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172 Proud to be a Card-Carrying, Flag-Waving, Patriotic American Liberal
This forum is being sponsored by the League of Women Voters.
- I am a 48-year-old woman voter.
- Like all American women, I grew up in a society dominated by men. When I grew up, we women were expected to know our place, and most careers which made any money – from doctors and lawyers to carpenters and welders – were not open to us.
- The message was not subtle. We were told in so many words that our brains could not handle the law books, that the schedule of a woman doctor would cause her to neglect her family, that we did not have the strength to swing a hammer, that our interest in the auto mechanics course at school was a blatant attempt to distract the boys.
- We found the high school regulations immovable, the law schools and medical schools closed to us, the union halls hostile.
- And anything that women did, women's work, was undervalued, or not valued at all. Like typing. Did you notice that, once computers came along, typing class had to be renamed keyboarding, so the boys would feel comfortable taking it?
- Like raising children. Male politicians go into shock in a discussion of the cost of child care. Why should child care cost anything? After all, that's something women do in their spare time between watching soap operas.
- What is frightening to me is that 30 years after women started to wake up to the inequities in our society, we are still fighting many of the same battles.
- Laws are not enforced. Harassment is still rampant. Domestic violence, which has trapped women for generations, is only now being recognized as the greatest physical threat and killer of women. And the right of us women to control our own bodies is still an open debate, this year, now, in the political arena.
- I am very angry that the issue of whether a woman can be expected to make, or is even capable of making, a rational decision about her own body, is still an issue in 1996 in the United States of America.
- It is no accident that this debate is taking place at a time when more than 9 out of 10 members of the Senate are men.
- * * *
- I am proud to have received two national endorsements in this race, from the bi-partisan National Women's Political Caucus in Washington, and from the National Organization for Women in Washington.
- I am the only candidate in this run for Maine's U.S. Senate seat to receive either endorsement. Despite its endorsement of her in the 1994 gubernatorial race, the National Women's Political Caucus did not endorse Susan Collins in her current primary run.
- We as a nation deserve better than we've been getting out of Congress.
- Women know this.
- And, at this point in our nation's history, women can do something about it.
- We have the numbers. We are more than half the population. We have the vote.
- But we have to have the will.
- Women in general, and women voters in particular, must insist on parity, not only in the work force, but as a political force.
- It is time to correct that imbalance.
- Point-blank, we need more women in Congress. But not just any woman.
- We need women who will stand up to the Republican party and refuse to be demeaned by their anti-choice, anti-woman, anti-children platform and agenda.
- We need women to counter the ridiculous rhetoric, like that of Dick Armey of Texas, who contends there is a national conspiracy by teenage girls to bring down the government by having babies.
- We need women in the Senate who understand the tough places people find themselves in through no fault of their own, and the responsibility of government to help them get past those crises.
- We need women at the highest levels of government who understand that you can't poison the air, the water, and the land in the name of higher profits, and not expect to pay a price in terms of sickness, deformity, and premature death.
- We need women who understand that if you plant seeds of hate, you reap a harvest of violence.
- We need women who not only understand all this, but are willing to stand up and fight for a better, healthier nation and a saner, safer world.
- I am such a woman. But I caution you that not all women politicians are created equal.
- Judging from her anti-gay, anti-minimum wage hike, pro-death penalty, and other positions, Susan Collins is pure Republican.
- Plain and simple, I am the best candidate to take on Susan Collins in November. If you want a woman fighter on your hands, vote for me on June 11, and again in November.
- If I don't make it past this primary, I urge you to vote Democratic in November. As a nation, we women can't afford to do otherwise. Thank you.
- – League of Women Voters Candidate Forum, Portland
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