Frank Capra never made that movie
Soraya is pretty obviously right about this.
Do we think a woman whose job experience for being president consisted of being a small town mayor would get any traction?
Don’t make me laugh.
Tip Jar
Soraya is pretty obviously right about this.
Do we think a woman whose job experience for being president consisted of being a small town mayor would get any traction?
Don’t make me laugh.
Minor quibble: South Bend, Indiana, is a small city with a population of 101,000. With “small town” I’d personally think a couple thousand people or fewer.
As for the main point, I’m not so sure I agree. There are so many factors, including intangible ones, that it’s hard to compare directly. Obama honestly had shockingly little experience and the handicap of being black, and he won. A woman with very little experience who struck a chord might likewise do well. Heck, not too long ago people were clamoring for Oprah to run.
Klobuchar’s other message in that exchange was to point out the value of her own experience, which Buttigieg had criticized as so-called ‘Washington experience’. She made a good case for herself and didn’t do it at the expense of Buttigieg’s own experience as a mayor.
Ugh. I get when Republicans pull this shtick — they’re dedicated to pretending that the federal government is terrible (except for defense. And Social Security. And Medicare. And agriculture subsidies. And…) So they’re happy to actually put incompetent people in charge of government, so that people will like government less, and they can say “see, we were right all along!” So making experience and competence a negative is like child’s play to them.
But Democrats shouldn’t be stooping to this level. Even moderate Democrats (and really, most Republicans, if they were honest) believe that the federal government does a fair number of important things. And it’s important that those things be done well, meaning that you have people with experience in charge.
Skeletor, I don’t think so. One reason? No one will admit that there is any diversity on that stage at all. The fact that Booker and Harris didn’t make the debate is seen as meaning there is nothing up there but white males, apparently. No one is willing to accept that a woman is in and of itself a cause for celebration, regardless of what color she is. And most of the Democrats I know personally will say “of course I’ll vote for a woman, as long as it’s the right woman, a qualified woman”, but no matter who is thrown up, there is always something wrong with her, and it is always something that all the men share, but is not being held against them. “Ambitious” – hell, yes, if you’re running for president, you are ambitious, by definition. Nothing wrong with being ambitious. “Shrill” – Trump was orders of magnitude more shrill than Clinton; Bernie is shrill, and Warren is not. But who gets called “shrill”? “Cold” – seriously? The moment a woman talks policy (and the women are talking policy, especially Warren, and Clinton did as well) she is “cold”.
I know a lot of people who voted for Obama, who would have voted for Bernie, who would vote for Mayor Pete, but will not vote for any of the women on offer for various reasons having little to do with the actual reasons, and a lot to do with being a woman. The expectations on a woman are so immense no woman can meet them, and when you elevate that woman to running for office, they multiply.
And yes, we have elected women to high offices, but that is mostly within their own states/districts. The presidency is something else entirely.
But I’ll tell you what. I’ll try to get my friend who was my councilwoman for 10 years to run, and see if you’re right. Of course, she can’t meet the stipulation, since in her run for mayor she was handily beaten by the male on the ballot. I live in the most progressive district on our town; she was able to win. But pulling the entire town into her column on the ballot was not something she was able to do, even though the mayor we elected was “cold” and she was not.
Vice president, though, sure. As long as she was attractive and wielded a cute wink.