Congressional Stimulus Conference? ALL MEN.
Today, Congress announced the House and Senate lawmakers who will be serving as conferees to work out the final version of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. Missing from this list? Women lawmakers.
Remember my post about all the white guys of a certain age who are currently being GRILLED at Congressional Hearings for leading our economy over the cliff? (notice that Congress never noticed they were only grilling mostly white men!)
Look, I have nothing against WHITE MEN, but
- if Wall Street is dominated by white men, and they gleefully, greedily profited,
- if the banking industry is dominated by white men, and they gleefully, greedily profited
- if the auto industry is dominated by white men, and they refused to change their business practices to protect their businesses,
- if the shadow banking industry is dominated by white men and they gleefully, greedily profited,
- if all these white guys are still flying private jets and taking super-high salaries and going to luxury resorts for spa-meetings,
- THEN PERHAPS A BUNCH OF CONGRESSIONAL GUYS SHOULD NOT BE ALONE IN ANALYZING THE PROBLEM!
Seriously, where are the women? Where are the non-wealthy?
There is no ‘voice of america’ in this conference… These guys have lifetime health insurance coverage. Their wives raise their kids, usually back in their districts (which translates to single parenting?) They do not take public transportation around their own states, they do not understand what its like to be broke and wonder how to keep your house.
Again, these guys were on duty when this economic debacle unfolded. Why do they suddenly think that they can solve what they never regulated or objected to?
Under their watch, the rich got richer and the poor did NOT.
And its not like they are economists. So they bring their own high-level life experiences into the discussion of how to stimulate the economy. If they don’t experience what middle class Americans do, then how can they possibly know what to prioritize?
These conferees are the chairman and ranking members of the relevant committees, and just happen to be men. But it underscores how important it is for these lawmakers to be extra vigilant in making sure that programs benefiting women and children don’t face the brunt of the cuts. Already, as ThinkProgress has previously reported, such provisions have been the first to go:
– The Senate bill put together by the so-called “Gang of Moderates” disproportionately cut programs that target women and children, including Head Start, Violence Against Women, school improvement, and food stamps.
We’d be better off with monkeys throwing darts.
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