Category Archives: Random Blogging

I’ve had it. And the 2008 election system has just started.

According to the pollsters, I am one of those “older female voters” who can be counted on to support Hillary Clinton because, after all, we’re so much alike. We share a gender.

This may come as a big shock to the so-called “analysts” who like to slice and dice the electorate into “interest groups” and “market niches” based upon some wonky version of identity politics, but women—even those of a “certain age”—are not a monolithic voting bloc. Not long ago, I wrote about my irritation with negative gender stereotypes: the South Carolina (female) Republican who employed a sexist term for Clinton, and the patronizing (male) commentators who applied a gender lens to every tactic employed by her campaign. I think many women feel the same impatience with that sort of one-dimensional approach to her candidacy.

But guess what? Many of us are equally impatient with a candidate who seems to feel entitled to our votes simply by virtue of a common gender, and with pundits who give that entitlement legitimacy. When Barack Obama was asked whether he anticipated getting a major share of the African-American vote, he sensibly replied that he expected he’d need to earn every vote. He clearly recognized what the “chattering classes” seem unable to grasp, that women, blacks, Latinos, young people and all the other groups into which voters get lumped consist of individuals who are more—and more complicated—than those labels reflect.      

In both the Republican and Democratic primaries, we have seen strong signals that voters are tired to death of the poll-centered politics of the last few election cycles. Both Huckabee and McCain have based their appeals to GOP voters on straight talk; Mitt Romney, vastly better financed and clearly more acceptable to the business wing of the party, has dutifully designed (or changed) his positions on the basis of his polling. Conventional wisdom favored Romney, but so far, actual voters haven’t.  

Among Democrats, as Frank Rich observed in the New York Times, it is the Clinton campaign, led by pollster Mark Penn, that is following the older script. “In Mrs. Clinton’s down-to-earth micropolitics, polls often seem to play the leadership role. That leaves her indecisive when one potential market is pitched against another.” If those polls also tell her she can count on women’s votes, she’s in for a surprise. This election won’t be decided on the basis of gender or race. They won’t be irrelevant, but they won’t be decisive, either.

This is an election about the future, about where we are going as a nation. It is about who can best bring a sour, fractured, dispirited citizenry together again, about who can best heal the deep divisions created by wedge issues and culture wars and pandering to political bases. It’s about vision and hope—and yes, change.

It isn’t about identity politics. Candidates who think it is are part of the past we so desperately need to change.

 

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Women who venture into preserves formerly considered male get used to sexist put-downs. There has been progress; females attending law school today are unlikely to encounter the sorts of accusations that were routine when I was one of a handful of women students in the 1970s: I was taking a place that should have gone to a man. I was just a bored housewife amusing myself with tort law. My children would become drug addicts.  

People—okay, men—who should know better still say remarkably stupid things, of course. Just last year, Representative Steve Buyer told The Hill that women "don’t fight fair. Men do very well at focus, well at what’s in front of them. Women bring their memories to the debate and bring in things that may not even be relevant…  They bring in external things that may have occurred in the past. So you have to come in, nod your head and be a good listener."  But most politicians—whatever their private prejudices—have learned to avoid such patronizing buffoonery.

And then Hillary Clinton decided to run for President.

Now, Hillary is not my favorite political figure, but there are plenty of reasons to oppose her candidacy that do not rest on gender. If the polls are correct that she has a significant lead among women, it may be in part because women resent the gender-based putdowns by some of her opponents. The most recent episode, and the one that has gotten the most attention, was the exchange between Senator John McCain and a (female!) supporter who asked him “How do we beat the (rhymes with witch)?” McCain just laughed at the use of this time-tested epithet for “uppity” women.

McCain’s response can at least be dismissed as political. But what about what passes for professional commentary from our increasingly irrelevant chattering classes? Chris Matthews, commenting  after one of her appearances, said “We were watching Hillary Clinton earlier tonight and she was giving a campaign barn burner speech, which is harder to give for a woman. It can grate on some men when they listen to it. Fingernails on a blackboard..” Another time, he characterized her voice as “shrill” and her body language as “judgmental,” terms unlikely to be applied to a male.

