Up until about four weeks ago I too despised Hillary Clinton. From the time she announced for President, she rubbed me wrong, and I posted often on Facebook that I wished she'd just get out of the way so someone else could win. My gripe with her from the start was that she didn't really represent a woman's rise up the career ladder in today's world. She was partnered with her husband from year one, I sensed, while the rest of us have to make it on our own.
Hillary is one year older than I am, she's from my generation, and what people don’t remember, and I've even forgotten over time, is how much things have changed over the period of my lifetime. When I was in high school, women still looked at finding a husband as the way to have a good life. Remember, my fellow sixty-somethings, the saying, "the only reason women go to college is to get an M R S degree," as in to find a husband. My mom drilled the importance of finding a good husband into me to the point that I rejected it all out, and in fact never got married, even through two pregnancies. (A lot of good that did me.)
It irked me that Hillary had this easier ride than I did. I'd look at her and think, if she hadn’t married Bill, she'd be retiring now with a smaller Social Security than everyone else too, like me and so many women in our generation.
But then during the campaign I heard her make a speech where she addressed that very issue, this demographic of women in my generation who are right now being affected by the fact we're trying to live on 400 - 700 a month Social Security. Hillary has vowed in several campaign speeches to raise the minimal Social Security or in some other way address this specific problem that is affecting my life so badly. I realized yeah- she rode her husband's coattails to the top, at first, but now- listen to her make a speech. This woman has devoted her entire life to making herself qualified for this job, and she did it the way women did it in her age group. She succeeded so far and I'm all for seeing her keep going farther.
When I was 49 years old, Time Magazine came out with a cover of Hillary Clinton's portrait and the headline, This is Fifty or something like that. Since I was approaching fifty myself, I stared at that magazine cover for a long time, and it affected me. Like it or not, Hillary Clinton is a role model for me. If she's what 68 looks like today, it still inspires me and motivates me at age 67 to keep going.
It's interesting that all through the campaign, Hillary's female-ness was not important to me. But as I watch her stand tall and strong under attack from all sides, and compare that to my own inability to handle criticism, I think, I want this woman to represent me. It's Time for a competent, intelligent woman to run the country.
Hillary is one year older than I am, she's from my generation, and what people don’t remember, and I've even forgotten over time, is how much things have changed over the period of my lifetime. When I was in high school, women still looked at finding a husband as the way to have a good life. Remember, my fellow sixty-somethings, the saying, "the only reason women go to college is to get an M R S degree," as in to find a husband. My mom drilled the importance of finding a good husband into me to the point that I rejected it all out, and in fact never got married, even through two pregnancies. (A lot of good that did me.)
It irked me that Hillary had this easier ride than I did. I'd look at her and think, if she hadn’t married Bill, she'd be retiring now with a smaller Social Security than everyone else too, like me and so many women in our generation.
But then during the campaign I heard her make a speech where she addressed that very issue, this demographic of women in my generation who are right now being affected by the fact we're trying to live on 400 - 700 a month Social Security. Hillary has vowed in several campaign speeches to raise the minimal Social Security or in some other way address this specific problem that is affecting my life so badly. I realized yeah- she rode her husband's coattails to the top, at first, but now- listen to her make a speech. This woman has devoted her entire life to making herself qualified for this job, and she did it the way women did it in her age group. She succeeded so far and I'm all for seeing her keep going farther.
When I was 49 years old, Time Magazine came out with a cover of Hillary Clinton's portrait and the headline, This is Fifty or something like that. Since I was approaching fifty myself, I stared at that magazine cover for a long time, and it affected me. Like it or not, Hillary Clinton is a role model for me. If she's what 68 looks like today, it still inspires me and motivates me at age 67 to keep going.
It's interesting that all through the campaign, Hillary's female-ness was not important to me. But as I watch her stand tall and strong under attack from all sides, and compare that to my own inability to handle criticism, I think, I want this woman to represent me. It's Time for a competent, intelligent woman to run the country.
Their Goal is to keep Democrats fractured right now. So expect to see Lots of Made Up Stuff in next few months. I think, and this is just my thinking, that the messages going out that Hillary suppressed Bernie's vote, and that she's about to be indicted, and that 17 women accused Bill of rape are all probably an effort by Republicans to fracture us and keep people from voting for Hillary. I think the Billions of Dollars in Dark Money being spent thanks to Citizens United is not going only into things we can see, but is going into behind the scenes stuff. We Need to forget small differences and face the massive enemy by which we are confronted
Voter Suppression in 2014: my email was Full of messages with Subject lines that told me Do Not Bother to Vote. Then there was that devastatingly low Democratic turnout in 2014 (and look what that got us) so lots of people must have been getting that message in their email, from what claimed to be democratic sources. So Please, this voter suppression goes on at so many different levels, is So Screwed Up, and the democratic opponent is Not the Bad Guy here
No comments:
Post a Comment