This letter was sent out today from the National PTA in regards to Governor Palin's involvement in the PTA. I found it very interesting, what are your thoughts?
----- Original Message -----
From: Todd Haiken
To: Federal Legislative Chair
Cc: James Martinez ; Byron Garrett
Sent: Wednesday, September 03, 2008 5:46 PM
Subject: [legislativechair] Governor Palin and PTA
Good afternoon:
If you’ve read the news in the past few days, I’m sure you’ve heard PTA’s name a few times. We’ve had several inquiries about Governor Palin’s involvement in PTA and I’m guessing you have too. According to the Alaska PTA, Sarah Palin was a PTA member for two years in the mid- 90's in the Wasilla, Alaska area. She has never served in PTA at the state level in any capacity and the National office has not worked with her in her official capacity as governor.
As you all know, PTA does not and cannot support any candidate for public office as a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization. If you are asked what you think about Palin, we ask that you decline to comment. We can only wish her luck but as an organization we are restricted in what we can do. Please direct all media inquiries to James Martinez, Manager of Media Relations at 800-307-4782 x325.
All my best,
Todd
Thursday, September 4, 2008
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28 comments:
Because I am a PTA member I am advised not to give an opinion on Palin? What the hell? I would not ever comment on behalf of the PTA, but I am free state my personal opinon, why was this email even sent?
who cares?
how about Joe Biden's story about a truck driver who "drank his lunch" and hit his family back in
'72...........turns out that there was NO alcohol involved. How sad to use a tragedy such as this to solicit support............sick
This sounds like proper organizational behavior to me. If Joe Biden was an active PTA member what would you be saying then, "anonymous"es...
It is a nonpartisan group, it does not get an opportunity to endorse a candidate. If someone questions an upper level PTA member about their feelings on Palin (or McCain, Obama, or Biden) in terms of their position as a PTA member, you would have to refrain to comment as a PTA member and explain your thoughts were that of a private citizen who did not represent the organization.
It was obviously the purpose of the email to clarify this for high level PTA people, and keep PTAs from becoming partisan bodies.
Just two years in the nineties?
The PTA has always had a policy of not endorsing any particular candidate. Why did they feel the need to send this out regarding Palin specifically? Will we see something about Obama, given he, too, has school-aged kids and may/may not be a PTA member at his children's schools?
Palin has been publicly refered to as a "PTA member" if I remember correctly and I think they want to remind their members that as an organization with 501(c)(3)status, they don't and can't endorse a candidate. As a private citizen, you can do what you want, on behalf of the PTA, you play by their rules. Not that hard to understand.
Palin also refers to herself as a 'hockey mom'.....I am one too but I'm a hockey mom who supports Obama! :) In this case, she doesn't represent all of us either!
and we care why???
Momof3 I like you!! I'm a football mom, a band mom, and a everything else mom. I don't need a PTA person to advise me on how to vote.
Serving on 2 PTA boards, I also received this email. It was terribly offensive! I did email Mr. Haiken and he gave me a sincere apology but a thin explanation. He stated that it was intended for the state level PTA representatives.
This email has truly left me disillusioned with PTA. Did you know that Mr. Haiken worked for Democrat Senator Jeff Bingaman - New Mexico before working for PTA? Interesting huh?
This seems like pretty standard procedure and a CYA move to protect their 501(C)(3) status. This way if a local PTA endorses a candidate the National PTA can produce this letter to show they made their position clear on this issue. No biggie.
Everyone...Pandora... why was Palin mentioned at all in this email? Why not simply remind the PTA leadership that PTA's are not to endorse any political candidates? There was no need to mention any one candidate in particular. Yes, Palin stated she was involved with the PTA at one of her child's schools, but I do not know why people are taking that as all PTA's are supporting her.
This letter could be taken as don't you dare endorse Palin. I agree, there was no need to mention a specific candidate. Sounds to me like this PTA guy does not like Republicans.
