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Artist - Dave Granlund

I wanted to write a bit on the whole Ann Romney stay at home mom thing but I just don't know where to start.  The comment that she had never worked a day in her life clearly was not meant as a jab at stay at home moms but at the Romney's ridiculous amount of wealth.  Hilary Rosen shouldn't have said it, however, because it could be taken so wrong and Democrats were good to jump on her for it.

The strangest thing about the whole story is Romney's position it the debate.  Clearly, he supports his wife and is now all gung-ho about stay at home moms.  But what if Ann was poor?  Earlier, he said that mothers who need financial help have to go to work to receive benefits.  I don't know what happened in these few months to change his whole outlook on motherhood and how they raise their children... oh, yes, it has become politically expedient to do so...


It's going to be a long road to November.

Hoekstra's Jab At Women

Republican candidate for Senate in Michigan, Pete Hoekstra, displayed his true feelings about women in the workplace. He called the law signed by President Obama that ensures equal pay for women a nuisance.

He was asked at a campaign event yesterday whether he would try to make it a priority to repeal the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act. His response was very timely considering all the recent talk of the Republican War on Women.

"Will, you know, will repealing it be a priority? If you came back and said, you know, that's really the thing that's hurting my business the most. My guess is there are other things that we can do that have a higher priority in terms of what I, what I believe might need to be done. I think you know we need to create -- that thing is a nuisance. It shouldn't be the law."

If paying your employees fairly and not discriminating based on gender is really hurting your business and you can't handle it, perhaps you shouldn't be in business. It is absolutely ridiculous that this sort of talk is happening in 2012. And maybe the most appalling thing about it is that it is happening by candidates for national office. These are not Bill and Steve at the local bar, but a candidate representing one of the two major parties for the upper house of the United States Congress. It has no place in the public discourse and ought to be mocked at every turn. If the Democrats do not sweep the woman’s demographic in these elections I will be shocked.

Truly, if that does not happen it will be because people are not paying attention, but that won't be surprising. The Democratic party can easily harness the War on Women as a jab at Republicans. If they don't they are leaving points on the field. I think the Republicans are seeing this and are trying to combat this, laughably to be sure, by asserting that the Democrats are the one's waging a war on women. I think I'll address how ridiculous that is another time...

Wisconsin's War on Women

Surely, everyone has heard about Scott Walker repealing Wisconsin's equal pay law. This is the law that enabled victims of wage discrimination to have to recourse in court. Now, they don't. But this isn't what I want to write about. I want to talk about the fools who passed this and think this is a good thing for their state. Sen. Glenn Grothman (R) is one such individual.

From ThinkProgress:

Repealing the law was a no-brainer for state Sen. Glenn Grothman (R), who led the effort because of his belief that pay discrimination is a myth driven by liberal women’s groups. Ignoring multiple studies showing that the pay gap exists, Grothman blamed females for prioritizing childrearing and homemaking instead of money, saying, “Money is more important for men.”

I'd like to take the time here to remind everyone that this is the 21^st century. Clearly, no one has reminded Mr. Grothman of this fact. I don't understand how anyone today can get away with saying things like that. I suppose the people of Wisconsin could always petition to recall this guy but they already tried that for the union busting law and he's still there.

This reminds me of an incident at work where a female coworker was dismissed by a customer that he deemed didn't know what she was talking about and said, “let's get a man over here.” My coworker said that he get's to deal with her and that will have to be good enough. I was only called over when there actually was something she needed my help with. At the time I was helping him, he didn't know that I already knew what he had said to her. Of course I put on a happy face because that's part of the job but I was seething inside. I'm fairly certain that I was more pissed about the whole thing than she was.

Anyway, on goes the War on Women. We do get to capitalize that now, right?