I don’t blame them for not wanting their Mom to run. The “media” would’ve gone even further into overdrive harassing them 24/7.
In “Decision Points,” George W. Bush recounts how his daughters, particularly, Jenna did not want him to run for president. He tells a story, IIRC, about how he wandered out into the yard or porch one evening, sat down beside her and had a heart-to-heart talk.
Result: he ran.
That said, his girls were older and were never going to be the subject of the same kind of hate and violence the Palin children will (yes, WILL) receive.
If Bush’s daughter’s reasons were similar to the Palin kids’, I wonder what his decision would have been. I can’t see any parent living with the idea that national/global media will be making rape “jokes” about your kids and so on.
This was more than harrassment. The Bush girls were harrassed (a little) when reporters took pictures of them — gasp! — smoking and showing a little love to the boys.
This was not what was in store for the Palin kids.
Remember the jokes about raping Willow?
That’s not harassment, a la celebrity stalking. That’s pure bullying and it’s bullying by a huge international media against which there really would have been no escape.