Mommy Bloggers Chat with the Clinton Campaign

The Chicago, NYC, DC Metro, and Silicon Valley Moms still have an open invitation to the Obama, Huckabee, McCain, Paul and Romney to meet with us in person or over the phone. Email us at info(at)chicagomomsblog(dot)com guys!

Just days before the biggest Super Tuesday in US history, writers from the Chicago, NYC, Silicon Valley, and DC Metro Moms Blog met with Judith Lichtman, a long-time friend and consultant on the Hillary Clinton Presidential Campaign. Here is a summary of what we discussed and why Ms. Lichtman thinks you should vote for Senator Clinton.

As long-time readers recall, this collaborative of mommies met with Elizabeth Edwards last year. Many were smitten enough with the Edwards message & campaign that they formed Momcrats to help spread the word of their candidate of choice.  Last week former Senator Edwards ended his campaign in New Orleans, LA, where he kicked off the campaign a year ago. His choice to start and conclude his campaign in NOLA epitomizes one of the core reasons his supporters chose him – The fact that he was the only candidate really speaking about poverty in our country, the most powerful country in the world. With that, we asked Ms. Lichtman about Senator Clinton’s position on poverty, not just the middle class crunch, but poverty and specifically why should Edwards supporters set up camp in the Clinton. Her responses will be in italics. This is not a transcript, but put together by notes from different bloggers.

As an Edwards supporter in 2004, I feel that I have a tad bit of credibility with your writers. Both the Obama and Clinton campaigns admit that the Edwards campaign focused the entire campaign on poverty among other issues. He forced a very public conversation about poverty in this country. Senator Clinton has a very, very long record in addressing the issues that affect people who advocates rarely get heard. We have a long professional relationship together and it has focused around strong advocacy for poor and disabled kids. She is and has been concerned about what was happening to children who were excluded from mainstream education and concerned about families When her widely known efforts to forge a universal health care system went down in 1993, many other would walk away and find a new issue to work on. Then First Lady Clinton kept on working and helped to create what we know as the Children’s Healthcare Insurance Plan or SCHIP. Today more than 50 million children nationwide are covered by SCHIP. Other initiatives Senator Clinton wants to pursue is to give tax rebates to low income people to help pay for health insurance instead of waiting until tax time to get a refund and a moratorium on mortgage foreclosures. Her healthcare plan covers just what Senator Edwards’ plan did – It covers everyone. Which is why it includes the upfront tax rebate for poor people who do not have the money to pay insurance premiums up front. Whether you’re looking at health care or education, Senator Clinton is deeply concerned with people.

Considering that healthcare bills is the #1 reason why people find themselves in bankruptcy, would Senator Clinton’s healthcare plan address that and help eliminate that situation?

It will. With mandated coverage, everyone would be covered. Making it affordable for everyone. A cap or ceiling on a percentage of income that you would have to pay for healthcare would address the issue of affordability. Low wage workers who are not already covered by Medicaid or Medicare will have their premiums capped at a percentage of income to avoid the problem you identified – Bankruptcy.

2) No Child Left Behind is up for renewal. There are many flaws in the legislation despite the good intentions. How does Senator Clinton plan to address the inequities in K-12 education across this country? Would she be willing to demand that graduation rates be included in any revised version of NCLB?

Graduation rates? She is very concerned about graduation rates. Senator Clinton has a long history of holding schools accountable while advocating for the resources necessary to be successful. As First Lady of Arkansas, she was quite clear about the accountability piece and was a leader in major education reform.

3) Senator Clinton has said that she will pull the troops out of Iraq 90 days after she enters the White House. What is her plan for Afghanistan? President Bush & the First Lady made the case that we had to go into Afghanistan not just to seek revenge against those who attacked us, but to liberate the women and girls from the rule of the Taliban. What is her plan in reference to Afghanistan?

Going into Iraq really took this government off the ball in Afghanistan. There has to be a very significant investment in resources, in jobs, healthcare, and education for women. You can’t just do that with military successes so that President Karzi can be successful. You can’t just do that with military investments. There has to be real cultural investments, in changing the right opportunities into domestic and security investments.

4) We are a group of mothers. Some of us work outside the home, from the home, and for some of us our family is our entire job. How does Senator Clinton plan to help all of us find a balance in our lives? Affordable & safe child care? Social security credit for staying home to care for others?  As you know there are women in the world who think it is stupid to quit our jobs to care for those we love the most. How can a President Clinton make that decision not such a big gamble?

