Will women be in a bind or bound for glory?

Today my friend Kathe added to a post-debate e-mail thread on the binding effects that Mitt Romney’s policies might have on women’s workplace equality.  Kathe pointed out that all one need do is “look at the woman Obama married vs. the one Romney married, and that's all you need to know.” 

Actually, as I replied to Kathe, Ann Romney would make a pitch-perfect First Lady for America.  That is, she would if this were America in the year 1952.  That America is mentally still inhabited by the Fox News bouffant-blond not-so-demure debutante demagogues and the good ol' boys around them.  They long for the days when a First Lady appeared on TV as White House tour guide, preferably wearing white gloves. 

Yes, I so agree with Kathe that the two wives quintessentially embody the attitudes of the candidates toward women.  Obama grew up -- as I did, in full disclosure -- with a mother and grandmother who were the breadwinners and had to make their way in a world of work that was much more binding in terms of career choices.  I can vouch for the validity of the implied message of his story, that a man borne of that background has developed a visceral identification with the rights of women to actualize all of their potentials.  His answer to the young woman's question on equal pay began with his having signed the Lilly Ledbetter Act and went on to ensuring access to educational and employment opportunities.   

Meanwhile, Mitt is trying his damnedest – I use the word advisedly – to convince women that they should hitch their wagons to him and his policies because he knows how to create jobs and thus create opportunities for them.  Some women are finding that a credible pitch, but most are not, because most see him for what he is: a private equity, Swiss-bank-account plutocrat who wants to raze Planned Parenthood from the face of the earth and overturn Roe v. Wade and who has refused to take a position on the Lilly Ledbetter Act and famously sidestepped like a matador Tuesday’s debate question on equal pay for women.  (His history of disrespect for women's autonomy and subjectivity is far worse than that, as recounted in Geoffrey Dunn's investigative report summarized and referenced in my October 12 post below.) 

Seriously, it appears now that Mitt may have concocted this whole scenario of a Pennsylvania woman pathetically tugging on his sleeve to ask for help getting a job.  Alfred Lubrano wrote in the Philadelphia Inquirer today (“Who is the job-seeking woman Romney mentioned?) that reporters have been looking high and low at all the venues on which Romney lighted in Pennsylvania on the day in question and have come up empty. 

Even if the incident happened, it would go like this: when Mitt asks her “What can I do to help?” the woman could make but one request that Romney actually would help with: “Please, please, please, would you lower my bosses’ taxes?”    

I hope and pray -- and I will keep knocking on doors each weekend to make it more likely – that we can re-elect Obama.  Nate Silver’s FiveThirtyEight Blog Rube Goldberg mathematical model has O's percentage probability of winning the Electoral College back up to 65.7% as of last night -- it had gone from 61.1% Friday to 66.0% on Monday to 64.8% Tuesday.

The uptick to 65.7%, better than a down tick but long-term not yet statistically stable or decisive, still does not tap into debate impact. Who the heck knows how this population will respond -- especially the flotsam-and-jetsam sub-population of ill-informed and disengaged waverers and undecideds whose wavering and indecision presumably account for most of the volatility?

And especially when the versions of reality that they are served up can stand in such sharp contrast with each other depending on their sources of news and commentary. Fox News -- whose logo was graphically paired with Mitt's puddingy punim last night on Colbert's show as Colbert referred to "Romney and his running mate" -- is still selling as absolute gospel that Obama did not say the Benghazi consulate attack was an act of terrorism. Limbaugh still says that Candy would have committed "career suicide" with her brazen partisan real-time fact-checking of Romney, if only we had any journalistic standards left in this country (if you are puking up at the thought of Limbaugh's journalistic standards, you are among co-puking friends).

In contrast, MSNBC hosts (and guests other than Michael Steele) are equally resolute that as a moderator, Candy was way dandy. Fox was all-angry-all-day, MSNBC all smiles. Loved it, but Ed Schultz et al will not be seen by most of those people who are floating loose like seaweed or jellyfish in the ocean -- in the middle of Iowa yet!

So who ya gonna believe? Rather, whom are the jellyfish going to believe, since they apparently don't trust themselves to rely on their own devices.

Meanwhile, there are pull-lenty of Americans who actually take it all in and think for themselves a little bit. Which brings me to what I'll cleverly call "Today's Moment of Ama-Zen": in the form of Amazon Reader Reviews of Avery Durable Binders available on the site. Shows that Americans are not lacking for creativity, wit and a fine appreciation for the smoldering pile of hypocritical stench that is Governor Romney. (For best viewing and the most fun, see the original page on Amazon.)  Thanks to Mia Rose Diamond Dansky Blitstein for the link -- thanks to her and her mother I get to share in the cornucopia of the social network.

