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Lynette Long's letter says it all

From: drlynettelong at aol.com

Date: May 19, 2008 9:09:47 PM CDT

Subject: Re: Hillary Clinton



First I want to thank each and every one of you for writing to me. I want to apologize for sending a group email, but I got hundreds of letters. I want you to know you are not alone. There are millions of women who feel as you do, that the Democratic National Primary Campaign uncovered the pervasive and insidious sexism that runs rampant through our country. That Hillary Clinton is the most qualified candidate, and that she is being cheated out of the nomination by the good old boys network, the DNC and the Mainstream Media. You are angry. You are in a rage. I am too.

Underneath that rage is sadness, sadness that we are second class citizens in a country where we are the majority. What’s especially disquieting to me is that many young women are blind to the sexist nature of the world in which we live. It’s our job, each and every one of us, to educate them. Economically, women earn seventy-seven cents on the dollar for the same work compared to men. Women are in significantly fewer managerial positions, are less likely to own a business and more likely to live in poverty. Politically, women comprise fifty-two percent of the population and an even larger share of the voting public yet only sixteen of the current one hundred Untied States Senators are women. Similarly, only sixteen percent of the current members of the House of Representatives are women. There is only one female Supreme Court Justice on a nine member court and most remarkably America has never had a female president or presidential nominee. Women did not get the right to vote in the United States until 1920. The glass ceiling is real on both economical and political fronts. Men want parity for their daughters and granddaughters but not for the women sitting beside them. They are not going to give us the power that should be ours, we have to take it. Are we ready?

Women have no sense of their own power. White women are the largest race/gender voting block in the country. White men compose the second largest voting block, black women the third largest block, and black men are the smallest race/gender block. White and black women together women comprise more than fifty percent of the electorate and if were fully committed to a single candidate, we could determine the outcome of any office in the country. It is our turn. Are we ready?

I am sad that black women do not support Hillary in greater numbers. Many members of the black community wrote to me and said they were afraid to stand up for Hillary. They explained how black radio is pressuring it’s listeners to vote for Barack Obama. White men and women alike wrote me and told me that they were called racist for supporting Hillary Clinton. I want to remind each and everyone of you that, in 1969, Shirley Chisholm the first black woman to serve in the U.S. House of Representatives said, “Of my two handicaps, being female put more obstacles in my path than being black.” The impact of the “handicaps” of race and gender has not changed in the last 40 years. As women we need to come together, and take the power that could be ours. Racism and sexism are both terrible barriers, but one is not worse than the other. On average, a black man with a college degree earns more than a white woman with the same degree, and a black woman earns less than both. Black male physicians earn more than white women physicians, and black male professors earn more than white female professors. Yet ninety percent of black women voted for Barack Obama indifferent to the impact of gender on their struggle or how electing a female president might help them.



I want to change the world. I think we can. I think by electing female leaders we can create a gentler America. We need to be counted. We need to stand up and let the DNC know we will not get in line. As one woman who wrote me so eloquently put it, the DNC thinks we will vote for Obama because like abused women we have no where else to go.

I, Lynette Long, am a registered Democrat, but I will not vote for Barack Obama. I will not stay home. I will go to the polls and proudly write on my ballot, HILLARY CLINTON. I want the DNC to count my vote as a protest vote. I want them to know I am tired of being a second class citizen in my own country. This isn’t about Barack Obama or John McCain. This isn’t about Iraq or Iran. This is about a war, a war for our voice, our dignity, and our selves. I am doing this for my daughter, her unborn children and her children’s children. I am doing this for each and every one of you. I am doing this because I love my country. I hope you will join me.



Lynette Long

DrLynetteLong at aol.com

PLEASE FORWARD THIS EMAIL TO EVERYONE AND ENCOURAGE THEM TO HEAR OUR RAGE AND JOIN US IN OUR STRUGGLE. THANK YOU.

Huffington never approves my comments

I don't know why the Huffington Post cares so much what I have to say, but once again they denied my comment. In fact, I don't think I have commented there successfully once. Shouldn't that be a story in itself? If I had more time, I'd post here.

Here is the comment I last attempted, oooooh NASTY:

This comment is pending approval and won't be displayed until it is approved.

There is nothing brave about taking the dominant gender point of view and forcing the woman out of the way. There is nothing acceptable about betraying millions of women who have looked at NARAL as a feminist organization. Then posting here at Huffington Post, a media outlet that has proven to be anti-Hillary and anti-feminist is even more cowardly.

All NARAL had to do was wait 3 weeks to let the people decide on the candidate. Hillary Clinton has devoted her entire life to supporting women, children, reproductive health and freedom, and women's right to choose. In fact, Hillary's campaign is all about women's empowerment.

I can only imagine that Nancy was promised something in a under-the-table deal from the Obama campaign. What a shame on behalf of those of us who have supported her organization for decades.

When I was at Harvard Law School, I stood up at several clinic protection efforts in Boston. Although Barack Obama was on campus with me, he never supported me or the rest of the pro-choice movement on campus. He was never an active supporter for women's rights on campus. The legacy he left the Harvard Law Review, where I too was an editor, was not a legacy of feminism.

I am sad for NARAL, which is now losing many members, including me. I'm sure my post will be flamed by the Obamaniacs here -- and I know that most of you are paid to post, but I'm not.

Texas Caucus Report

Here is an actual blow-by-blow caucus report from Texas. Now YOU tell me if caucuses are democratic (small d).


What a Texan caucus actually looks like

You can only participate in a Texan caucus if you have already voted. You've already made your presidential pick. Spending an additional three hours at the polling station in the evening is deeply unfair to the elderly, disabled, and ill, as well as to parents of young children and everyone who works in the evening.

