I work for a nonprofit called MomsRising.org. We were started by Joan Blades (of MoveOn.org!) and Kristin Rowe-Finkbeiner. We work to bring truly family-friendly policies to corporations and government, supporting legislation like Lilly Ledbetter's Fair Pay Act, paid sick days legislation, flextime and health care for all kids.
Using a BINGO format, we've been tracking both presidential campaigns to get a sense of where they stand on our issues. During the nomination acceptance speeches, our members found that Obama hit all our issues and mentioned family at least 15 times. McCain got points for several mentions of family, but no mentions of the concrete issues on our platform.
Meet me after the jump to hear about how this leads to getting kicked out of Palin's office (sigh).
We also noted that Obama voted for the Fair Pay Act but McCain was absent-- though he later said that women just needed "more education and training." So in April after the vote, we hand- delivered over 9000 resumes from our members saying that we really just need equal pay.
Here's a picture of our "Magnificently Overqualified Moms (MOMs) delivering the resumes:
With all the hubbub around Gov. Palin's status as mother as well as politician, we decided to ask her to clarify the McCain-Palin stance on family-related issues. We got over 20,000 signatures and counting on this.
And hey, you can still sign on! Because we just got kicked out of her office while we tried to deliver the letter with all the signatures.
A camera crew accompanied our executive director, Kristin Rowe-Finkbeiner, and a group of moms on their way to the delivery. Palin's office invited the camera crew up-- but said we couldn't come up to share the letter and signatures. They told us to mail it.
Here's a picture of the group trying to deliver the letter. Our ED Kristin is in red.
Here's part of the press release we're sending out about it:
NEWS RELEASE CONTACT: Gretchen Wright
September 24, 2008 202/371-1999
Governor Sarah Palin's Office Refuses to Accept Letter from America's Moms
MomsRising.org Attempts to Deliver Letter Asking Governor's Positions
on Family-Friendly Issues
Fifteen DC-area moms and MomsRising.org Executive Director Kristin Rowe-Finkbeiner were turned away this afternoon when they attempted to deliver a letter to Governor Sarah Palin asking her to share her positions on issues like health care, paid sick days and flexible work options. The group was attempting to deliver the letter to the State of Alaska office in Washington, DC.
The letter was signed by nearly 22,000 moms, dads and others from across the United States who would like to know what a McCain/Palin administration would do to support America's families.
"We are extremely disappointed that we were not even allowed to deliver this letter today," said Rowe-Finkbeiner. "Health care, paid sick days, paid family leave and afterschool programs are among the issues that are top-of-mind for many families. We were told that we need to mail in our letter and we're going to do that. We are still counting on Governor Palin to respond to us. "
[I'm snipping out the part of the release that quotes the letter, which you can read here at our website.]
The full text is available on the MomsRising.org web site at www.momsrising.org. MomsRising.org will mail the letter to Governor Palin's four regional offices, her Washington, DC office and McCain/Palin campaign offices.
The letter is part of MomsRising.org's MomsVote '08 effort, which includes Get-Out-the-Vote activities, debate watches, voter registration and educating the candidates about issues that matter to America's families, like paid family leave, flexible work options, afterschool programs, health care for all children and affordable child care.
MomsRising.org is an online grassroots organization that is working for paid family leave, flexible work options, excellent childcare and health care for all children, and to stop the wage and hiring biases that penalize so many mothers today. MomsRising.org has more than 150,000 members across the United States.
# # # #
UPDATE: Wow!! My first time on the rec list!! Thanks so much. It means a lot to this small nonprofit staffer (I'd like to think of myself as a community organizer, but that's a pretty grand title in my world. ;) )