Tuesday, April 17, 2012

Ann Romney "At Home" with $20 Million a Year

It doesn't matter whether Ann Romney stayed at home to raise her five sons. Nobody cares.

What matters is that she stayed at home to be a full-time mom with millions of dollars of annual income.  Maybe when her sons were young the family income was lots less than the $20 million annually of recent years. Maybe it was only 10%, only $2 million a year.

That's still an awful lot of money.

I raised five sons and a daughter. Sometimes I was a full-time stay-at-home mom; sometimes I was a  married working mom; and sometimes I was a single parent working mom. In any of these situations I sure would have been glad to have millions of dollars in annual income.

Think how different being a mom is when you've got bushels of money! You can hire household help  - lots of it. Someone else can cook, clean up the kitchen, do the laundry, fold the clothes, do the marketing, pick up the kids, wash the dog (when he's not on the roof of the car). Someone else can go to the dry cleaners, sweep the porch, call the plumber, make the beds, pick up after the kids, pick up after the kids, pick up after the kids. Someone else can bake the birthday cakes, wrap the presents, address the holiday cards, take your various Cadillacs to be serviced, schedule the pediatrician appointments and  the dentist appointments and the barber shop appointments. Someone else can take the kids to get shoes and school clothes. Someone else can make sure teeth are brushed and ears are clean.

You get the picture.

Most of all, you don't have to worry about money. You don't have to think about it at all. There's no budgeting issues, no waiting for the next paycheck to get the kids those shoes. No dismay as the kids' dental bills pile up on your credit card or winter heating oil doubles in cost. There's no stricken sense of calamity approaching when one of your Cadillacs starts making a funny noise. There's no sorrow to endure because you have to tell a kid he can't go on a school field trip because of the expense. Or can't play on the soccer team because you can't afford the equipment.

There's no agony about wanting to sit next to a sick child in a hospital but not having the money to hire a sitter for the kids at home.

Money doesn't buy happiness but it sure can provide you a cushion against the anti-happy aspects of most people's lives.

What money buys is insulation.

Ann Romney has indeed been insulated. There is no way, with millions a year in income, that she can have the slightest idea of any normal mom's life. She knows nothing of being a stay at home mom except the percs: no nasty boss, no juggling work and home, no terror of leaving infants all day with sitters, no raggedy loss of sleep because of days that start at 5 a.m. and end near midnight.

She got the perks of staying home and paid little of the price. With her millions she could avoid all the mess and work of baking cakes and just enjoy the birthday boy blowing out the candles. She never had to suffer the loss of income of a stay at home mom. Nor did she have to endure (let's face it) the boredom and loneliness of being home alone all day with small people who are less than stellar conversationalists. If the home drill got a bit tedious, she could boogie on down to her "girls club" for companionship or jump a plane for a week of fun somewhere.

Hers was not the stay at home life of 99.9% of those moms who do stay at home. If ahe chose to do some of the scut work of mommying, she could so choose. But, unlike the rest of us, she had a CHOICE. We had no choice about who cleaned up the vomit when a kid was stricken with flu at 3 a.m.

Mitt Romney boasts that he relies on his wife for information about women and their concerns. If this be true, he's a very stupid businessman. What chief executive would use a consultant who knows NOTHING about the topic, i.e. nothing about the lives of women other than the lives of very rich women?

Because Romney and his missus are so insulated by their vast income, they don't even know that they don't know! This accounts for his "tone deaf" remarks that underscore his wealth, like relating to NASCAR on the basis of being chums with owners of NASCAR teams. Romney isn't just "tone deaf". He's deaf, blind, and so wrapped in wealth he might as well be from Mars. And if he's from Mars, Ann is from Venus, an even further planet. Neither has a clue about lives of people outside a $20 million a year bubble.

