Moms, what kind of Mama critter would you be?

Buzz, who is about as politically astute as your average 11-year-old, which is to say not at all, asked me about some things he had heard on television.

"What is a Mama Grizzly?" he asked as we were driving home from our campground.

Thinking he'd been watching Discovery, not Fox News, I gave the only answer a new.

"A mother grizzly bear," I said.

"Why does Dad call you a mama bear?" he went on.

Then it struck in what he was really asking.

"You mean Mama Grizzly like Sarah Palin Mama Grizzly?" I knew then why he was concerned. Political parties aside, I'm not a follower of the former governor of Alaska for many reasons, all of them my own, but I do respect some things she has done. He was wondering if I was one of those Mama Grizzlies, too.

Mother bears

"Mother bears are ferocious when they are protecting their babies," I said. "That's why your dad calls me a Mama Bear -- because I get all worked up when I think someone is trying to hurt you, make fun of you, or force you to go door-to-door selling magazine subscriptions. But am I a political Mama Grizzly? No."

I'll tell you why, and it has nothing to do with whether or not Palin and her followers are protective of children and so forth and so politically blathering on.

It's a bad analogy for a political movement and I object on the grounds of a writer who loves analogies.

Yes, real mama grizzlies are ferociously protective of their young -- but only their young. They don't give a flying pundit for anyone else's children, unless it to kill them and take them home to feed their own kids.

Is that the image these politically active women really want to get across? I know they don't really feel that way, but if you're going to pick a symbol, you'd better research it a little better than that.

"Well," said my son, who likes to figure out where everything fits in the universe, from light bulbs to ephemeral political theory, "What kind of mama animal would you be?"

"Human," I said. "We look out for everybody's babies."

Other possibilities

But I thought about it over the next few miles. Is there an animal other than human that would represent the kind of mom I'd like to be? Almost every mother is very protective and nurturing to her own young, but what about those whose caring and nurturing don't recognize species or political boundaries? Here are some possible Political Mom Parties.

Otter Moms: Very playful, they encourage learning new skills by disguising lessons with play time. Very effective for those who want their children able to crack open oysters with rocks or dive down mudslides into cold creek water. I seriously considered this for a long time. They are slightly better than beaver moms, who are little cold blooded when it comes to booting out the first pair of babies to make room for the second...

Emperor Penguin Moms: This is the party for the working woman with the laid off husband. She drops the egg then heads for the beach and only comes back when it's time to serve up supper to the chick and the hubby, who has been huddling in a pack of his bros, trying to keep warm and griping because there don't seem to be any women around.

Elephant Moms: By far the coolest, and the only reason I hesitate to jump in on this party bandwagon is because Pachydermus politicus has already been claimed by another party. Elephant moms take great care of their babies, and all the babies in the herd. They adopt elephant orphans, they midwife each other's labor and delivery, and they don't boot the kids out until they turn into obnoxious teenagers.

Cuckoo Moms: This is the political party for those who love the idea of having children, but not actually raising them themselves. Popular with celebrities, teenagers and men between the ages of 13 and 80.

Mama dogs

I'm not an animal expert by any means, despite the hours I've logged on at the Discovery Channel, but to the best of my recollection, I can only think of one species besides ours that goes out of its way to nurture, protect, and even love and adopt babies that weren't theirs, or even their species, and that's dogs. How many times have seen the pictures of a dog nursing kittens, rabbits -- even tiger cubs.

When I was growing up, we had a little black cocker spaniel who was death on rabbits, no matter how hard we tried to train her or restrain her.

She was also a great mom and would steal puppies from other dogs in the neighborhood if she didn't have any of her own. Sometimes, even if she did have some of her own -- Bonnie loved a big family and never had more than three pups at a time. Once, however, she found a nest of rabbit kits, orphaned after a dog -- probably Bonnie -- sent their mama to the great briar patch in the sky.

She nursed the kittens until they got old enough and wise enough the see signs of Mommie Dearest in her attention with her two instincts colliding. They skedaddled.

Isn't it ironic, though ... one of our culture's favorite insult to hurl at a woman is that naughty word that means female dog, and yet the female dog is one of the only, if not the only, animals besides the human that will reach across lines of differences to help another living creature.