On the other hand -- raising your own children is not "work"

Well, the blog I posted earlier today about the flap over Hilary Rosen's saying that Ann Romney "never worked a day in her life" turned out to have another side.

As Huffington Post's political bloggers, Ryan Grim and Amanda Terkel, clarified:

"Ann Romney may believe that focusing exclusively on raising children counts as work, and the majority of Americans may agree with her, but that's not how the federal government sees it.

"As far as Uncle Sam is concerned, if you're poor, deciding to stay at home and rear your children is not an option. Thanks to welfare reform, recipients of federal benefits must prove to a caseworker that they have performed, over the course of a week, a certain number of hours of 'work activity'. . . .  

"Raising children is not among them."

Unless you're taking care of someone else's children, that is.   Then it can be considered work.

So the truth is that Hilary Rosen's original intent was absolutely true -- that the Romney family wealth allowed her the privilege of making that choice.  As Rosen later explained, she believes staying at home with children counts as work, but that most women must both raise their children and earn money.

If Mitt and Ann had been poor, it would have been a different story altogether.  This was a comment about privilege, not about the value of raising your children.

Ralph