Archive for HerPolitics

Kaley Costello founded “Run Against Rom­ney” to unite her pas­sion for fit­ness and her pas­sion for sup­port­ing a can­di­date who cham­pi­ons women’s rights. (Photo cour­tesy of Run Against Romney).

Peo­ple who say pol­i­tics are slightly per­sonal are absolutely wrong.

Pol­i­tics are com­pletely personal.

They define who we are, where we go, and what we have.

The elec­tion today requires a defin­i­tive ref­er­en­dum about what rights we believe we deserve and who we think our gov­ern­ment should protect.

Ohio is the unof­fi­cial “decider” of this elec­tion, and the vot­ers here are in the national spot­light, with their clash­ing view­points and con­cerns treated as a micro­cosm of the entire country.

One Ohio voter, who I know per­son­ally, demon­strates how a vote for Barack Obama is both a ratio­nal choice and neces­sity for pro­po­nents of women’s health and rights.

Kaley Costello caught HPV from a for­mer boyfriend, who she trusted with her heart and body. She not only received the news she had HPV, a com­mon dis­ease among Amer­i­can adults, but also dis­cov­ered she had a severe type, which could quickly lead to cer­vi­cal cancer.

Luck­ily, Kaley was able to get proper screen­ings and surgery because she was eli­gi­ble to receive care through the “Afford­able Health­care Act,” as she was young enough to receive care from a parent’s benefits.

Mil­lions of women who need pre­ven­ta­tive screen­ings, con­tra­cep­tion, or treat­ment for dis­eases that sig­nif­i­cantly affect women, such as cer­vi­cal and breast can­cers, cur­rently receive help through poli­cies or pro­grams Mitt Rom­ney would cut or eliminate.

Kaley is one of those women. Pol­i­tics is not some obscure idea that she can’t touch. A polit­i­cal con­vic­tion by Barack Obama is the rea­son she had pre­ven­ta­tive surgery instead of can­cer treatment.

Kaley started a move­ment, “Run Against Rom­ney,” to express her grat­i­tude and sup­port for Pres­i­dent Obama and his com­mit­ment to pro­tect women’s health. She encour­ages male and female run­ners to pur­chase “Run Against Rom­ney” shirts, to spread the word against Romney’s agenda dur­ing any­thing from a morn­ing run to a marathon.

When some­one sees a run­ner in her baby blue “Run Against Rom­ney” t-shirt, it is more than a polit­i­cal state­ment. It is big­ger than par­ti­san bick­er­ing. It is a com­mit­ment to the man who wanted all peo­ple in this coun­try to have a right to health­care. It is appre­ci­a­tion for a man who thinks fam­ily plan­ning and con­tra­cep­tion is a gov­ern­ment pri­or­ity, not nui­sance. It is a thank you to the man who believes Kaley’s body, and my body, and any other woman’s body is just that. Ours. And not any­one else’s.

I am proud of Kaley for telling her story. When sta­tis­tics have faces and voices, they are harder to ignore. Pol­i­tics are com­pletely per­sonal, and choos­ing a can­di­date defines you as a person.

Herlinked.com is proud to stand with Kaley and the mil­lions of women who will vote for Barack Hus­sein Obama because we refuse to lose the own­er­ship of our rights or our bodies.

We hope you take this elec­tion per­son­ally, too. Get out there and vote as if your life depends on it. Kaley’s did.

Her­link:

For more about Run Against Rom­ney and Kaley’s jour­ney, click here:

Run Against Romney