Women's Issues and the Presidential Campaign

There’s a lot at stake in this Presidential election.  The results will touch women both directly and indirectly and have a cascading effect onto the lives of their children and immediate and extended families.  As the founder and director of a Center for Women’s Leadership Development I feel that I have a responsibility to offer opinions on how I believe the candidates stand on women’s issues.

 I could easily duck this responsibility by stating that stepping into the political debate may possibly alienate current or potential clients, pose a threat to my business or diminish my standing in some way.  However, that would not be leadership.

My life’s purpose is to inform, inspire, motivate and help others fulfill their potential.  If I choose to “hide” behind a rock and keep my beliefs and opinions to myself then I have failed miserably as a role model for others and in fulfilling my purpose. My hope is that my blogs will move people to conduct their own research and fact checking, and critically analyze their own positions and motivations as well as those of the candidates.

My blog posts over the next two weeks will focus on topics that directly and indirectly affect women.  In my search for the presidential candidates’ positions, I first examined their official websites.  

In an era when women and women’s issues are critically important to our country and economy and our actions a source of influence for the world, I was amazed that Mitt Romney, unlike Obama, has no category for “women” on the Issues page of his website. 

As I continued my research, however, I could only conclude that the reason for this omission is because Mitt Romney doesn’t have much to say on women’s issues other than offering generalities and platitudes. 

More often than not, Romney has evaded taking a position on several  major issues and legislation of the day affecting women.   As examples, he is silent on the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, The Violence to Women Act re-authorization, and the Paycheck Fairness Act.   The absence of a definitive position on these and other issues leaves voters uninformed about how he will govern when it comes to issues affecting women and is a failure of leadership.  Women voters, their families and the country deserve to be treated better.