Meandering Starre

Do you think a woman can be as effective a President as a man?

I will not respond as I could to this lovely question asked by ABC New on their facebook account. Duh! I will not list all the women leaders and rulers that have been as, or more, successful than men. I will not go off on how one of England’s greatest ruler—who ruled during their golden age—was a woman. But it is tempting. I really could rant about this. But I need to sleep.

It is so sad this is even a question. This may be the home of the free and the land of the brave, but the need to ask this also sounds like we are the place of the sexists.

I don’t have time to wax poetic, or even really offer much opinion on this right now (off to a lunch date), but I had to post this news item. According to CNN, a middle school in Portland Maine is providing a full range of birth control (including pills!) to middle school students! This is due to an “outbreak” of pregnancies among middle school girls. The students need parental permission to go to the health center, but once there their ”treatment” is fully confidential.

It seems the possibility of Hilary Rodham Clinton running for president has unleashed a whole storm of the questions concerning whether America can, could, or would elect a female president. NPR today did two stories on it, one with an interview from Senator Clinton herself and another involving both expert opinion & discussion and “person on the street” quotes. Bills addresses one comment from the second one rather well in this blog entry . I found both the NPR stories fascinating, but the second one makes me incredibly sad. And angry. The story talks about, among other things, what a woman would have to do to get elected—and of course issues like hair, make-up, and clothes become an issue, as does a few things that actually might really impact how well anyone can lead a country like leadership and military experience. However, there seems to be a big concern that people will particularly not feel comfortable with a woman running a country during war. Now frankly I can see (but do not completely agree) the argument that it is good for a president to have real military experience (and preferably experience in a war), but not all male presidents have had this and our incumbent has questionable military experience and certainly didn’t fight in a war (while the most recent candidate to run against him received purple hearts for being shot in war, and he didn’t get elected). So why must we judge women on different standards? Why must, according to the second story, a woman parade her accomplishments and always wear and show her power.

But most importantly WTF hasn’t America already had a woman president? And WTF aren’t we asking this question? We think of ourselves as this forward thinking (well some of us do) country that leads the world and is the flagship of democracy. As these things, it seems only logical that we would be the first country to elect a female president. After all more than 50% of our population is female, so shouldn’t more than 50% of our political representative of all shades and especially our presidents be female? But alas, we are more backward and sexist than we will admit. And we have been beaten in leading the world and democracy in one area—having a female in our highest office. We have been beaten by People’s Republic of Tannu Tuva, Mongolia, China, Argentina, Bolivia, Haiti, Nicaragua, Ireland, Liberia, Ecuador, Switzerland (source), India, Great Britain, Iceland, Pakistan, Myanmar (Burma, with 80% of the votes, although the military did not let her take power), Canada, Bulgaria, Bangladesh, and many more (source) and this is not counting queens and other women leaders (note that list does include prime ministers). Some of the countries that have elected women are countries that some Americans might consider “backward” and even far “beneath” the US. Yet these countries are more advanced, more modern, more forward thinking then the US and they have proven they can do something we haven’t. Frankly I think we should be embarrassed that we are asking if a female can be elected, and we should be ashamed our ourselves for not having already elected one.

Johanna Goldsmith, a.k.a. the blonde bimbo bunny who asks Harold Ford to call her in the political commercial that may have lost Ford the Tennessee race, is afraid she may be typecast as a blonde bimbo in future roles . I, like the rest of you, are shocked by this. Typecast? Her? Oh, but wait, she used the word “stereotype” and not “typecast”, as any real actress would. Perhaps not surprisingly, her next role is that of a trophy wife of an Italian mobster.

As one respondent pointed out on the Texas Politics blog where this was posted, she not only will be typecast as a blonde bimbo, but a republication blonde bimbo. However, I bet a certain evangelical minister would prefer to have her in his past than the gay “masseur“. Best of luck to Johanna and her search for more serious and nonpolitical roles for her apolitical self.

I almost was upset by NPR Monday. Well, I actually was for a bit. I was driving home during evening rush hour and heard their top of the hour (5 pm to be exact) news headlines. They first listed the Foley story with Foley resigning and then mentioned the Amish school shootings. I was shocked. What is more important: the shooting of several school girls with the resulting deaths of 3 (at that time) or some slimy congress member resigning over sexual instant messages with teenage boys? In my mind that is not even a question. However, NPR redeemed themselves when they went into the full stories, as they did the Amish school shooting story first and then Foley instant message sex follies. [note: I looked around but cannot find the hourly newscast/top of the hour news overview for that day. The whole program can be listened to from here]

I was happy to see that CNN focused on the school shootings as the main story and made the Foley mess the second story. I did not get a chance to check out other news media on Monday to see their focuses. The Daily Show only talked about Foley, but I think this was because of when it was filmed. They had some great stories on Foley check out the site for more . Very funny.