I'm not defending a clumsily worded letter, and I have no idea if this was politically driven. What I do know is that similar statements have been issued by the NAACP and Friends of Earth (two groups whose members are mostly pro-Obama) as well as liberal and conservative churches. The IRS is closely monitoring non-profits this election season.
Mr. Haiken is a Columbia graduate. He knew exactly what kind of email he was sending out.
If this email would have said "if you are asked about Obama, we asked that you decline comment" it would be ALL over the place.
Come on women, get tough and demand the equal treatment.
"Come on women, get tough and demand the equal treatment."
^^^^^ This is why women will never be taken seriously.
Gov. Palin was singled out in this letter because SHE has spoken about her PTA involvement. I don't think it's about her being a woman I think the issue is that she has affiliated herself with a PTA and apparently people wanted to know if it was for real or not. This happens to any political candidate who says "I belong" to organization A implying that anyone else who belongs to that organization and the candidate have something in common therefore you should vote for them. I have many things in common with Sarah Palin but I will not be voting for her and the least of the reasons is her meager involvement in a PTA. Any woman who implies that she is breaking through the "glass ceiling" yet doesn't believe that a woman has the right to choose is hardly interested in equal treatment.
Fascinating is right on the money here. Plus, Ms. Palin has not just mentioned PTA membership as something in her past. She has implied that she had a greater than "member only" involvement,and that her involvement was so significant that it actually gave her a start in her political career. You would have to be pretty deeply involved in PTA, or in any other organization, to actually have it kickstart political activism and move you ahead to a career in politics.
"Any woman who implies that she is breaking through the "glass ceiling" yet doesn't believe that a woman has the right to choose is hardly interested in equal treatment."
--I'm sure you mean equal treatment for all...including babies who haven't requested to be killed by their mother. Give me a break Fascinating and Suze with your abortion opinions and stick to Red Clay issues on this blog. I know NBC has plenty of blogs for you to spew your venom.
Palin is not a good mother. For her to put herself and her family in the public eye while her 17-year-old daughter is pregnant is unfair to her daughter, to the father of the baby and to the baby. How can she do this to them? They will be judged and scrutinized by our entire nation from now on. What the hell is wrong with her?
Whoa. I never mentioned abortion. I wrote about PTA connections. I was referring to Fascinating's PTA references--sorry that I did not make this crystal clear.
Get your responses straight, Dad. And you sound pretty darned venomous yourself, Pappy. What the hell is NBC? I have been writing on this blog for months. Do not tell me that I am not welcome here, Buddy-Boy.
Likewise, Dad. I never gave my opinion regarding abortion I simply referenced the fact that there is some hypocracy in her messages. IMHO those messages are quite mixed.
I also have been leaving comment here since the ladies opened shop. If anyone is going to tell me to take a walk it will be Kim or Anne.
Mr. Man - so sorry to have made a mistake "the", I was up the night before with a sick child. What is your excuse for being such an _____?
Five children and only a PTA member for 2 years? That hardly qualifies as involvement!
Many of these comments illustrate why the NPTA felt compelled to issue the clarification.
What's interesting is that it appears to be from the PTA lobbyist.
I've been a PTA officer many years. I was upset when the October 2000 issue of our magazine featured Tipper Gore on the cover, including articles about his education plan and about her on the campaign trail.
After contacting NPTA, I was told that this issue had been planned long before the election season, and that they were not endorsing a candidate. (Yeah, right)
In '04 there were articles about how bad NCLB had been for the schools.
NPTA is (now) a liberal PAC. It's a shame because they have (and still do) promote many other issues for our children.
They always tell the state/council/units to stay away from any appearance of endorsing a candidate, but I think that they slip themselves on occasion.
That said - I'm not sure that I believe that this email is legit. No one that I know has received it.
Anonymous said:
That said - I'm not sure that I believe that this email is legit. No one that I know has received it.
September 12, 2008 1:21 AM
This was sent directly to me. I am PTA President of Forest Oak. I have received more emails from the state and national PTA pertaining to this issue.
I received the same emails and they went to tons of people. I am a PTA officer at my child's school.Many people were upset by the original email.
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