WASHINGTON — A Catholic women’s group said Tuesday that the latest USA Today/Gallup poll is a “slam dunk,” showing that women aren’t swayed by the Democrats’ war-on-women rhetoric. The poll shows former Gov. Mitt Romney neck-and-neck with President Barack Obama among women in swing states.
The group, called Women Speak for Themselves, is united against the mandate requiring religious institutions like schools and hospitals to provide contraception to their employees.
With the country on pins and needles to see if social issues like contraception, abortion and same-sex marriage are brought up in the town hall debate Tuesday night, the group’s co-founder says their message is not a political one.
“Laws are proposed that claim to be all for women’s equality and they say, ‘well, if you want to exempt yourself from that requirement then you can,’” said the group’s co-founder, Helen M. Alvaré, at a National Press Club event. “And we’re saying no, no, no you don’t even understand the nature of the human person and the religious woman such that you could make that statement at all.”
Alvaré does say that the political season is the time for issues like this to be at the forefront.
But Erin Matson, action vice president for the National Organization of Women, disagrees.
“Paul Ryan says priority number one when they get into office is to make sure the issue on contraception is reversed, there couldn’t be more at stake in this election,” Matson said. “
While women’s advocacy groups have been forced to have this discussion because of comments like those from Missouri Senate candidate Todd Akin, a Republican, on rape, the women in the general public might just wish it would go away, according to one expert.
“There are greater things at stake than reproduction,” said Kathleen Dolan, author of “Voting for Women: How the Public Evaluates Women Candidates,” and political science professor at University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee.” “Women care more about the health of the economy, Medicare, and so on.”
One Catholic woman couldn’t agree more.
“At the Democratic convention there was such an emphasis on abortion, to the point of exclusion of other issues,” said Mary Hallan FioRito, executive assistant to Francis Cardinal George at the Archdiocese of Chicago and co-author of the book, “Breaking Through: Catholic Women Speak for Themselves.” “But the issues number one to so many women are balancing work and family, that’s really the thing that’s on all my friend’s minds – how to make it all work in this economy.”