As the fans of Firefly/Serenity, Angel, and Buffy know, Joss Whedon is pretty cool. He recently spoke at Equality Now, and his speech is definitely worth a listen. I highly recommend it. In this speech (which is short ~8 minutes, including his introduction) Joss answers, in many different ways, the answer he has been asked 500 times (or so) by the press: “Why do you always write these strong woman characters?” Joss gives many different answers, all good, but the best… or one of the best, is this: “Equality is like gravity. We need it to stand on this earth as men and women.” The full answer is much better, and all the other answers are great too. So give it a listen and raise your glass (whether it be wine, blood, or sarsaparilla) to one who will continue to write strong female characters until people stop asking him that question.

Although I’ve had the idea for this posting for a few days, I must say the CNN.com “cover story�? that Bush’s approval mark at all-time low did prompt the more timely writing of this posting.

I was thinking lately about Bush’s falling approval rating and then realized something rather interesting:

Bush’s approval ratings go down as his votes go up–Bush had higher approval ratings during the term he did not win the popular vote than the term he did.

Isn’t this interesting? In 2000 Bush lost the popular vote by 539,947 votes, but his approval ratings for his first term generally ranged between 53% and 90%. Granted during his first term there were a few occurrences that upped this approval rating (9/11 and that pesky war in Iraq). In 2004 Bush won the popular vote by 3,012,497 but his approval rates range from 49% to the all time low (for him) of 37%. He did have some things that could have given him a nice bump up, such as Katrina, but apparently he didn’t handle that as well as 9/11.

I am resisting snide comments and a grand ‘ol Bush rant to let the facts stand nearly on their own (and because such comments and rants would take up too much time).

Here are some detailed numbers I spent far too much time tonight gathering:
Election results from cnn.com:
Gore 2000: 50,996,116
Bush 2000: 50,456,169

Bush 2004: 62,040,606
Kerry 2004: 59,028,109

Gallup Poll number from http://www.gallup.com/ (note the dates are often of the posting of the article about the numbers and are often a few days off of the poll dates)

November 14, 2005: 37%
July 20-October 19, 2005: 43.9%
June 28, 2005: 45%
March 31, 2005: 45%
February 12, 2005: 49%
December 11, 2004: 53%
October 2004: 50%
June-August 2004: mid 40’s
December 2003: 63% (after the capture of Saddam Hussein)
September 12 2003: 52%
Late August 2003: 59%
July 02, 2003: above 60%
June 20, 2003: 63%
May 01, 2003: 70% (at war)
March 24, 2003: 71% (at war)
January 28, 2003: 60%
October 12, 2002 and the whole quarter: 68%
June 7, 2002: 70%
March 21, 2003: 80%
December 21, 2001: high-80’s (post 9/11)
October 24, 2001: 88% (post 9/11)
Sept 24, 2001: 90% (post 9/11 and a record high for any president as recorded by Gallop)
August 22, 1001: 57% (pre 9/11)
June 19, 2001: 55%
March 20, 2001: 53%
February 13, 2001: 57% (shortly after entering the office)

Tonight ABC did the nation and the free (and not so free) world a favor. ABC’s Commander In Chief, with a woman VP stepping into the presidency on the death of the president, premiered. The show itself was enjoyable and did a good job addressing some of the issues raised against women being president (like launching nuclear war because of PMS. Yeah. And how often do we go out and shot people because of PMS?). But most importantly the show showed that a woman can be president and as the series continues will likely illustrate how good of a job a woman can do (even if it is TV). The simple act of seeing a woman as president of the US (even if it just a show) should help us finally get to having a female as president. It is sad that it may take having Gina Davis be president on TV for some women to be president for real. But if that is what it takes…

Now, I am not arguing that we should have a woman president for the sake of having a woman as president. We should always elect the best candidate, whoever she or he happens to be. Of course, we have not done so well with that in the past, now have we? And frankly, if we did elect a woman just because she was a woman I doubt she could do any worse then some of our presidents, and likley much better. But it is a sad comment that the US, supposedly the seat of democracy, has yet to be lead by a woman, or an African-American, a Jewsih person, or really anyone but a white Christian male. How can we be a truly representative democracy if we are not represented by our people? White males are a minority in this country, yet they are the only ones the political machines put forward for us to vote for (with some exceptions of course)? Perhaps Commander in Chief will let people and the political machines see we (well most of us) are ready for women candidates.

According the White House Project 80% of Americas say they are ready. Maybe this show will make the numbers even higher. We can only hope. Although, I think it is something of a statement, and likely a nice drama spin, that Commander in Chief gives us a female president through the most predicable channel, not as a candidate elected to the presidency in her own right, but as the VP stepping forward. Unfortunately I think this is what it may take. And I’m not the only one who feels this way. I’m in good company with President Ford. According to Ann Gordon in the Summer 2001 White House Studies

“…Supposedly, President Ford was asked about a possible first woman president. He said, ‘This is how it’s going to happen. A woman will be vice president. The president will die in office. She will become president. And we will never have another male president again.’ (1)

I do like the ending.

