Palin, cont.

A woman, but why this woman?
via Drudge, from the Baltimore Sun

Susan Reimer, a female columnist, echoes many of the sentiments that I've heard ad nauseum since the Palin pick, from female liberal friends, in the papers, around my office, etc., that they're "insulted" by McCain's selection for VP, as if he made the choice solely to appeal to them.

John McCain picked Sarah Palin, governor of Alaska and mother of five, to be his running mate to woo women like me. He seems to think that my girlfriends and I are so disappointed that an utterly qualified woman is not going to be president that we will jump at the chance to vote for an utterly unqualified woman for vice president.

Reimer then goes on to complain:

Does McCain think we will be so grateful for a skirt on the ticket that we won't notice that she's anti-abortion, a member of the NRA and thinks creationism should be taught alongside evolution?

Here's a thought, Susan. Maybe McCain actually couldn't care less who you and your girlfriends vote for. Maybe, because you only seem to consider a female candidate truly representative of your gender if she completely agrees with your positions, maybe McCain realizes that you wouldn't vote for him unless he had picked Hillary Clinton to be his running mate. Maybe he's written you off months ago, and he actually chose Sarah Palin as his running mate because she's smart, charismatic, knows energy policy backwards and forwards, because she's pro-life, because she's been a lifelong NRA member, and because she'll appeal to all those millions of women out there who think exactly the opposite of you.

I find it incredibly self-centered and egotistical (which shouldn't really come as a surprise, considering I live and work in New York City, and am therefore surrounded constantly by some of the most self-centered, liberal females in existence) that liberal women can claim to feel insulted that McCain had the nerve to select a woman as his running mate who wasn't a pro-abortion liberal, as if it was the Republicans who chose not to nominate the first pro-abortion woman with an actual shot at winning the presidency. Susan, the Democrats had their shot to nominate a liberal woman. You chose not to. No one is forcing you to vote for McCain/Palin, but to act as if Palin's selection is somehow a personal insult directed at you is moronic. It is a great thing for women everywhere, and to try to cheapen her historic achievement by declaring it illegitimate due to your differences in policy does a much greater disservice to women than John McCain ever could.

Get over yourself.