In a recent column,  Maureen Dowd reported on some telling research. In one recent study, Columbia University professor Ray Fisman confirmed the staying power of certain long-standing  gender biases.  As he put it, “We males are a gender of fragile egos in search of a pretty face and are threatened by brains or success that exceeds our own.”  Catalyst, an organization that studies women in the workplace, found that “women who behave in ways that cleave to gender stereotypes — focusing on collegiality and relationships — are seen as less competent. But if they act too macho, they are seen as ‘too tough’ and unfeminine.”

There are plenty of valid reasons to vote for someone other than Hillary Clinton.  “Rhymes with witch” isn’t one of them.

 

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Women who venture into preserves formerly considered male get used to sexist put-downs. There has been progress; females attending law school today are unlikely to encounter the sorts of accusations that were routine when I was one of a handful of women students in the 1970s: I was taking a place that should have gone to a man. I was just a bored housewife amusing myself with tort law. My children would become drug addicts.  

People—okay, men—who should know better still say remarkably stupid things, of course. Just last year, Representative Steve Buyer told The Hill that women "don’t fight fair. Men do very well at focus, well at what’s in front of them. Women bring their memories to the debate and bring in things that may not even be relevant…  They bring in external things that may have occurred in the past. So you have to come in, nod your head and be a good listener."  But most politicians—whatever their private prejudices—have learned to avoid such patronizing buffoonery.

And then Hillary Clinton decided to run for President.

Now, Hillary is not my favorite political figure, but there are plenty of reasons to oppose her candidacy that do not rest on gender. If the polls are correct that she has a significant lead among women, it may be in part because women resent the gender-based putdowns by some of her opponents. The most recent episode, and the one that has gotten the most attention, was the exchange between Senator John McCain and a (female!) supporter who asked him “How do we beat the (rhymes with witch)?” McCain just laughed at the use of this time-tested epithet for “uppity” women.

McCain’s response can at least be dismissed as political. But what about what passes for professional commentary from our increasingly irrelevant chattering classes? Chris Matthews, commenting  after one of her appearances, said “We were watching Hillary Clinton earlier tonight and she was giving a campaign barn burner speech, which is harder to give for a woman. It can grate on some men when they listen to it. Fingernails on a blackboard..” Another time, he characterized her voice as “shrill” and her body language as “judgmental,” terms unlikely to be applied to a male.

In a recent column,  Maureen Dowd reported on some telling research. In one recent study, Columbia University professor Ray Fisman confirmed the staying power of certain long-standing  gender biases.  As he put it, “We males are a gender of fragile egos in search of a pretty face and are threatened by brains or success that exceeds our own.”  Catalyst, an organization that studies women in the workplace, found that “women who behave in ways that cleave to gender stereotypes — focusing on collegiality and relationships — are seen as less competent. But if they act too macho, they are seen as ‘too tough’ and unfeminine.”

There are plenty of valid reasons to vote for someone other than Hillary Clinton.  “Rhymes with witch” isn’t one of them.

 

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Last week, I got word that Jeff Harris had died.

 

If you didn’t know Jeff, there is no reason you would have heard of him. I met him years ago when I was developing real estate, and he was involved in real estate sales and finance—one of many people whose paths I crossed doing business. A nice guy I’d promptly forgotten, until he called me a few months ago, joking that he was “a voice from your checkered past."

 

He’d called on behalf of a "good government" political action committee in Plainfield, Indiana. Plainfield has been growing rapidly, giving rise to concerns that its governing practices—rooted in casual, small-town "handshake" politics—were not proving adequate to the challenges of a more sophisticated economic development environment. They thought the Town needed an Ethics Ordinance and Jeff remembered that I had once chaired the Indianapolis Ethics Commission. Could I help?

