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“There is so much excitement here it's insane” wrote Faboo Mama of the aura around her neighborhood on Super Tuesday. Pretty much sums up the attitude of most Democratic women I know when it comes to voting in this year’s primaries.
Have you ever read an article linking the women’s vote to John McCain’s success? Scanning the press coverage, you’d think the only votes he gets are from white Republican men (but not Conservatives!). McCain won both men and women in yesterday's primaries, but the press just never covers gender splits for the Republicans. Only the Democrats, it seems, have blacks, Latinos, and women voting. Republican candidates have “moderates” and “conservatives.”
Maybe this is because fewer Republican women vote in primaries. While Democratic women have been up to 61% of the primary voting population in the Democratic race, only in South Carolina did Republican women approach half the voting population. Margie Omero writes, “What should really concern Republicans is that in nearly every participating in the primary dropped from 2000, the last time no incumbent was running. We don't have as many 2000 figures for the Democratic contests, but a trend seems to be emerging on the Republican side. Women are becoming even less likely to vote in Republican primary contests.”
So Republican women aren’t jazzed about their primary candidates, but look at this: only 23% of Republican women think the country would be better off if we had more women in office. The National Leadership Index is published by Harvard’s Center for Public Leadership each year. Thumbing through it today, I noticed:
Republican women are least likely to believe the country would be better off with more women in leadership positions: 74% of Democratic women and 68% of Independent women voters think the US would be better off if we had more women in leadership positions, but only 23% of Republican women think this. And this discrepancy is “not attributable the difference in their attitudes toward Hillary Clinton.”
GOP women: Who is your ideal candidate?
Anecdotally, women bloggers I’ve read have been almost universally anti-McCain, not to mention the ire he raises from high profile Conservatives like Ann Coulter to Michelle Malkin. So I was interested when BlogHer Shannon wrote yesterday, “all the conservative hatred of McCain has baffled me. I'm a staunch conservative, and I'm really proud to support him. I can't say I agree with every decision of his, but I respect that he seems to make decisions based on what he thinks is best--NOT the polls. And in order to make my decision this election, I decided to go with the candidate that makes me feel the SAFEST. If--God forbid--there is another 9/11, I want John McCain at the helm. Truly--I'm curious--I'd love to hear from conservatives who dislike McCain. I'm trying to understand it.”
The responses were telling: Dana Tuske:
His refusal to give a straight answer about his opposition for the Bush tax cuts disturbed me. I don't why it was so difficult for him to admit he opposed them initially.
I'm still miffed about McCain/Kennedy and the H-5A plan that American companies could hire foreign workers if they could prove there were no Americans that could perform those jobs. After that proposal, I'm not certain that McCain can really lower unemployment rates if he's so willing to allow illegals to work in this country. Sure, he wants to build a fence and enforce border control -- and I applaud him for that. But the method to his madness seems very backwards. I don't trust him with this just yet.
McCain claims he was a Reagan Revolution foot soldier, but I have doubts about his ability to uplift our economy. He doesn't seem to concerned with the mortgage crisis. He has only said that government action is needed but hasn't given any details.
I'm not fully convinced that troop surges are the answer in Iraq. I dread the day my brother is called back to active duty for another term in the Middle East.
With a flailing economy, how can we afford this war? And if we are really making progress, I'd like to see the results. I'd like to read about this progress instead of seeing another name on the list of those who have been killed. I supported going to battle to end terrorism, but I think we're beyond that point. This war has turned into something else and I'm starting to wonder why McCain would be "prepared to have troops in Iraq for 100
