Palin gave up $130,000 year job on principle.

OK, let's talk about a real issue -- character. Obama likes to talk about how he gave up a 6-figure job as a lawyer to take a "$12,000 a year" job as a community organizer. While in fact Obama's job paid $20,000 after he finished training, and he got significant raises each year, it is certainly true that at that point in his life, Obama saw something more important than money.

Well, I'm watching the MSNBC show about Sarah Palin. And I learned something I didn't know. It turns out that the job she had on the Alaska oil commission paid $130,000 a year (at least according to MSNBC).

As you may know, when she found corruption in the organization, she turned in the head (a republican). She then RESIGNED. Sarah Palin, hardly a rich person, gave up a $130,000 a year job ON PRINCIPLE. Not for another lower-paying job that would enhance her political career.

Because the person she turned in was the Head of the republican party, she had supposedly destroyed her political career. But she saw a chance for change, so she looked for more corruption, and took out another corrupt politiican who had to resign.

THen she runs against a sitting Republican Governor, and beats him. And of course that's the rest of the story.

But there is no way in 2004, when she gave up the dream job paying $130,00 a year, and a certainly bright political future, that she would know how it would turn out. All she knew was that what was happening was wrong, and she stood up and was counted.


Now the Democrats want to call her character into question, just as they try to call McCain's character into question. Character assassination is hardly what you'd expect from a campaign that is about issues, but I think her story belies the untruthfulness of the attacks.

In the end, while Palin was sitting in her modest home with her husband and family, wondering what they would do now that she had given up a 6-figure salary, her character was revealed.

Argue over whether she is experienced enough. Challenge, if you dare, her position about gun rights. Try to discuss the issue of aborting down babies against her. But let's not falsely smear the character of a good woman simply to win an election.

As another commenter said in another post -- this is not some game that you "win" at any costs. And it's not worth destroying the personal lives of our candidates.