Print This Post Print This Post

May

19

Clinton’s Arc: Being a woman was a help


So says Doris Kearns Goodwin in this above-the-fold front page article in the New York Times today.

And I tend to agree – for a panoply of reasons.

I believed that Hillary Clinton’s running, and her being on the ticket, would be a help to down ticket women, not a hindrance or drag as some predicted. Yesterday, I linked to an Ohio newspaper’s article that listed a slew of women running in Ohio races. I’m on the steering committee of the White House Project’s Go Run! training that will take place in Columbus in less than three weeks and we’ll have 100 women ready and waiting to run and/or help other women run. And I’ve been thinking a lot about a high school friend of mine who swore, when she was 16 or 17, circa 1978-1980, that she would be the first woman president (she’s in Chicago now running a money-management firm she founded after attending Yale and Harvard).

Women can draft behind this historic effort, no matter how it ends. And we’ll learn. Women are fantastic learners and don’t like to make the same mistakes twice (because they don’t like to lose).

And, of course, we’ve raised the profile of just how ingrained sexism is in our society – from the simpliest sweetie to the cable news talking heads and everything in between.

Many people are being quoted as saying that it will be generations. I feel their disappointment but I see this as an opportunity. The focus has been on these two extraordinary individuals – extraordinary for a variety of reasons, positive and negative.

We have got to take advantage of that spotlight or it will be generations. And thank goodness, there are many women like myself who have no plans of giving up or waiting.

We have to write our own narrative – we can’t let others write it for us. And I am certain that a woman president is not a generation away.

FYI: The NYT article mentions the Clinton Supporters Count Too group:

Cynthia Ruccia, 55, a sales director for Mary Kay cosmetics in Columbus, Ohio, is organizing a group, Clinton Supporters Count Too, of mostly women in swing states who plan to campaign against Mr. Obama in November. “We, the most loyal constituency, are being told to sit down, shut up and get to the back of the bus,” she said.

Bookmark and Share

By Jill Miller Zimon at 8:19 am May 19th, 2008 in Barack Obama, Campaigning, Elections, Gender, Government, Ohio, Politics, Social Issues, Women 

Comments

5 Responses to “Clinton’s Arc: Being a woman was a help”

  1. 1 Barbara on May 19th, 2008 9:07 am

    Amen Jill!! I am in TOTAL agreement with every thing you’ve said here!

  2. 2 Jill Miller Zimon on May 19th, 2008 10:13 am

    Thanks for the comment, Barbara. I really feel that this approach – seeing the opportunities that are there now that weren’t there 17 mos. ago is going to be the best way to make this experience work, esp. if we don’t want to lose the best of what’s come out of the last 17 mos – and that includes the mistakes and non-negotiables we craft for future runs.

  3. 3 Wiley on May 19th, 2008 2:03 pm

    I think considering the historic context of both the phrase and the Obama campaign, Ruccia’s use of the term “back of the bus” was in incredibly poor taste.

    Then there’s the matter of promoting herself as “loyal” as she’s announcing she’s going to work to defeat Obama.

  4. 4 Jill Miller Zimon on May 19th, 2008 2:05 pm

    Wiley – I tend to agree – I love reverse psychology as much as the next person, but I also have enormous faith in the programs now functioning to move more women into the pipeline (as well as note the women who are in it already).

  5. 5 Tess on May 19th, 2008 8:36 pm

    Wiley, Bitch is the new black, to paraphrase SNL. If we’re going to be treated as second-class citizens, we may as well use language that is universally understood.

Leave a Reply




"));