Jane Plumber Gets Airtime Over at CNN.com

Submitted by ncrw on Fri, 10/17/2008 - 3:29pm

Oct 17, 2008 posted by Linda Basch Today I posted an op-ed over on CNN.com, titled "What About Jane Plumber?" Here is how it begins: "The all-too-familiar talking points of the candidates reverberated through the air waves for a third and last time on Wednesday, but one key voting constituency was missing from the debate, namely, Jane Plumber, and, more specifically, Jane's retirement funds. As the bottom falls out of the stock market, the housing market plummets, and sub-prime mortgages put many American voters—especially women—in a financial freefall, it is the federal safety net that they're depending on to cushion their landing. For swing voters, the majority of whom are older woman, this highly contentious election may come down to two often overlooked, make or break issues: Social Security and Medicare. So far, neither candidate seems to have woken up to the tough economic facts facing so many older women voters…." You can read the rest here. I invite you to join in the lively debate that is taking place over there in comments. And our gratitude to Cindy Hounsell, President of the Women's Institute for a Secure Retirement, for her post here at The Real Deal earlier this week.  Cindy's was a featured post over at the Blog Action Day 08 – Poverty site. Together, let's keep this conversation going!


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Comments

I am wondering what is happening to my social security also. I have paid taxes to this all of my life. I am 59. Do not like to admit it. HA! In two years I plan to collect the 62 year old part of it cause if I wait it will not be there. I am wondering how this got to be socialism. What I am tired of with the Neo Cons is their spread of money to the richest people. When Obama talks about spreading the wealth among all Americans this is called Socialism. What can we do to get through to the hard heads who think that social security and spreading the wealth to others so duh they can have jobs in the USA and to quit out sourcing all of our jobs. Really. This has not been brought up in the campaign. I am tired of hearing about Joe the Plumber. He is a hard head Republican and does not speak for all of the plumbers or any middle class. What about the poor? Nothing has been said about them except that the poor were blamed for the financial crisis on Wall Street. What is wrong with this picture? Something needs to brought to everyones attention regarding these matters. There are challenges in todays world with the freeloaders on Wall Street, homelessness in our cities which include veterans, hunger, job loss, outsourcing of our work force to foreign countries, etc. I have a brother who is a right wing religious right. He would scream at me if we were living in the same city. We are not. I live in the capital of Texas, Austin. He lives in a very very small community near the Oklahoma border. I lived in California for many many years before moving to Austin. I reflect on the homelessness in all cities. I am a filmmaker who has not been doing well lately and with finances I am going back to school. I have paid taxes since I was 17 years old and I do not consider any grant that I obtain from the govt. to be welfare or socialism. The Republicans are spreading smears about Obama. I got an email in my gmail yesterday which I forwarded to my brother in law who works for the Obama campaign. The email had so many lies about Obama being not of the USA, etc. I truly am praying that Obama wins. If he does not I am wondering what will happen to America? Also this new all digital conversion is going to hurt may people. My converter box caused my TV of only 6 years to go bye bye. I now have to go out somehow and purchase a Digital TV. I do not mind this. I have been working with analog and digital conversion for years. The bill signed into affect to begin is going to put a lot of people out in the dark with no source of information. Think about it. Okay guys and dolls, I am signing off my soapbox.....Yours truly....... Vicki
Thank you for taking the time to respond to our blog posting. We are glad to hear that you are so engaged in the election and encourage you to continue the dialogue on women’s issues. Linda Basch
After reading this interesting article, I thought I would share it particularly with fellow women supporters of our next President, who I hope to be Senator Barack Obama. We all recognize that there are some gaps in the campaign and hopefully we can continue keeping everyone informed to make sure we cover as many issues of importance to our votes in order to assure the succesful outcome of this election! I want to make sure that while I support Senator Obama, I also help to inform his campaign by spreading the word. We have so many issues at hand, particularly in the less favored issue of health care, women's health, and the issue of our disgraceful high rate of uninsurance, along with a prospect of less resources for our soon to be retirees. I will make sure to keep this conversation going! Thanks for the insight!