One last post-debate reflection (for this post, I mean!), and it's from James Lipton of the Actor's Studio.  He was one of those guests on MSNBC last night, on Hardball with Chris Matthews. As noted on Joy Reid's website in the heading over the video clip, Lipton framed this election in a way that is brilliantly insightful and ought to resonate with anyone who is not already in the clutches of Romney's binder.  In a phrase that ought to become THE sound-bite of the last three weeks of the campaign, he boils down the campaign to a simple but all-important choice: a President versus a Boss.  Watch it and share it far and wide.

Customer Reviews

Avery Durable View Binder with 2 Inch EZ-Turn Ring, White, 1 Binder (17032)

5,015 of 5,183 people found the following review helpful 5.0 out of 5 stars A presidential candidate's choice is the choice for me, October 17, 2012 Bazinga - As a woman, I'm not adept at making decisions that concern me. So when I need the right choice, I turn to the presidential candidate that KNOWS. One with prideful experience in this department. I don't want to be filed away in an inferior & confusing electronic doohickey that I couldn't possibly understand. Or heaven forbid, have a man ask for & listen to my ideas! I'd much rather rely on this top of the line, 1980s style, Avery Durable binder. It's the choice America can trust. My education, my ideas, my opinions, my choices, please PLEASE keep them safely stored away here and far away from the men that might fear them (I mean, want to use them to hire me somedaynever). I'd write more about this most useful product, but it's time I hurry home to make dinner.   2,229 of 2,323 people found the following review helpful 5.0 out of 5 stars Wow, I feel secure!, October 17, 2012 LeeBo (Raleigh, NC)   As a wife and mother, I LOVE this binder. It keeps me in my place, allows me to get dinner ready on time, AND only costs 72% of the more masculine version. Some people might think it's sexist, but sheesh, I'm not binding my feet, just my brain. Extra bonus, if you sit on it just right, it can act as an effective method of birth control! Full disclosure: I submitted this under my husband's account, with his full permission. He is the head of our household, and the owner of the binder.   228 of 235 people found the following review helpful 5.0 out of 5 stars Now I know how I got my job!!! My boss has Mitt's binder, too!!!, October 18, 2012 Go Flash Go! I watched the Presidential debate on Tuesday. I didn't understand most of it, but I loved what Mitt Romney said about his binders full of women. I work for an asset management firm which tends to be a male-dominated industry. I have long wondered, as a woman, how I managed to get hired at my firm when there were surely many more qualified men. Could my boss have a binder, too? On Wednesday, my boss called me and said, "Hun, would you come down to my office?" "Yes, sir!" I eagerly rushed down. Sitting on top of his desk, next to a box of golf balls and his "World's Greatest Boss" figurine (here's a little secret - we girls think he bought it for himself! Teehee!), was this beautiful Avery Durable View binder. You can see in the product photo that there is that dumb-looking piece of paper stuck underneath the front cover. Boring! My boss removed that, and replaced it with a pink piece of paper that said "Greg's Girls." It was so pretty! The letters were in cursive, written with a fuchsia marker. There were stickers of flowers and hearts on it, too. He saw me gazing at it with wonder, and he said with a shy smile, "My secretary designed the cover." I was so happy to finally have all my questions answered, right in this wondrous binder. "Can I touch it?" I whispered. "Yes, and if there is anything you don't understand, just ask, sweetheart." I held my breath as I flipped through the pages, until I found a tab with my name. The first page was a photo of me taken from my Facebook profile. Beside it, someone wrote a couple of notes: "Looks pleasant enough." "Would she consider losing 10 pounds?" Now I understand why my boss always asks me to get coffee from the place 5 blocks away, rather than from the one in our building. He's so funny!   494 of 517 people found the following review helpful 4.0 out of 5 stars Makes me seem productive! (Don't tell my boss!), October 18, 2012 uebergeek (San Diego, CA USA) - As a woman who doesn't leave work early to cook dinner, I struggled to prove to my employer that I'm worth the full 72% of a man's pay. How could I, working 16-hour shifts, ever be seen as pulling my weight, when other women were heading home to do their domestic duty? Thank goodness for this binder. Now, each day when dinner time rolls around, I'm able to select a stereotype-friendly woman from the binder to go home and cook. This leaves me free to fritter away the entire evening at work, while still collecting the full 72% paycheck. And my boss is none the wiser! Thanks to this binder, I'm on Easy Street!