Sarah Palin's pregnant daughter

There was an interesting discussion on the Footy show this morning about Sarah Palin's pregnant daughter. Footy is a moderate realist with a pretty good way of taking politics out of the discussion (unlike most of talk radio). So he asked: "whatever your politics, does it show failure as a parent if your unmarried, underage daughter gets pregnant?"

But I want to back it up one step and use the concept of behavior-based safety. I don't think the pregnancy is what matters. After all, condoms fail. Even a responsible 17 year old can get pregnant (unless they practice complete abstinence). If the parent did a responsible job teaching the child (son or daughter) about safe sex, STDs, etc., then he or she is a responsible parent. Sometimes, even responsible behavior results in unfortunate "accidents."

So I would only blame VP-nominee Palin for the pregnancy if she was irresponsible in what she taught her daughte, not for the pregnancy itself.

This could be a national "teachable moment" if she used the abstinence only approach (which I would guess given her evangelical status). If even a well-educated, stable, strong-values family can fail using abstinence only, I think this is a good lesson to advocates of it.