For my family, one of the best parts of this primary election has been talking about it to our five-year old. We follow politics closely and openly discuss political news and opinion at home, so she has picked up on the general idea of the Presidential Primary.
As political junkies, it's been a thrill to see her interested and animated by what's happening on the normally "boring" news. She knows I decided to vote for Barack Obama a long time ago, because he's a great man and father who has spawned a once-in-a-lifetime movement - reasons that have nothing to do with Hillary Clinton.
But as the Clinton campaign's attacks against Barack Obama have escalated, the political experience has become heart-wrenching - and not just because I had to explain the meaning of the word "attack" a few weeks ago. Hillary Clinton, a candidate I should be able to point to as a role model for my daughter is engaging in the kinds of behaviors that my kid would get a big, fat time-out for.
I won't re-hash the litany of Clinton attacks here, others have done so quite thoroughly. But the latest bullshit courtesy of Geraldine Ferraro (another female politician that I would have loved to point to as a role model for my daughter - oh well) and sanctioned by Candidate Clinton in her refusal to ask Geraldine to step down, puts to rest any notion this mommy had that Clinton was a figure worth looking up to.
You don't get much more right-wing than playing into the angry white vote by invoking the affirmative action race card - which make no mistake, Clinton has. I want my daughter to be nice, to fight fair, to honor the truth - characteristics Hillary Clinton seems incapable of embodying.