This is probably what that clumsy nobody, Hilary Rosen, meant to say. Let's hope so. But it's hard to give the benefit of the doubt to a woman who so ineptly creates a distraction just when Obama had accrued a 20% advantage with women voters. In its thirst for controversy, the media bent over backward NOT to tell the public that Hilary Rosen has absolutely no role in the White House and none in the Obama campaign. Her sole role is getting herself on TV. Given the politically stupid nature of her attack on Ann Romney, it's pretty obvious why no one at the White House or the election campaign gave her a job. With a Democratic friend like Hilary Rosen, who needs an enemy?

Better yet, to paraphrase that famous political film, "Bambi":  "If you can't say something well, don't say anything at all."

Will Rosen's remark change any votes? No. And that points out another instance of how out of touch with women Romney, his missus and his fellow GOPers are. They think we women are a bunch of dumb bunnies who will abandon a candidate who is solidly on our side because some woman we never heard of said something about Romney's wife.

WE WOMEN ARE NOT STUPID (except for Hilary Rosen).

We do not think as we are told to think. We older ones had a lifetime of men telling us what to think and what to do. "We have been down on the floor!" The younger among us can't even imagine such goings on and certainly want nothing to do with such a program. SO SHUT UP, ROMNEY, AND YOU GUYS AT THE AUGUSTA GOLF COURSE!

And shut your wives up too, the last women in America who do what their husbands tell them to do. We don't want mouthpiece Ann Romney telling us about the hard work of being a stay at home mom when she did not have to do one lick of the work of being a stay at home mom.

So just shut up, Ann Romney, and go to your roots-bleaching appointment like a good girl and leave us real women alone.

  








28 comments:

  1. Excellent post, Dorothy. I hope you keep blogging.

    I think the Romneys are pushing their luck by trying to play the part of the victim. All the TV pundits (mostly male) seem to think Ann Romney is just wonderful. I don't see it. She strikes me as entitled and touchy. I don't find her, or her husband, at all likable or relatable. When asked by Diane Sawyer what they wanted to say to Obama, Mitt said "Pack your bags" and Ann said "It's our turn... it's Mitt's turn."

    Yuck. I can't imagine that attitude doing anything but turning people off. Therefore, I hope they keep it up until the election. :-)

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    1. Thanks,Saquin, for your encouragement. I plan to keep blogging. Have been doing it since last August and have readers in about 30 countries. Usually I post blogs about twice a week.

      Ann R. strikes me the same way she does you. Also I applaud you picking up on her remarkable statement of entitlement: "It's our turn." She must think an American presidential election is a kids birthday party. Or if you're rich enough, you can demand what you want.

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  2. Outstanding post.

    It seems to me that the GOP just thinks women are so stupid that they will believe anything that the "Real Housewives of Politics" say to them.

    It's going to be quite a shock to them when they find out that women are capable of evaluating actions as well as words.

    Thanks for writing such an insightful post!

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    1. Thanks for your insight, Elu. You sound like a sharp guy. After living to 76, it seems to me that the GOP men think of us as paper dolls: we're there but not real.

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  3. You KNOW you can write! Beautiful, thoughtful, gut-busting! I love it! Annie Romney has not a clue about what real women endure just to raise children, keep a house, cook meals, do laundry, mop the bathroom, and straighten the closets, all after coming home from working out of the home all day! Then helping kids with homework, making sure the dog is walked, fed, and watered, and finally, consorting with hubby! All before midnight, and rising at 0500 hrs to get ready to do the same thing all over again!

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    1. Right on, Rosel! Sounds like you've been there and done that! It's the toughest job in the world unless you've got big bucks like Ann to pave the way. She's got a hell of a lot of nerve claiming to know anything about anything. If she and Mitt win in November, I'm moving to Ireland. How about you?

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  4. Great post. I'm older than you, Dorothy, with five kids. One was profoundly developmentally disabled, so equaled the work of another five. I was fortunate enough to be able to stay home, but had no outside help. Ann and Mitt haven't a clue what it is like to live like 99% of us have had to. I, too, have a blog, but this is yours so won't advertise. But really a great post.

