Target: Ann Romney

[Geee]

National Review:

Recently a Democratic operative, Hilary Rosen, was furious that Mitt Romney had made reference to his wife’s opinions on women’s issues and the economy. So Rosen blurted out on a cable news show that Ann Romney “hasn’t worked a day in her life.”

All hell broke loose. Some liberals doubled down and claimed rich women were out of touch with contemporary women’s dilemmas. Conservatives screamed about liberal bias against traditional lifestyles. A compromise view soon emerged, voiced by President Obama himself, that the wives both of presidents and of presidential candidates should be off limits to public criticism. But should they?

Such blanket sanctuary is not quite fair — at least not in the way that we should avoid all criticism of presidential children not of an age to engage in politics. From 1993 to 2001, attacking Chelsea Clinton, who was twelve years old when her father took office, was a cheap shot; but attacking Hillary Clinton was not necessarily.

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The answer to the question of how to treat a first lady or potential first lady depends on the degree to which she interjects herself into politics in ways that transcend just supporting her husband.

We can all agree that Bess Truman, Mamie Eisenhower, Jackie Kennedy, Lady Bird Johnson, Pat Nixon, Betty Ford, Rosalynn Carter, and Laura Bush for the most part avoided political controversy. They were political only to the degree that every wife in some ways shares in her husband’s career and wishes to defend him when he is attacked. They deserve a degree of latitude, both to defend their husbands and to do so without commensurate rebuttal.

But how about a far more ideological and engaged profile like those of Eleanor Roosevelt, Nancy Reagan, Barbara Bush, Hillary Clinton, and Michelle Obama? In their cases, they saw the role of the first lady as something that transcended support for their husbands, or advocacy for nonpolitical causes such as highway beautification, the arts, literacy, or the campaign against substance abuse. Eleanor Roosevelt waded into all sorts of class, gender, and race issues of her time. She was both blamed and praised for her activism in the cause of equality for women and minorities, and she was often consulted by party bosses about left-wing political appointments and endorsements.

[Valin]

Rosalynn Carter for the most part avoided political controversy?

 

 

That is not the way I remember it.

 

 

Here the Lefts problem with attacking Ann Romney, it can be summed up in two words...Pat Nixon.