):
22
* Trig Palin (0):
72
Okay, that's a bunch, but doesn't seem like that much. Let's try some combinations, shall we (all searches for exact phrases)?
* Bristol and Willow:
80
* Bristol and Piper:
374
* Piper and Trig:
119
* Willow and Piper:
430
* Track, Bristol, Willow, Piper and Trig:
111
And I could go on, but these names are driving me insane.
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Let's add up, shall we:
Obama: 13, 94 with pairs
Biden: 4, but really only 2
McCain:
marriage 1: 19, but really only 4 or 5.
marriage 2: 427
grand total: 446
Palin: 1114, 1094 more with pairs, and I didn't even search all of them
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Now, McCain's kids, like Meghan, sort of have an excuse: she's in that time when, thanks to the Bush economy, it's hard to get a job, so she's being supported by her parents. I was there — it's not fun — of course I was not traveling around in a bus looking at foliage. The rest of the kids are pretty close to on par with Obama's kids, considering they're a bit older. Biden's kids are adults, and have jobs or something.
Then there are the Palins. One would surmise that they could have stayed in school up in Wasilla. But, no, they are being dragged around the country as props for the campaign. Kids the same age as the Obamas are being mentioned in the news more than ten times as often, and, hey, Obama is actually running for president. They want Bristol and hubby-to-be to be left along, but there she is in the backdrop of every other news report prancing around with her pregnancy thing. Shouldn't a 17-year-old high school senior be, you know, in school, pregnant or not? Levi dropped out, is she next?
The Obamas value education; their kids are staying in school this fall even though they could surely be out making people smile on the campaign. The Palins, whose whole venture in to higher education took five years and six colleges (or is is six and five) don't seem to feel the same way. They're obviously real Americans. I mean it's not like we have a public education system or anything.