"Who cares?" asked Nicole Wallace, McCain Campaign Strategist (and formerly a top figure from the Bush-Cheney reelection campaign). Ms. Wallace's response was to a question posed by Time's Washington Bureau Chief Jay Carney. Mr. Carney asked "Can Sarah Palin answer tough questions about foreign and domestic policy?".
http://www.time-blog.com/...
The McCain campaign is now blaming the media and the Obama campaign for "attacks" on Governor Palin and her family and claiming she will not allow herself to be subjected to such attacks.
First of all, the attacks are questions, and important ones. McCain/Palin (and Obama/Biden) are applying for the the highest office in America, the most powerful country in the world. If any presidential or vice-presidential candidate lack the courage to face challenging questions from the press corps, how do we expect them to face the challenges inherent in running America's Executive Branch?
As a society we cannot expect any individual to withstand the questioning of 100's of millions of voters. We place some of our diminishing trust in journalists to ask the difficult questions and to report the responses. Reporting of such information (in a clear and unbiased manner) is a crucial pillar of a free and democratic society.
Any candidate should be willing and able to answer to the people they seek to serve. There are no questions that are off-limits. The fact that Governor Palin's child is pregnant is especially relevant when her party makes "family values" a central, recurring theme.
Evading America's questions and withholding information is reflective of disregard for the democratic process on which America was founded.
Certainly there is plenty of recent precedent of contempt for our Constitution and law. Let us not forget the same blind trust the McCain campaign is asking the American people to extend is what led to the disastrous war in Iraq that continues to cost American life (and Iraqi life). The same blind trust has led to record gasoline prices (and oil industry profits), Enron, the "Patriot" act, the betrayal of a CIA agent, the politicization of the Department of Justice and many other offenses against American society that will affect most Americans (regardless of political ideology) for generations.
The American people demand and deserve answers to even the most difficult and personal questions not another four years of contempt for the American people cloaked in false imagery and scripted responses.