A prominent female donor to the Republican National Committee in 2012 is breaking off to head a Super PAC called “Women Lead”, so that her agenda to get more women elected won’t get co-opted by the boys party.
Christine Toretti took over her grandfather’s drilling company, S.W. Jack Drilling Co., after her father died, and served as the finance co-chair of the Republican National Committee in 2012. In 2010, Politics Magazine named her one of the most influential Republicans in Pennsylvania. Yet, she tells Politico that at GOP dinners, she would often be the only woman and it was assumed that she was the then-RNC finance chair’s secretary.
Hello, 1950, where’ve you been?
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From Politico:
Toretti recalled that as she traveled the country raising money with then-RNC finance chair Ron Weiser, “At a lot of dinners I would go to, I was the only woman in the room and they would assume I was Ron’s secretary.”
“I decided that if I was going to do this again, I was going to do it differently,” she continued. “Really, for me, it’s about getting more women at the table.”
They thought she was his secretary. Really.
THIS woman — “If she’s not the most powerful, non-elected woman in the GOP, I’d like to be introduced to one that is because I haven’t met them,” former Gov. Tom Ridge told PennLive.
I doubt anyone can explain to someone whose financial interests lay in the Republican Party’s deregulation fever that appealing to women who do not, say, own a drilling company, is going to be a bit tougher. And the number of women who do own a drilling company is not enough to win elections, by a long shot. There’s only so far you can go on the morality of hate and racism, especially when your party is taking aim at women’s freedom.
In some ways, Toretti seems like a woman who might get it. After all, she’s divorced and she has kids.
However, the very wealthy operate in a different legal arena than the rest of America. This is yet another example of how electing more ovaries does not necessarily mean that better policies for women will be enacted. Being female does not necessarily mean that you support equality, freedom and liberty for women (see Sarah Palin).
The Republican Party endorses laws that make it harder for single mothers and children. These are the issues Republicans should be addressing as they try to win back women. Toretti knows that female donors are hanging on to their money because they feel disenfranchised, telling Politico, “There are a lot of women we would meet with who have the capacity to write really large checks who feel disenfranchised by the party.” However, she seems to believe this sense of disenfranchisement centers around the abortion issue, which she is wisely leaving alone in her PAC.
It does not center around abortion. Women are fleeing the Republican Party because the party is obsessed with regulating their bodies, and stealing liberty and legal protections away from women every chance they get. Republicans are against equal pay, which might not matter when you are running your grandfather’s drilling company, but it matters very much when you work for someone else for a living.
Republicans are against healthcare for children, food programs for children of single parents, and much more. Republicans spend a lot of time denying the existence of rape or sexual harassment and trying to use the law to make it harder for a woman victimized by either.
And at the heart of the “abortion” debate is not a debate about abortion, but rather about if women can be trusted to make good decisions about their own bodies or if we should let politicians tell women and their doctors what they have to do. It’s a matter of freedom and liberty.
It’s not a surprise that Toretti doesn’t care that Republican men assumed she was the secretary. She is not relying on them to pass laws that will impact her. She is not relying upon them for a raise, or for the freedom to make her own medical decisions. She knows her family will always be safe from the tyranny of Republican big government overreach. Money assures that.
It is a surprise that Toretti doesn’t get how offensive that is to a woman who has no choice but to rely upon these Republicans to make decisions about her salary, her medical care, who she can have sex with and whether or not she will be tossed in jail for having a miscarriage.
Additional Source: Roarty, Alex; Sean Coit (January 2010). “Pennsylvania Influencers”. Politics Magazine. pp. 44-49.
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