Bristol Palin was paid over $250,000 by teen pregnancy prevention organization

Here's some depressing news regarding the sad state of sex education here in America. The Candie's Foundation, whose stated mission is "to educate America's youth about the devastating consequences of teen pregnancy through celebrity PSA campaigns and initiatives," paid Bristol Palin over $260,000 dollars to promote her abstinence-only agenda in 2009 alone.

This news comes via the organization's tax forms (see below), which also go on to show that only a paltry $35,000 was spent on actual educational efforts and programming — that's just over a tenth of Palin's salary, for those keeping score at home. Clearly the emphasis at Candie's is on "celebrity" and not "initiatives."

It's frustrating to think of the myriad of useful ways those funds could have been spent. A quarter-million dollars can pay for a lot of condoms, as well as fund educators who can awkwardly demonstrate how to use them on bananas. This news shouldn't really come as a surprise though. This same organization has come under fire in the past for their sexy, albeit contradictory, ads telling teen girls not to have sex, so sending ineffective, mixed messages is basically what Candie's excels at.