This is an issue near and dear to Senator Clinton. I was the chief lobbyist for the Family & Medical Leave Act in a wonderful coalition. It was the first bill that President Clinton signed into law barely two weeks after he took office. This is after the first President Bush vetoed it twice. It’s a piece of legislation that I’m so very proud of. It was no accident that President Clinton signed it. I showed Hillary the legislation back in the 1980s and she knew immediately that it needed to be law. I have the first pen that President Clinton used to sign the bill into law. When we have the inauguration party next year, we can take a field trip to my office to see it!

I use to talk about women juggling both their family and work responsibilities. Hillary said that families are struggling, not juggling. I have never had to explain the importance of family leave laws to her, unlike other politicians. Whether you’re talking about paid sick leave, she is a major sponsor in the Senate with Kennedy and Dodd, whether you’re talking about the next step in family leave or funding for afterschool programs and Head Start programs so that all children have an equal standing when they start school, she is keenly aware of the kinds of pressures that families face whether mom is working hard in the home or working hard inside the home and also an economic provider outside the home.

Has Social Security credits been discussed? Credits for women who take time out of the paid workforce to care for children or elderly parents?

This is a very, very complex issue. Senator Clinton is very open to taking a look at all of the issues, include credits, to put them on the table and have a very prestigious commission take a look and come back with very specific recommendations. She is thoughtful and open; she has not closed off or come up with one specific way to address the potential shortfall. Your questions about expanding Social Security credit for the quarters that we’re are homemaking and outside the workforce, that is something that she’d like to take a very close look at in the context of overall Social Security reform.

From all four sites, thank you Ms. Lichtman for taking time to speak to us and our readers.
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Our time was limited, but we sent additional questions to Ms. Lichtman and we will update this entry when we finish with all the follow-ups. Phone tag is fun when there are only 2 days until Election Day.

Q1: Pay equity is still a large concern, especially with this group of women. How does Senator Clinton plan to enforce the laws that we do have to ensure pay equity in our country?

From her website: Senator Clinton “is leading the charge in the Senate to strengthen equal pay laws and end pay disparities between men and women. She introduced the Paycheck Fairness Act to strengthen the penalties associated with wage discrimination, to ensure that the federal government sets a higher standard, and to increase oversight of employers.”

2) LGBT rights is also a concern of this group of mostly heterosexual and married women. How will Senator Clinton help lead this country to embrace all of our citizens and end the discrimination (marriage, housing, employment, etc) that LGBT people face?

Her website has a nice fact sheet on the LGBT Community. But to be honest, it took a Yahoo! search to find it as there is not a link from her main site to this fact sheet.

3) What plans does Senator Clinton have for NCLB for children who test ahead of where the grade is (ie. gifted students) as well as disabled children? Neither is addressed in the current legislation.

From her website: From her days as a staff attorney for the Children's Defense Fund (CDF) working as an advocate for children with special needs to her leadership of the Arkansas Educational Standards Committee, Hillary has been a passionate advocate for providing greater educational opportunities to all children. Her work for CDF helped pave the way for the Education for All Handicapped Children Act, the first time children with special needs were guaranteed the right to a free, appropriate public education.

She has been committed to strengthen and fully fund our special education system.

Hillary also knows that we have to improve our K-12 system in order to ensure that every child is prepared to compete in an increasingly global economy. As president, she will:
    * Meet the funding promises of IDEA to ensure that children with special needs get the attention and support they deserve.

We are awaiting feedback that directly addresses gifted students or clarification that Senator Clinton groups gifted students as students with special needs.

4) During the debate last night Senator Clinton mentioned freezing the interest rate for five years. How does she think we would avoid having this same crisis in 2012 or 2013?

We are awaiting clarification if this point on her website covers this question. It is assumed that by converting all variable rate mortgages to fixed rates will keep a crisis from occurring in 5 years.

From her website: Hillary will challenge lenders and financial institutions to take three immediate steps today: 1) Voluntarily support a moratorium of at least 90 days on home foreclosures; 2) freeze the fluctuating rates on subprime loans for at least 5 years until they can be converted into fixed rate, affordable loans; 3) Require regular status reports on the progress they’re making in converting unworkable mortgages into loans families can afford so we have real accountability.