 

During the following months, I met with Jeff and other members of the Plainfield PAC. I found a model municipal Ethics Ordinance, and worked with them to revise it to meet Plainfield‘s needs. I attended the Town Council meeting where Jeff asked for consideration of the Ordinance. And I enjoyed getting reaquainted with Jeff, who was unfailingly cheerful and upbeat–the result, he told me, of a heart transplant he’d had ten years before. It "brought home how wonderful life is."

 

What I thought was wonderful was seeing a group of citizens coming together for the sole purpose of improving the way their Town’s government did business. If there was a hidden agenda, I didn’t see it. None of the people I met had business interests involved. Their efforts certainly weren’t partisan (everyone in Plainfield, apparently, is Republican). The PAC members had grown concerned that questions were being raised about the Town’s business practices, and they wanted to put rules in place to provide ethical guidance and ensure transparancy. If there were any personal scores being settled, I saw no evidence of it. What I saw was a group of good citizens taking responsibility for their community—not carping, not complaining, not dealing in accusations or innuendos, but spending their own time and money to make their government more open and responsive.

 

In Jeff’s case, he was using some of his "borrowed time" to engage in the effort. He’d raised his children in Plainfield, and he wanted them to be proud of their community. He wanted to ensure that Town business was conducted "fair and square." That’s what good citizens do.

 

When Jeff’s transplanted heart gave out a few weeks ago, Plainfield—and Indiana, and America—lost a good, decent man and a model citizen.

 

When I get depressed about our national politics—the corruption, the partisanship, the contempt for the rule of law—I think of Jeff Harris and the people like him, people who don’t want to run for office, don’t "wheel and deal," and don’t create organizations based on business calculations.

 

They are the best of America.  

 

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For thirty-five years, I was a Republican because Republicans were the “live and let live” party. Back then, the GOP was the party of limited government, the party that believed government should do those things that government really had to do, like provide police and fire protection, pave streets, and collect garbage. I left the GOP (along with many others) after it was hijacked by moral scolds, and an emphasis on limited government and fiscal prudence gave way to an obsession with imposing religion and making life miserable for gays and lesbians. 

 

Is the tide beginning to turn?

 

Nationally , signals are decidedly mixed. On one hand, there’s the spectacle of GOP senators frantically distancing themselves from (“I’m not gay”) Larry Craig, while showing a bit more “Christian charity” to (call me a Madam) David Vitter. On the other hand, none of the Republican frontrunners for the Presidental nomination are rabidly anti-gay, although both Guiliani and Romney are engaged in a rather unseemly effort to rewrite their past moderation on gay issues.  

 

On the local level, however, there is an unmistakable—and welcome—change in the air. It began with Carl Brizzi, who expanded his office’s nondiscrimination policy to include discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation, and extended to Governor Daniels, who has pointedly avoided anti-gay rhetoric. Local councilor Scott Keller has championed equal rights for gays and lesbians.

 

At a recent fundraising dinner for Lambda Legal, a gay civil rights group, Republicans were well represented; among the 500 plus guests, I saw the GOP’s county chairman, its candidate for Mayor, a couple of ward chairs, and a number of others who have not previously attended.  

 

And when Indiana Equality sent a questionnaire to all candidates in the upcoming election for Indianapolis’ City-County Council, the responses from a number of Republican candidates were a pleasant surprise.

 

One Republican respondent wrote “The role of government is not to promote  distinctions; rather, to recognize the challenges facing each community and adopt a course of action that ensures that the civil liberties and personal freedoms of each are protected….understanding works to eliminate prejudice dirven by fear and ignornance.  When you eliminate prejudice, you eliminate a threat and the community is safer.”

 

Another said “I respect everyone’s right to live without prejudice or discrimination, whatever their race, beliefs, or sexual orientation.  I live my life that way and my wife and I raise our children that way.”

 

And in a response that hearkened back to the “old” GOP, one candidate wrote “[My district] is a diverse mix of people — straight/gay, rich/poor, black/white and every shade in between – but we all have one thing in common.  All of us are finding it more difficult to provide for our families.  And I mean family in the broadest sense of the word – however you choose to define it.  I have no private or political agenda to further – I just want local government to get back to the basics.”

 

I couldn’t agree more.

 

 

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