[Op-Ed] Ann Romney Should Stop Defending Her “Stay-At-Home Mom” Status

Mitt Romney was busily working the NRA on Friday to call out President Obama over his softness regarding gun rights and personal liberties in general when his personal “hero” wife Ann Romney came onto the stage to address the crowd over her decision to be a stay-at-home mom.

In her statement to the crowd Ann Romney proclaimed

“Let me give a shout-out to all moms that are working and by the way to all dads that are working. We love all of you. You know, I often think that you’re only as a parent as happy as your saddest child. And you never stop being a parent. Our boys are grown now, and they have children, but it is such an opportunity for me to think about the heritage that we’re leaving those children.” Women, as she plainly stated, are not a special interest group. “There’s only one part of that phrase that’s correct: women are special.”

The statement comes shortly after Hilary Rosen claimed that Ann Romney never worked a day in her life. A statement that landed her in hot water after Ann pointed to raising five children.

Here’s the issue with Ann Romney’s statement, regardless of whether or not she actually raised all five children with no help from paid workers millions of voters have collectively asked themselves one simple question “how many nanny’s did she have?” A recent discovery by DataLounge found that in 2010 the Romney’s had 5 maids on their payroll, of course all their children are now grown and moved out of the house. When it comes to cooking family dinners, cleaning up messes that your children leave behind and making sure your kids get to where they need to be its much easier when you can summon the help.

Now I’m IN NO WAY claiming Ann Romney farmed out her kids like a minor league baseball team to a bunch of Nanny’s but I’ve seen Mitt Romney’s schedule and between the state dinners, business events, whirlwind trips on a moments notice and various other events I find it incredibly hard to believe Ann Romney was cooking all the family dinners and helping her kids with all their homework with all the help the family could afford.

However that’s not even the real issue. Ann Romney needs to stop defending such a silly statement made by Rosen because she’s hindering her husbands campaign. Ann on the one hand has defended her stay-at-home mom status repeatedly over the last several days yet when it comes to delving further into her home life the conversation quickly turns to “other worries” for women. As Ann states:

“I’ve been on the campaign trail for one year, and guess what women are talking about? They are talking about jobs, and they are talking about the legacy of debt that we are leaving our children. That’s what I’m hearing.”

So if that is what mothers are talking about why won’t Ann Romney just put the stay-at-home mom comment to rest instead of turning it into a drab talking point, she could use this moment in time to talk about real issues women are worried about, although it should be noted that choosing to stay at home isn’t an economic possibility for many mothers these days. The answer is simple, Obama has the women voters, the GOP wants the women voters which according to an April USA Today/Gallup poll shows Mitt Romney trailing Obama among women by a huge 18 points, 54 percent to 36 percent. The GOP isn’t winning women over by attacking birth control and abortion laws so they grasp onto silly comments that they try to tie directly to the Obama camp even though Hilary Rosen has no direct association with the White House or DNC.

Ann Romney needs to drop the work-at-home attacks because even if you fully believe she was a great mother who raised five great children, you’re probably wondering right now how many maids, nanny’s, personal chefs and other helpers the Romney’s had along the way, an answer that could be zero, we don’t know because of course Ann Romney didn’t delve that far into her family life, perhaps for good reason.

Before anyone goes off on the rails that a male writer would make such comments, I work a full-time job at Inquisitr and then I stay home with my daughter while my wife goes to her job which we need for the insurance. It’s the America we live in and that’s why Ann Romney needs to move on to other topics, she’s speaking AT women and is a small way at men as well because she doesn’t really understand their family’s socio-economic status’ enough to speak WITH them.