The latest horrible ad by the Romney campaign meant to appeal to women voters reveals in a nutshell some of the major problems with Romney, with Republicans, and with Conservatism. In the several dozen seconds that the video runs, we can see some of the essential failings of the Republican view of the world. Join me over the orange weapon-bone for more.
If you can bear to watch, here it is:
And the transcript:
Dear Daughter, welcome to America. Your share of Obama's debt is over 50 thousand dollars. And it grows every day. Obama's policies are making it harder on women. The poverty rate for women—the highest in 17 years. More women are unemployed under President Obama. More than 5.5 million women can't find work. That's what Obama's policies have done for women. Welcome, daughter.
POINT ONE: The visuals are all blurry, seemingly in a bedroom, like some patriarchal Victorian vision of women who exist in a soft, fuzzy world of babies and linens, where the hard, male, outside world is but dimly glimpsed through a curtained window.
POINT TWO: What mother addresses their newborn baby girl as “Dear Daughter” and says “Welcome, daughter”, with the “welcome” being in fact a sarcastic statement?! No mother, fuckers, that’s who.
POINT THREE: The whole idea that a mother talks her newborn baby by trying to scare the shit out of her, basically saying “You’ve just been born and you’re DOOMED to a life of misery” is crazy. This dialogue could only come from some rightwing ideologue who has no idea, has no interest, has no empathy, in what feelings a normal mother would have toward her tiny baby.
POINT FOUR: The Romney Republicans who came up with this sick ad see people – women, mothers, baby girls – as mere props and through which they can give vent to their delusional Conservative and Tea Party vision of the economy. People are paper objects with no other purpose than to serve as screens on which rightwing Republicans can project their cruel and crazed view of the economy and the world.
“Welcome, daughter”. This is the voice of a badly programmed robot that has a poorly hidden agenda of stealing our humanity and wrecking our society.
Compare the closing of Romney's ad:
"Welcome Daughter." "I'm Mitt Romney and I approved this message"
with this:
Goodbye, Mitt.