Guest blogger and soccer enthusiast Political Dad's take on Palin's "Hockey Mom" status...

As soon as Alaska Governor Sarah Palin described herself as a "hockey mom" in her speech to the Republican National Convention, America and the media went nuts over the latest clichéd demographic. Palin joked, "What's the difference between a hockey mom and a pit bull? Lipstick--and with that the "Hockey Mom" replaced the myth of the suburban "Soccer Mom."

Now in the interest of full disclosure, I spent most of my life kicking a soccer ball, so I know a few things about what my mom endured--carting me from one practice to another, washing grimy soccer socks, cutting thousands of orange slices. In elections past, everyone seemed obsessed with courting the soccer mom vote. How is it possible that things could change so fast? Is there really any difference between a mom who packs the kids into a minivan to take them to an ice rink instead of a soccer field? After all, isn't hockey just soccer on ice?

At last count, there were 18 million kids playing soccer in the United States--more than any other nation in the world. But, according to USA Hockey, there are only 347,061 players below the age of 20. That's roughly 17 million more soccer moms. Where'd they all go? Nowhere, I suspect--because here's the deal: Hockey moms are soccer moms, especially when they live around the Great Lakes swing states--and that stereotype of a woman is exactly what the Republican Party wants to revive. They want moms to believe that Sarah Palin is just like them.

Here's the problem: Governor Palin opposes just about every issue that the majority of moms, hockey or otherwise, support. She believes that creationism should be taught in public schools but denies global warming. She opposes gun control but supports governmental control of a women's uterus. She opposes stem cell research but approves "abstinence-only" programs, which increase unwanted births, sexually transmitted diseases and abortions. I'll skip the obvious irony here.

Even scarier, Palin, unlike McCain, pledges to criminalize abortion by overturning Roe vs. Wade. She believes that if one of her or your daughters were impregnated by rape or incest, they should bear the child or go to jail.

Sound familiar? This hockey mom isn't a pit bull with lipstick, she's George Bush with lipstick. And if enough soccer moms believe this fantasy--well, then we all might end up with an incredibly dangerous and inexperienced person a heartbeat away from the presidency.