Friday, October 31, 2008

palin and women

so this spam from mccainland tells me that hillary clinton's female supporters and other women are complaining that obama's ad in which gov. palin is depicted winking at the camera is sexist.

now, i've been a feminist for 40-something years. true, i've also been a [shudder] leftist, so i'd be unlikely to vote for mccain in any case. but i would love for him to have picked a worthy republican woman as his running mate--someone i could disagree with but whose intelligence i could respect. we need that image in this unquestionably male-dominated world of american politics.

palin is shrewd, and she's loaded with personality. but she doesn't come near the intelligence a vice president [which is to say, a potential president] needs. she's uninformed about things a third grader should know. and she gets---well, . the reason the dem's used that picture of her winking is that she bloody winked! i have no doubt that had a male candidate winked for the camera, they'd have used that too. it's . i would hope that all clinton supporters know that hillary clinton wouldn't act like a valley girl.

no, the real sexism is from mccain and whatever advisers foisted the governor on him. did they really think all women would vote for a woman simply because she was a woman, regardless of her politics, her intelligence, and her demeanor? she's feisty and pretty, and she has several child, one of whom is a down's syndrome baby that she chose to have. that's cool. that's nice. but it doesn't offer a reason to vote for her as vice president.

her politics are not pro-woman, or at least not pro-less-than-rich woman. and her scope of knowledge is not such that she would be able to handle the job of president with any of the skill demanded of that job. indeed she has made a mockery of the presidential campaign and of professional women.

obama is male, and i don't know how deep his committment to women's issues go. but he's intelligent, informed, and more of a feminist than gov. palin. and he knows how to pick a vice president who could, if need be, do the job of governing the country.

women have been relegated to the "cute" for far too long. i'm sure palin earned her Miss Alaska title. but she's not fit to be Madame President.

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