Weakening Credibility

My mother worked up to a point. She was working as a commercial artist when she got pregnant with me. Then she gave birth to 10 kids over 14 years, and she never drew a paycheck again in her life.

After the kids were grown, she thought about going back to work, but my father's law career was going great guns at that point, and her contribution to the family income would have been marginal, especially given marginal income tax rates. So she took up art again, this time for her own pleasure, rather than for pay.

Nonetheless, she was a bright woman, a University of Chicago drop-out, but an art-school graduate, who read the newspapers and read books and formed her own opinions about world affairs. I would say she was entitled to her opinions, and I figure Ann Romney is entitled to her opinions too.

I'm not sure I've ever heard Ann Romney speak, but people say she's warm and personable, and a big influence on her husband, so evidently some Democrats perceive her as a political threat. I can see where they would want to weaken her credibility, especially since she has a credible persona.

But the way to weaken her credibility is not like this:

Said Rosen: “What you have is Mitt Romney running around the country, saying, 'Well, you know, my wife tells me that what women really care about are economic issues, and when I listen to my wife, that’s what I’m hearing.' Guess what? His wife has actually never worked a day in her life.”

Well, this isn't completely coherent on its own terms. Even if she hasn't drawn a paycheck, she might have talked to enough "regular" women on the campaign trail to get a pretty good impression of what's on "regular" women's minds.

But what really backfired, I imagine, was the sneering tone toward a woman who had, after all, raised five children, which strikes most people as being work of an important sort.

Do not appear
to sneer
at motherhood.

It rarely does your cause much good.

You'll have better luck if you try
attacking apple pie!