Bush and Women: Gap Between Rhetoric and Reality

[Guest guest]

March 8, 2004: Today is International Womens Day. The Bush

administration no doubt will use the occasion to court women with

its words of support for womens rights worldwide. The line weve been

getting is very good, but the administrations actions again and

again fall far short of its promises.

 

On this day, we urge women to demand that these promises become

reality. Take, for example, the administration's pledges to support

womens rights in Afghanistan and Iraq.

 

In Afghanistan, images of women in burqas gave a face, through the

lack of it, to President Bushs promises to oust the Taliban. But

Bush's heralded "Marshall Plan" for reconstruction has not

materialized. Womens programs have not been funded at proposed

levels, and abysmal security continues to keep women wearing the

burqa and fearful to leave their homes.

 

Afghan women won new constitutional language that includes equal

rights for them, but another clause says that laws cannot

contradict "provisions of the sacred religion of Islam." In January,

an Afghan Deputy Supreme Court justice used the constitutions

religious provision to attempt to ban TV appearances by female

singers after a performance had been broadcast.

 

The administration also vowed to include women in rebuilding Iraq,

but the Coalition Provisional Authority, which Washington controls,

evidently didnt get the message. The 25-member Iraqi Governing

Council has only three women members, only one woman is in the Iraqi

Cabinet, and among the 18 provincial governors there are no women.

The result: Women are largely absent from all decision-making bodies

in the new Iraq, and their rights are being threatened by emerging

religious forces within the country.

 

Iraqi women took to the streets demanding equal rights and at least

40 percent representation. The all-male committee drafting the

interim constitution got the message and added a minimum target of

25 percent representation for women in the new legislature. Better

than nothing, but women are more than 60 percent of Iraqs war-

ravaged people. And, even 25 percent representation is not

achievable unless there is real security that permits democratic

elections. Iraqi women deserve not rhetoric but firmer support from

the United States.

 

What about fighting the devastation of AIDS and supporting families?

Women worldwide cheered Bushs pledge last year to provide $15

billion over five years, a "work of mercy beyond all current

international efforts," to fight AIDS in Africa and the Caribbean.

Instead, Bush asked $800 million less than he promised for the

programs first years, and he fought bipartisan efforts by Congress

to raise the total.

 

The funding shortfall is devastating to women, because new

infections are rising fastest among married women infected by their

husbands. And, the administrations ideological emphasis on

abstinence-only prevention strategies does nothing to help the

majority of women and adolescent girls in those countries who are

already married.

 

Unfortunately, this backtracking from promises is becoming the norm.

So, just as Bush calls for accountability and responsibility, our

organizations have been monitoring the reality behind the

administrations rhetoric and have issued grades at www.wglobal

scorecard.org. There you will see that the administrations mostly

high marks for its pledges to women are in stark contrast to low

grades for its actions on a range of policies.

 

Bush still has time to improve his grades. He can:

 

• Instruct his delegates in Iraq and Afghanistan to insist that

women be fully included in the nations' decision-making bodies.

 

• Increase the presence of international peacekeeping troops and

funds for re construction in Afghanistan.

 

• Ask Congress for full funding for his AIDS initiative and for

security in Afghanistan and Iraq.

 

• Refuse to support new legislation, constitutional drafts, document

language or political leaderships worldwide that do not guarantee

womens rights.

 

Bush's public statements raised hopes among women that he would be

their champion. Its time to match the words with action.

 

Source: The Miami Herald, USA. Posted on Mon, Mar. 08, 2004.

INTERNATIONAL WOMEN'S DAY, by ELEANOR SMEAL and JUNE ZEITLIN

URL: http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/opinion/8131738.htm

[Guest guest]

"Bush's public statements raised hopes among women that he would be

their champion. Its time to match the words with action."

 

Why on earth why! why! must it be Bush?

[Guest guest]

Nora asks:

 

*** Why on earth why! why! must it be Bush? ***

 

Unbelieveable as it may seem, about 45% of American voters say yes,

it absolutely must be Bush.

 

And about 45% of American voters say it absolutely must *not* be Bush.

 

The remaining 10% of Americans will decide whether or not this bum

gets another four years to dismantle America and manhandle the rest

of the globe -- this time around, with no one to answer to and

nothing to lose.

 

This 10% of critical "swing" voters includes a large number of well-

to-do women and affluent minorities who could go either way. Watch

for the Bush campaign to plow through an unprecedented supply of

corporate cash in a relentless ad campaign to convince them he's on

their side.

 

Is resistance futile? Not at all. In fact, it has never been more

imperative. And I urge every American voter in this group to do

everything in her or his power to ensure that resistance is

successful.

 

Sorry for the political rant.

 

DB

 

, "N. Madasamy"

<ashwini_puralasamy> wrote:

> "Bush's public statements raised hopes among women that he would be

> their champion. Its time to match the words with action."

>

>