Six precincts vote at Harmony Hill Elementary School in San Antonio. As an out-of-state volunteer for the Clinton campaign, I've been asked to spend the day here informing voters about the evening caucus. An Obama volunteer is already there with a pick-up full of brochures, as are two local Republicans handing out flyers for a constable and a sheriff. The four of us stand the regulation 100 feet away. As voters emerge from the school, the Obama volunteer buttonholes African Americans and young white men, while I approach Hispanics, white women, and the elderly. With this simple formula we predict voter preference 90% of the time. The two Republicans start pointing out the Republican women to me so I won't waste time (their caucus doesn't add to the delegate total). "They'll vote for Hillary in the general election," one says, "although they won't tell their husbands that." We discuss energy and healthcare policy. An election official spends her cigarette breaks chatting with the Obama supporter. The hours crawl by.

At 6:00 pm, six external Obama supporters arrive, primarily young professionals. Local Hillary supporters are nervous because the newcomers are obviously practiced. A few white men in cowboy hats show up who turn out to be Hillary supporters, despite initial local suspicion that they're Obama moles. Hillary people get four of the six packets, largely because the Obama people are ineligible as they're not from local precincts. At other sites there must be considerable potential for outright conflict, even physical altercation. Intimidation is already playing a role.

The magic hour of 7:00 approaches but the line of voters still stretches out the door. The Republicans go home. Local Hillary supporters decide who will try to chair each of the six precinct caucuses. An Obama supporter sits at the front door wishing Hillary voters good night and persuading Obama voters to stay. I balance him out. Voting doesn't end until 7:45, after which the four election officials take forever to cross-check voter registration lists with the list of those who voted today. One admits this should have been done during the day but claims they hadn't had a free moment, while another snaps angrily at Hillary supporters who offer to expedite the process by reading one of the lists out loud. Is this stalling? And how would one prove it?

And here is the heart-rending part. It is dark, unseasonably cold, and windy. From my vantage point at the door I see elderly people arrive in wheelchairs and with walkers. Each is dependent on another person to drive them there. One pale and gaunt woman quietly says something about intestinal difficulties. Another woman has rushed there from work, hasn't eaten all day, and on realizing the lengthy process ahead anguishes over whether to stay or go home. Shift workers have to leave. Many young parents have children with them. One or two young couples aside, all of these people end up on the Hillary side of the caucus rooms – or don't end up anywhere, because they have to go. The election officials refuse to accelerate their snail-like pace in stamping the voter lists. It's 8:15. There is talk of mutiny in the caucus rooms. A man in a wheelchair and his attendant leave. Young women leave, mainly Hillary supporters say the locals. The woman with stomach pains leaves. Another old fellow leaves. And on and on.

This is deeply unfair. You can't caucus unless you've already voted – but if you've already voted then you've already indicated your presidential preference, so why do you have to go through physical hardship or neglect other responsibilities to express it again? This system favors voters who are physically fit and have flexible schedules – Obama supporters, in other words, given the clean break in this primary election along age, gender, and income lines.

The election officials finally cough up the voting rolls. In the largest caucus room there is uncertainty as to whether a simple signature will suffice or whether a hand count must be taken afterwards for the signature to be valid. Stalling is not the issue here; the Hillary supporters are genuinely uncertain and want to do everything correctly. Several more people leave in exasperation. And the signature procedure itself is far from simple. Name, address, three phone numbers (home, work, and cell), voter registration number, and presidential preference are painstakingly entered into little squares. Then you check whether you want to be a delegate, as well as columns for gender, age, ethnicity, and sexual orientation. No one knows why this information is required, and several insist it is illegal. A deaf/mute man is put at the front of the signing line in one caucus because his elderly interpreter, also a voter, is ill and needs to go home. This means that debate over the legality of these questions has to be filtered back and forth through sign language, not to mention the interpreter's evident unfamiliarity with such issues in general coupled with her increasing physical distress. She graciously perseveres but it is painful to watch. Meanwhile the temporary chair of this caucus – a Hillary supporter – insists on having everyone sign only one sheet at a time. Whether she's following procedural rules or is afraid that Obama supporters might sneak in additional sheets as reported on MSNBC, you can imagine how long this takes. More people leave, or rather more Hillary supporters leave according to locals. And this is supposed to be democratic?

One caucus has the bright idea of giving one sheet to the Obama line and another to the Hillary line, each monitored by one Obama and one Hillary observer. This speeds things up, but it is 9:45 before the last person signs, so some of them have been waiting for three hours. But finally the crucial part – namely the recording of votes – is over. The hard core is left to discuss the correct treatment of provisional voters, such as those who had driver's licenses instead of voter registration cards. And only then do we start with the thresholds and percentages and rounding up and rounding down. The Obama people whip out their calculators and their "EZ" math sheets. Alternate calculations have to be done for provisional supporters, while everyone watches each precious fraction of a delegate like vultures. Although distinctly in the minority here, the Obama supporters try to get themselves appointed the permanent chair of each caucus – who call in the final tallies. They're not successful although it's very close because most of the Hillary supporters have gone home. In Obama strongholds, however, his supporters' physical stamina, organizational discipline, English as a native language, and apparent will to exploit everything technically legal will almost certainly give them undue procedural advantage.

But the main point is this: is Obama really proud to take away the votes of people who want Clinton in the White House but were too old, tired, or ill to stick around for hours, who were at home putting their kids to bed, or were keeping community services running in the evening?

Hi, world

I am messenger M, messenger Mom, messenger messy, messenger non-malicious. I need a place to compile my opinions which is not Facebook. Maybe you'll read this. Maybe you won't.

I'm here. I have opinions. Don't shoot the messenger!