The Obama Diary

The Insult that is @AnnDRomney New Blonde Barbie® Media Darling

Everyone needs to understand and wrap their heads around the fact that neither Ann nor Mitt Romney came from poverty. They were both born into enormous wealth, and have not had one day of struggle in their lives. They went to private schools, traveled to Europe, and went to expensive Universities they didn’t need a student loan or scholarship for. They have not the remotest understanding of how most Americans live.

Even one of* Ann Romney’s nannies agrees with Hilary Rosen: Ann Romney has never worked a day in her life. For the GOP/Media to even suggest that Ann Romney is your average stay-at-home mom is one of the biggest insults to mothers everywhere to date.

*This begs the question, just how many nannies did the Romney’s employ, and at any given time? How many gardeners? Cooks? Maids? Household staff? Accountants? Drivers? Stable hands/grooms/trainers? Personal assistants?

I get that many of you are sick of it, and I completely understand why, but I guarantee you the GOP/Media aren’t letting this go anytime soon. It is not in our best interests to ignore it. We need to stop repeating the mistakes of the past.

The @AnnDRomney fauxrage is not a distraction, but an extraordinary opportunity for all of us since the GOP intends to get all the traction it can out of this – especially if we ignore it, and refuse to fight back.

The new Ann Romney Average Stay At Home Mom (and by extension they’re a normal family) meme is ridiculous on it’s face, and creates a gigantic spotlight on pretty much every other cause we need to be fighting for. It’s a bigger “gift” to us, than for Ann’s birthday.

Ann Romney has never been an “ordinary, average, stay-at-home mom.” She never will be.

@AnnDRomney has never, nor will EVER:

- Be forced to work a regular job with a paycheck, ever.
- Be forced to TRY to get gainful employment to earn that paycheck.
- Be forced to work multiple jobs and still be short money to feed her kids.
- Worry about where hers or her children’s next meal is coming from.
- Worry about how, or not be able to pay for that next meal.
- Not be able to afford childcare.
- Make a choice between food, shelter, or medicine.
- Have to juggle laundry, housework, cooking, diapers, doctor visits, piano lessons, child transportation, grocery shopping, and/or figure out how to pay for it all. (You know, like NORMAL stay-at-home moms.)
- Sacrifice ANYTHING for her children or their college education.

This is not only about the GOP’s endless War On Women, it’s about:

- The lack of JOBS, thanks to the GOP trying to kill the economy to get power by refusing to pass the American Jobs Act.
- The continuing redistribution of wealth from the poor and middle class to the wealthy and the GOP filibustering the Buffet Rule.
- The endless hypocrisy of Mitt Romney saying it’s okay for his überwealthy wife to choose to be a Stay-At-Home-Kept-Woman, but if you’re poor, you had better be back at work by your child’s 2nd birthday.

And you know what else? As a cancer survivor, and a woman who lives with MS, @AnnDRomney is the PosterGirl for Obamacare, because most of America doesn’t have the luxury of having a husband who makes an annual income of $20 MILLION+. So, YES. Let’s go there. Let’s have that conversation now, since the power to take away healthcare from over 30 million Americans, a large number of them children, is in the hands of five MALE conservative justices.

What’s more, the fact that Ann is so far removed from how 99% of Americans live, she cannot see her own insulting behavior for making the comment in the first place, never mind understanding the subsequent outrage from MOST of the country over it. It focuses an even brighter spotlight on how out of touch these people have been all of their lives with how most of America survives on a day-to-day basis.

Hilary Rosen didn’t say anything wrong. And no, it wasn’t a “poor choice of words”, no matter what anyone says. Only rightwing tools willfully misunderstood her, because that’s what they’re PAID to do.

Most women agree with Rosen (and Ann’s nanny), and I’m sick and tired of the GOP demanding the President apologize for random people speaking the truth when it doesn’t suit the GOPropaganda™.

What @AnnDRomney should have said, (if she had any grace, class, or empathy DNA in her at all), was, “Hilary Rosen is right. While raising five children as a stay at home mother kept me rather busy, as all moms know, I have been EXTRAORDINARILY BLESSED with having the means to have a comfortable life my husband provided.” And leave it at that by shutting the hell up.

