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Saturday, May 15, 2004

It’s the Women, Stupid

“Let's face it, John Kerry could use a little help. And since Bush has already bagged Jesus as his co-pilot, Kerry will just have to settle for John Edwards.”

That’s Lakshmi Chaudhry, talking sense in AlterNet a few days ago. She worries that Democrats are pandering to a bogus “crisis of masculinity” that keeps us talking constantly about phantom NASCAR-Dad constituencies and floating wistful trial balloons about an olive drab (emphasis on the drab) Kerry-McCain ticket.

But, as Chaudhry points out: “It's women, single and married, who represent a ‘swing’ constituency in 2004, and not disaffected white men, whose emotional investment in Bush is far too great to allow them to acknowledge his failures. Bush has received higher job approval ratings from men than women in all but three Gallup polls conducted since he took office. The gender gap in his approval ratings stood at seven points in March and is expected to widen as women grow increasingly more skeptical about the war in Iraq than men.”

It was a recognition of the power of this kind of electoral math that prompted the whole “Compassionate Conservative” line of bull last time around – a line that is hardly likely to hold up well if it is tried again.

Democrats should leave the trouser-stuffing to the Republicans. (Tho', come to think of it, we'd all be better off if they stuck a sock in their mouths instead of their drawers, for once.) What John Kerry needs in a running-mate is a figure who can supplement him in ways that will appeal particularly to women.

“There is no one better equipped to help Kerry with that task than John Edwards. It became clear during the primaries that while there is little difference between the two men on the issues, there is an enormous gulf in their ability to articulate their vision.

“Edwards is a man who can talk…. [His rhetoric i]s not about healthcare but about being able to care for a sick child. It's not about Social Security but about ‘working middle-class families’ who are ‘saving nothing.’ His populist message – couched in carefully inclusive rhetoric – is bound to echo with unmarried women. As sole breadwinners of their family, single women's highest priorities are health care, employment, education, job security and retirement benefits. Certainly not the candidates' military record.

“It doesn't take a leap of imagination to see just how easily someone like Edwards could make the war in Iraq about saving the lives of our soldiers and keeping our families safe at home. That's a message most women can get behind, including so-called "security moms" who are worried about terrorism.”

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