As many have heard there is discussion of Hillary Clinton running for President soon. And another group announced itself on the ABC forum for Commander in Chief—a group supporting Condoleezza Rice for President in 2008 (See http://www.americansforrice.com/). Apparently they even aired commercials during the show in NH. Interesting. Now Condi and Hillary is a match up I would like to see…

I have much more I could say on this, but my tired brain is making me long winded. So I close with some links to examine:
1) ABC’s website for the show. Rather cleverly set up like a news site “Mackenzie Watch�?: http://abc.go.com/primetime/commanderinchief/articles/
2) The White House Project, a non-profit organization dedicated to advancing women into political leadership positions, including the oval office http://www.thewhitehouseproject.org/index.html
3) A Fifth grade class’s thought on having a woman and president. Cute, touching, and inspiring: http://www.pocanticohills.org/lebenson/president.htm

Update on “Cobb County Vote Yes�?

With a very close margin of 117 votes (with one precinct remaining) the referendum for the sales tax increase passed! Cobb County did vote to decrease congestion and improve public safety. I think this will be a good thing for the county, and apparently 50.15% of the other Cobb County residents who voted agree. I’m not too surprised it was close due to the whole laptop fiasco and the simple fact that most people (like everyone) don’t like tax increases.

However, there are two other factors that may have impacted the vote. One is an unconfined rumor and the other is a sneaky and misleading last minute eleventh-hour telephone campaign.

Rumor first: As I said this is unconfirmed by me, but my husband, a reliable source (at least to me), says he checked out the Marietta Daily Journal on election day (Sept 20th for this vote) and they had on their front page a story that said the tax was a property tax and not a sales tax. Now this makes a big difference in many ways and might influence people to vote against the tax when they not otherwise might have voted for it. Now, I searched the MDJ archives for this story and could not find it. It is possible they removed it, or that my husband was hallucinating, or that my searches or their search engine were not effective.

Now on the minute eleventh-hour telephone campaign: The Cobb County Taxpayers Association made a last ditch effort to get the predicted yes vote to go the other way. They contacted 20,000 republican voters with a message urging them to vote no due to “Cobb County’s recent history of squandering tax money for laptops�? and also stated “The other side has spent $300,000 to trick you into voting for their tax increase.” This message is misleading in many ways; here are a few:

• The school board, who had the lap top idea, is separate from the county government, who did not have the plan
• No tax money was spent (or “squandered�?) on the plan, the plan was ruled against by Judge Ingram, and the contract with Apple was broken
• There doesn’t appear to be any trickery by “the other side.�? There were myriad public meetings and newspaper articles about the referendum. I, myself, have seen nothing misleading by “the other side.�? It’s pretty clear: vote for the tax increase and money goes to public safety and transportation improvements, vote against and no tax increase. If there has been any misleading on this end please let me know!

You can read more about this last minute campaign in two different MDJ articles:

• “SPLOST foes pull dirty trick.�? This, if you can’t tell, is an opinioned/biased reaction to the telephone campaign. It’s amusing and very anti-campaign
• “Opponents calling GOP voters in last-ditch effort�? This article is a bit more balanced and less opinionated.

Tomorrow, Tuesday 9/20/05, Cobb County residents have the opportunity to vote on a referendum that will help to cut down on traffic congestion and increase our public safety. What could be better (okay many things could, but this is a good thing)? The referendum will add a 1% sales tax (called “Special Purpose Local Option Sales Tax�? ) which will be used to fund transportation and public safety projects. To quote the Cobb Community Improvement Projects (CIP) site:

Specific projects allowed include:
• Roads, streets, bridges and sidewalks/paths which will provide congestion relief.
• Public safety projects, include a jail, courthouse and an enhanced public safety communication system.

See, this is a good thing! One thing that makes the referendum even better is that the state and federal government will contribute money along with the tax, which will greatly increase the money for transportation and public safety! According to CIP, Cobb County residents will only end up paying 40 cents on every dollar used for these projects, likely due to state and federal matching.

For those who think the 1% tax will suck, please note that the surrounding counties all have this increased tax and quite possibly have better transportation and public safety then we have. Isn’t it time we catch up? Plus, if we don’t like it we can vote against it in 6 years.

For those who are up in arms about the whole education laptop issue (See Infinite Loop at http://arstechnica.com/journals/apple.ars/2005/8/25/1052) know that this funding in no way goes towards education, it is for our roads, our parks, and our jails. It may fix the roads outside the school, but no money will go to the school itself. Apparently some people are so concerned about the laptop issue that people think they will vote against this tax in case that it will go to the school. Not the case!

I admit to a vested interest in the tax as my husband is a traffic engineer and this tax will give him job security (to some degree). But even if he was not a traffic engineer, I would be for this tax.

See you at the polls!