Kossack Caerus made a comment in a diary of mine today that has me thinking more deeply about the Hillary/Chelsea tag team attack on Bernie. It bears sharing:
www.dailykos.com/…
Something which makes me MOST angry about what Chelsea and Hillary are doing, is the fear they are inflicting on older women ( I know, men are on social security too) but women do live longer, we all know that, and more and more older women are completely dependent on social security and Medicare. To deliberately inflict fear on that part of the population, is, well, a sin. Won’t use the other words, I’ll get banned.
This is NOT how women behave toward older women. Hillary and Chelsea know what they’re doing, they’ve both studied their internal polls, focus groups, this was deliberate!
I’d been so wrapped up in what I thought to be disingenuousness around this episode and my distaste as a parent for trotting out her daughter to do this dirty work on her behalf that I did not consider this point until I read the comment. But, it strikes home with me. My mother just turned 80 and has spent a fair bit of time in the hospital recently with heart issues. As you can imagine, such things are scary for her. She lost her my father and husband of over 50 years 8 years ago. One year before that she was at my sister’s bedside, as was I, when she passed from breast cancer — her lack of insurance forcing an early death.
My mother is lonely. Not because she does not have a loving family near — I’ve a brother who moved in with her to help, 4 sisters nearby and loads of her grand kids and great grandkids — but she misses the companionship only a loving partner provides. This adds to her health fears, makes them more acute.
And now, her saving are running out, leaving only social security. Fortunately, her home is paid off, but she has lots of prescriptions, and medical costs are her largest every month.
My mother is vulnerable.
Vulnerable. Even saying the word makes me shake a little. It’s sounds precarious and fraught with sadness.
Until reading Caerus’s post, I had not thought about the greater depravity this new tactic of Hillary’s is. Let’s be clear, she IS trying to scare older folks in thinking they’ll loss their Medicare under a Sanders presidency, and that their care will be subject to the whims of cruel Republican governors. Rolling over this now in the context of my mother’s fears really has me steamed now, really has me disgusted. Just politics as usual? Don’t you DARE say scaring seniors is a normal and acceptable tactic for Democratic candidates.
You know, when I first saw VL Baker’s diary with the partial title “Shame on you Hillary,” I laughed at what I then thought was dramatic hyperbole. Within this context, I’m not laughing anymore.