Entries for September 2008

Women are important this election cycle. They are donating more money and voted in high numbers during the primaries, but they aren't changing their opinions about candidates willy-nilly as some would have you believe.

The buzz is that John McCain had captured the support of white women because of Sarah Palin. But here's the rub: white women haven't behaved any differently from the general population. They haven't been swinging as wildly as my colleague Bonnie and many others have suggested.

Over the last few days, Sarah Palin started to come out of her shell. She did an interview with Katie Couric and took a question on the way out of an event. She performed less than exceptionally, to put it nicely. Robert, who was decidedly less nice, called the interview painful. After these bumbled interviews, questions about her ability to lead have reached fever pitch and now even some conservatives are calling for her to rethink her candidacy. Kathleen Parker writes on National Review Online that Palin should just drop out for the good of her party and her country. After all, Parker says, "No one would criticize a mother who puts her family first."

What do you think? Post your thoughts in the comments section.

Women control more than half of the wealth in the United States but typically they cling to it rather than give it to political candidates. So, if a candidate could unlock half of the money in the country, they'd be a sure thing, right?

Well, money doesn't always lead to victory, but the correlation is pretty strong. So, why, when women vote in higher percentages than men, donate to charities at a higher rate than men, and control significant wealth, do they typically constitute less than half of the total amount of political contributions?

If you watch cable news, you'd think that because John McCain put Sarah Palin on the ticket, Hillary Clinton supporters are flocking to the Republican team. While more women are now comfortable with McCain, the majority of Clinton supporters aren't moving to the newest woman in the race. Many are still upset Clinton isn't on the Democratic ticket but are coming around to support Barack Obama. (But there are still enough Clinton die-hards who vow to support McCain that it could make a difference in the race.)

Is "lipstick on a pig" sexist? No. Was Obama calling Palin a pig? Certainly not.