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Obam released (well, technically, he had his wife present) the "Plan to Support Working Women and Families". Most of it is pie-in-the-sky unfunded mandates - well, except for health insurance for women, that's certainly not a mandate in Obamaland. Here's a link to the pdf, but for some reason it's just an image, not an actual pdf text document. Here's the pie-in-the-sky list of topics covered - pretty vague, especially about how all this stuff will be funded:
1. Fight for pay equity
2. Making Work Pay for Working Families
3. Increase the Minimum Wage to $9.50 by 2011
4. Expand the Earned Income Tax Credit
5. Provide a Child and Dependent Care Tax Credit to an Additional 7.5 Million Women
6. Create Automatic Workplace Pensions
7. Expand Retirement Savings Incentives for Working Families
8. Expand Family and Medical Leave Act
9. Encourage States to Adopt Paid Leave
10. Expand Paid Sick Days to 22 Million Women
11. Protect Against Caregiver Discrimination
12. Expand Flexible Work Arrangements
13. Expand High Quality Afterschool and Summer Learning Opportunities
14. Fix the Nation's Health Care System
15. Ensure All Children Have Health Insurance
16. Fight Cancer
17. Supports a Woman's Right To Choose |
| Number 17 caught my eye, so i grabbed an image of the text:
Umm... so what is he actually going to DO to "support a woman's right to choose"? We certainly aren't promised anything in THIS document... which is probably exactly what he plans to deliver.
If you examine the text, looking for what his "plan" is, you'll find... NOTHING. No initiatives, no pending legislation, no court challenges he's supporting, nothing. Benign neglect isn't going to cut it, but that's what we're looking at here.
Instead of concrete proposals or even a promise to pick judges who won't further erode womens' access to reproductive health care, it's a laundry list of past legislation that he was peripherally involved with. He "supported" legislation.. .when he wasn't voting "present". Sometimes, he even went as far as to co-sponsor something. Whoopee. Nothing about doing the committee work and markup necessary to get legislation passed.
My disgust is complete with the last sentence. After all the whining at the beginning of the section about how he understands that abortion is a "divisive issue" and his "respect for those who disagree" with him, I didn't expect much - and I wasn't disappointed. Notice the weasel words in his "Barack Obama opposes late term abortions, but believes that there must be exceptions for the life and health of the woman". "Late term" is fast migrating from third trimester to anything past first trimester in the Obama lexicon, but he's not going to say that. He uses the Bush/Rove tactic of redefining things the way he wants them to be to obfuscate what he means by "late term". Also left out is his recent statement that mental distress won't qualify as a consideration for the mother's health, a position which places him in agreement with Justices Thomas and Scalia, and to the right of the other seven justices on the Supreme Court. Health is physical health only in the New Obama Dictionary, but if people are confused or misled by his generic use of "health", well, that's fine with Obama.
Look for more blue smoke and mirrors as the campaign progresses. If Obama gets the nomination, by November you'll have no idea what you're voting for. |