Instead she whined. ON TWITTER, and ON TELEVISION, (and will continue to do so along with the GOP/Media unless the rest of us shame them all into silence.) The woman with the $2.5 million combo boathouse/equestrian stable with living quarters at her NH home, whined that raising five children was “hard work.” Cry me a damn river. How hard must that have been with the staff the Romneys have on hand at each of their estates? (One of many reasons they don’t want to release their tax returns.)

Ignoring this gets us NOWHERE. Fighting this helps BURY them, and helps get President Obama a Progressive ARMY to work with during his second term, which is EVERYTHING.

Just because you’re tired of it, or are uncomfortable with the subject in some way, doesn’t mean it’s not a useful tool.

There’s a LOT of UGLY ahead. We need to seize every opportunity we can, as ugly, and unsavory as it might be, because you can bet your life that the GOP will not only jump on everything, they’ll lie about it all in the process. This one is RIPE, and already backfiring on them BIG TIME.

Ann Romney doesn’t get a pass because she’s the wife of an elected official when she voluntarily steps into the Media spotlight, and attempts to use it to her and her husband’s advantage.

This is about way more than Ann Romney, even though she chose of her own free will to be a GOP spokesperson. This is one more shot at putting women “back in their place”, and something else the GOP are eager to deflect back onto to President Obama…

The pushback against this has already started, and is swelling by the hour. Every day the GOP finds itself on the wrong side of yet another issue, and makes it worse by digging themselves in deeper. If you don’t believe me, please consider Trayvon Martin. Had we ignored that, and taken some kind of High Road, like, “Oh, the police and Florida authorities know what they’re doing…”; Zimmerman would still not have been charged.

But that didn’t happen. People were outraged. They took to Twitter. They took to the streets. They even took to the floor of Congress. They world cried out when American voices weren’t loud enough.

Remember John Kerry’s campaign and the $wiftboat Vets™®. Remember John Kerry, WAR HERO, was “above” fighting back? Remember how everyone on the Left IGNORED it as well? Sure, ignoring may be the opposite of caring, but it does NOTHING in a fight. To the spectators, it looks as though the one who won’t fight back is weak. PERIOD. We cannot have that. We need to be outraged and angered because our First Family doesn’t have the luxury to be, while we do. And we have more and better tools than Kerry did in 2004.

I need you to remember the great words of our amazing President on Election Night 2008 (you know, the ones the EmoProgs conveniently forgot):

“The road ahead will be long. Our climb will be steep. We may not get there in one year or even in one term. But, America, I have never been more hopeful than I am tonight that we will get there.
 I promise you, we as a people will get there.”

“This victory alone is not the change we seek. It is only the chance for us to make that change. And that cannot happen if we go back to the way things were. 
It can’t happen without you, without a new spirit of service, a new spirit of sacrifice.
 So let us summon a new spirit of patriotism, of responsibility, where each of us resolves to pitch in and work harder and look after not only ourselves but each other.”

He cannot do this alone. We must help. Especially with a bought and paid for Congress, that we may be stuck with.

We have never been in this situation. As the first African American family in The White House, President Barack, and Michelle Obama will never be afforded the luxury of rage, or outright anger. They may want to, every moment of every day, but if they allowed themselves, or their staff to go there, the GOPMEDIA would scream “ANGRY BLACK GANGSTA THUGS” 24/7 from now until the end of time. Let’s face it, if President Obama so much as uses his Stern Dad Voice, the GOP practically wet themselves.

Instead, they must always occupy The High Road, and act with love and grace, until the end of his Presidency. Perhaps President Booker will be allowed a modicum of anger, but not this President.

That doesn’t mean we don’t have their backs. It doesn’t mean that WE cannot be enraged and show it outwardly. It doesn’t mean we have to stay sweet and keep quiet in the face of deep injustice, and not scream and fight for our rights, because that’s what they are – our rights.

Sure, PBO set the bar specifically for ELECTED OFFICIALS, on this, as he SHOULD. Michelle stepped up too. They’re all on the high road. Great. They’re better. WE KNOW THAT. We expect them to be. They framed it perfectly, and in a rational world (…should I even finish that sentence?), they left Romney and the GOP with nowhere to go.

