Ok so...Thoughts?

Were you spanked???  Do you spank??? (not the monkey Rodan)

 At a July 4th parade in Iowa, a young mother spanked her toddler. A police officer witnessed the spanking and wrote the mom a ticket, citing her with child abuse now, she's suing the state. Who is right? Well, that depends. On a lot of things, actually.

How hard did she hit the girl? By her own account, it was just a little swat -- in this video, from Fox News, she demonstrates, in fact, exactly what happened. By smacking the toddler. Who then throws a fit. In front of a whole bevy of cameras.

Hmm.

The legal analysts at Fox agree that the mom lacks parenting skills, but they disagree about spanking as an act of child abuse. One analyst says, over and over, that if the mom is willing to spank the toddler in a press conference to demonstrate what she did at the parade, she MUST be abusing her kids when no one is looking, and she's probably hitting them harder when the cameras are not around. Of course, that same analyst makes a big deal about the fact that this mom has three kids under four years of age, which seems kind of irrelevant. The analysts also point out that the kids are all running amok during the press conference, which does seem to point to a lack of control on the mother's part.

But does it make the spanking an act of abuse?

What say you -- is spanking an appropriate punishment for a two year old? Or does swatting your tot justify a ticket?