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    1. Good job, Shirley! You had a tough road. My youngest son had epilepsy and died at age 16. It is a rough go whenever one of our children has health issues, but even harder when we don't have resources. If I had Ann Romney's millions I'd give it all away to struggling parents with sick kids. Hearing from you has been very inspiring. Hope to hear from you again.

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  5. Very well put. I laughed all the way through this post and I'm not even a mom. Keep writing the stories that people can relate too. If you keep writing like this I'm not going to have any time to visit the other lesser blogs, like Facebook.

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    1. I'll try, Charles. I sure will try. You may want to check out some of the other blogs I've posted. The GOP certainly provided good comic material these past months. Thanks for your encouraging words.

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  6. Great to see you blogging - I'm a youngster at 64 and I had the same response to this faux poutage around Mrs. Romney.

    You rock!

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    1. Thanks, Denise! You rock too. I know you by reputation.

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  7. Thank you! You somehow put my thoughts into words, and very eloquently! I look forward to reading more of your posts--after I go back and read your past posts!

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    1. Thanks, Mommy! (How nice it is to have someone to call Mommy!) I hope you enjoy the others I've posted. Encouragement like yours really means a lot!

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  8. Great post. Spot on. (btw, it's 'perk')

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    1. Right, Jonathan! I get my keyboard confused with the coffee pot! Thanks for straightening me out!

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  9. I've been giggling nonstop since I read, "They think we women are a bunch of dumb bunnies who will abandon a candidate who is solidly on our side because some woman we never heard of said something about Romney's wife."
    Love, Smart Bunny

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    1. Glad you got a good giggle, Timber. Your comment has this old gal smiling mighty wide. Thanks! And I love your moniker.

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  10. Great post! I'll be back to read regularly now that I've found your blog.

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    1. Thanks, Chris, for saying you'll be back. That's really an incentive to blog on!

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  11. Great post. I figured it would backfire. It just showed Ann Romeny is as out of touch as Mitt.

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    1. Thank you, Mire. I think we could agree that Ann and Mitt Romney are not just out of touch. They also just don't give a damn about the rest of us. Let's be plain: with them it's all about money and what they and their kind have and how they can get more. But they can't have the White House. They can't have our White House. No!

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    2. I don't think they will get the White House. They are so genuinely unlikeable. And like you said, women aren't stupid. Especially about issues like birthcontrol and the difference between being a mom on a tight budget, versus Ann Romney, with her cadillacs, horses and millions.

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    3. For Mirre and other resders:
      A BIG thanks to Mirre and all of you for your enthusiasm. And for all your great suggestions about getting a wider audience. My daughter, "grassroots mom", will be adding connective features for twitter, etc. to my blog so please watch for these. Also she will try to help me replicate my blog onto Daily Koz. I don't want to leave this site for DK entirely because I've got a following here of people in about 30 or 40 countries and don't want to abandon them. And typing everything twice onto two sites would be too hard. But we'll find ways to make this blog site more accessible and get the postings directly onto DK. The DK readership seems like such great people! Again, thank you all!

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  12. stay at home mom then the sky is the limit for you to earn money. Just because you are tied up at home does not mean you should for ego prospects of a career! Here are some of the lucrative business opportunities you can leverage while staying at home.

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  13. I could just delete the above inappropriate "comment" from a Cassie Hicks, but I'm, letting it stay so that I can make clear that it is TOTALLY UNACCEPTABLE. It's possibly an attempt to use my blog for commercial advertising. I do not have ads on my site because I am not in this to make money, much as I may need it. So DO NOT RESPOND to "Cassie Hicks" attempt to get you to click on her plug for something called "ways to work from home". I do not want my readers being bothered with advertising of any kind. Nor do we know when a site could introduce a possible virus into your computer. So GET OFF of here, Cassie Hicks, and STAY OFF. Same for any others who want to use my blog for their own purposes and possibly annoy my readers or put them at risk.

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