But today’s GOP no longer exists in the Rational World. They live in KlownKar Krazyland™. We’re not dealing with normal, logical, rational thinking adults. We’re dealing with “I know you are, but what am I” toddlers who project all their faults onto their enemies because they’re completely incapable of taking any responsibility for any of their own actions. They claim it’s not their “war on women”; it’s President Obama’s, even though THEY voted against the Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, and in some states, even going on to repeal it.

I have to say, I honestly think PBO & Co’s comments were very calculated, and they knew this would be catnip to the GOP. I think Axelrod would love nothing more than for them to double down with @AnnDRomney and their “she’s a normal mom” nonsense, because it’s insulting as hell to most women, especially mothers, most of whom don’t have the luxury to “choose” to stay home.

She’s also not a civilian, anymore than Michelle Obama is, and hasn’t been ever since she stepped onto a stage with her husband when he was running for Governor. She willingly volunteered to open her mouth just as much as Michelle Obama did on the campaign trail back in 2008. The GOP have been relentless in their attacks on Michelle since day one, and that is why the Obamas’ statements this week are even sweeter, because the GOP will NEVER apologize for their horrible treatment of our first Black First Family, let alone stop it.

The GOP relinquished all rights to even be in the same vicinity of The High Road.

However, for the DEMS, and that includes all of us - to not fight back on this, is insane. This is just one more battle in their War On Women that they’re upping the stakes on every day. The GOP have already passed PERSONHOOD LAWS, some that state the beginning of life is even before you have sex (first day of the woman’s last menstrual cycle), so do not imagine YOUR RIGHTS have not already been actively diminished. And to say women’s rights aren’t a huge part of the campaign is simply incorrect.

I am only as free as the least of my sisters. Believe it.

The GOPMEDIA™® will not back off just because our First Family and the Obama Campaign took The High Road. If anything, they’ll take it as weakness and go in for the kill. The ONLY way they will back off is if the rest of us fight back in a tsunami, and keep fighting against this, and RUSH, and Personhood insanity, and every other damn piece of poison the GOP tries to inflict on us from now until the end of time.

Which brings me back to Ann (I’m a normal mom) Romney. Do not think for a minute the GOP aren’t going to use EVERY DAMN THING they can to Swiftboat™ our POTUS. EVERYTHING. This included.

I am DONE with allowing them to frame the debate, and LIE. I am NEVER going back to the world our mothers and grandmothers had to endure.

The GOP are LOSING their “War On Women” in a big way, and they’re going to try anything to save themselves on this one. The problem is, no matter what they say, or try to do - it’s backfiring on them, because they have been waging a war on women NONSTOP for DECADES, and the American public isn’t nearly as stupid as they want us to be, and we’re SICK OF IT.

Those of you who are not on Twitter: It’s TIME you got on. NOW. We need you. YOUR PRESIDENT NEEDS YOU. Your COUNTRY needs you. It’s easy. It’s the most immediate NEWS FORCE on the planet. It’s the BIGGEST social media out there that reaches the entire community. It’s not tainted (much) by the GOPMEDIA™®, and when they try to muck in and control the narrative the pushback is ASTOUNDING and IMMEDIATE. It’s truly something to behold. It is WHY Bitch McConnell & Boner had to pushback on the teabaggers regarding the Debt Ceiling.

Yes, we need continue to keep up the fight on all the issues, like jobs, and all the rest of the endless pile of shite the GOP constantly force on the American public so they, like the Romneys, can get richer at our expense. Like the BIG LIE from Mittens the other day about “92% of the jobs lost under PBO’s watch have been women.” While that is partly true, it’s because of the GOP’s decade of Bush Tax Cuts, and killing Public Sector jobs. We must push back with FACTS -

But do not fail to see the enormous opportunity @AnnDRomney has afforded us. The US population is almost 60% FEMALE. If we can get most of them, and the men who agree with them to VOTE - we just might give our POTUS the tools he needs to really bring the change we all hunger for in his second term by giving him a functioning Congress. Not to mention shutting up the EmoProgs…. how sweet would that be?

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