I say yes, you say no, OR People are Strange

Ah, Bill, you devil you!

Linda

And yes, of course, the binder "story" was in fact a lie:

http://blog.thephoenix.com/BLOGS/talkingpolitics/archive/2012/10/16/mind-the-binder.aspx

Mind The Binder

From the rush transcript:

CROWLEY: Governor Romney, pay equity for women?

ROMNEY: Thank you. An important topic, and one which I learned a great  deal about, particularly as I was serving as governor of my state,  because I had the chance to pull together a cabinet and all the  applicants seemed to be men.

And I -- and I went to my staff, and I said, "How come all the people  for these jobs are -- are all men." They said, "Well, these are the  people that have the qualifications." And I said, "Well, gosh, can't we  -- can't we find some -- some women that are also qualified?"

And -- and so we -- we took a concerted effort to go out and  find women who had backgrounds that could be qualified to become members of our cabinet.

I went to a number of women's groups and said, "Can you help us find folks," and they brought us whole binders full of women.

I was proud of the fact that after I staffed my Cabinet and my senior  staff, that the University of New York in Albany did a survey of all 50  states, and concluded that mine had more women in senior leadership  positions than any other state in America.

Now one of the reasons I was able to get so many good women to be part of that team was because of our recruiting effort.

Not a true story.

What actually happened was that in 2002 -- prior to the election, not even knowing yet whether it would be a Republican or Democratic administration -- a bipartisan group of women in Massachusetts formed MassGAP to address the problem of few women in senior leadership positions in state government. There were more than 40 organizations involved with the Massachusetts Women's Political Caucus (also bipartisan) as the lead sponsor.

They did the research and put together the binder full of women qualified for all the different cabinet positions, agency heads, and authorities and commissions. They presented this binder to Governor Romney when he was elected.

I have written about this before, in various contexts; tonight I've checked with several people directly involved in the MassGAP effort who confirm that this history as I've just presented it is correct -- and that Romney's claim tonight, that he asked for such a study, is false. 

I will write more about this later, but for tonight let me just make a few quick additional points. First of all, according to MassGAP and MWPC, Romney did appoint 14 women out of his first 33 senior-level appointments, which is a reasonably impressive 42 percent. However, as I have reported before, those were almost all to head departments and agencies that he didn't care about -- and in some cases, that he quite specifically wanted to not really do anything. None of the senior positions Romney cared about -- budget, business development, etc. -- went to women.

Secondly, a UMass-Boston study found that the percentage of senior-level appointed positions held by women actually declined throughout the Romney administration, from 30.0% prior to his taking office, to 29.7% in July 2004, to 27.6% near the end of his term in November 2006. (It then began rapidly rising when Deval Patrick took office.)

Third, note that in Romney's story as he tells it, this man who had led and consulted for businesses for 25 years didn't know any qualified women, or know where to find any qualified women. So what does that say?

Indeed.  What does it say that he spent 25 years in the private sector -- a fact that he is inordinately proud of -- and doesn't know any qualified women.  What does that say about the kind of organization he runs?  What does that say about him as a CEO or a supervisor?  I would hard-pressed to find any man I know who would say he didn't know any qualified women in his field. 

L

Once again....I am so glad that I am here where I can count on facts to show up and not some slanted view.  It is so refreshing to come to a place that doesn't take some favorable sounding part and put it up as though that is all there is.  To everything that I have seen, even from the Repugs side --- Romney did not deliver last night.  I'm still a bit appalled that he was going to strong-arm Candy  like he did Leher ( which I think I'm spelling wrong ) but that fell apart and that he showed at one time such dis-respect for the office he is running for by talking down so to the Pres. Also I did not feel that he managed to connect much with women.  I think there may be big repairs in order.  We have some work to do on our side too.  Its growing late.   

Jackie 

You left out Timothy McVeigh - parents divorced at 10 and raised by his father. So much for single mothers being the problem.

Glad to see you popped in Glenna!  Hope treatment is going well for you.

Wishing you a very good time on the cruise Chickadee.  Hope the internet access is there so you can still visit with us.

The binder story just makes me wonder how they think they can get away with some of their 'stories'.  Ryan supposedly washing dishes at the soup kitchen too.  Are they so used to only having people around them who are scared to challenge them maybe?  Because this stuff is so easily proven to be phony ... why even say it?

Dh and I enjoyed the debate last night.  Both had their strong moments.  However, Obama came out strong and confident, which was so reassuring after his last time out.  Romney started out confident but was rambling and repeating himself before too long. He seemed to think that the person who said the most words was the winner.

Watching him sitting there with that wierd smirk and the obssesive blinking made me wonder what other heads of states would think while conversing with him if that is what they saw.

Blue, I watched that Rose Garden presser = and it was ALL ABOUT the seriousness with which the President of the United States, Barack Obama ( in case any lurker has forgotten) takes ACTS OF TERROR.  HRC had been brilliant ( HRC, 2016)

BLUE:  Stay away from the places which upset you...I figured out how to watch the WHOLE DEBATE, fabulous,  used the MUTE button so I only heard PRESIDENT OBAMA ...passed that idea around during debate by email - and wow, amazed at how many dear friends hadn't thought of that option...

BINDERS - took them 90 seconds to buy the website.  Tee, hee...gotta be THE MEME of the Month, and probably the Halloween Costume of the Year too...

Wanna bet Tina Fey uses it at the Golden Globes - she & Amy will be hysterical, not as funny as Etch-A-Sketch whatzizname, but good...

Yorkie - Mormon Playboy - a classic.  Also neat pic of WJC ;-)))

So why was MA 47th in job creation during his reign as Governor?  He just didn't want to then or what?

What was the real deal with you East Coast folks and your earthquake?  Shake, rattle and roll or just a little jiggle?

Ann, I'm going to share the meme on my page.

Here is another important chart:

Question:

In debates where there are alloted times to speak, why don't they just have the mikes automatically go dead when the time is up?  I hate the way that they all take advantage of the 'time'.

I like the idea of timing by dead mikes.  The one who is speaking has a live mike until time is up.  The one who is not speaking has a dead mike until it is his or her turn.  I would also like to see each candidate talk for five minutes on the issue and have a two minute rebuttal.  Regardless of the forum every question should come from the American People.  Each party can take turns choosing the question to be asked with the incumbent allowed to choose first.  The candidate who does not use all of his or her time, can add it to the closing statement. 

Passed out, and have only just come to. Damned meds - when they don't kill you, they nearly kill you. Unable to go to work today.

Chickadee - yey - we'll hear how your cruise is going - watch it with the chocolate pictures - some of us are trying to watch what we eat, ya know.

Glenna - my only complaint is that you don't post enough. It's so wonderful that we are all here saying such interesting things, not letting our health status define us, serious though it is in too many cases. Really glad to see Sandy here.

HL - very interesting graph.

Possum lovers are here again....I didn't see the post. The punctuation and bigotry always give her away, thought. The more ignorant, the more the hate.

Interesting to read the real story about how women got hired to top positions in the MASS government.

Next Romney will say we should be happy because we don't have to pay employment taxes on the underbutler - only on the butler. Ooooh, the oodles that will save me!!

Athena, the Plains Dweller (we do our own food serving.  )