Althouse: "But the ousting of a wide swath of Democratic women Nov. 2 would chip away at a generation of female politicians inspired by the 1992 election..."

October 12, 2010

"But the ousting of a wide swath of Democratic women Nov. 2 would chip away at a generation of female politicians inspired by the 1992 election..."

"... which saw a surge of Democratic women inspired to break up the boys’ club of Congress after Anita Hill’s testimony in then-Judge Clarence Thomas’s Supreme Court confirmation hearings the previous year."

Will you shed a tear for the departure of that generation of women politicians? What did they do, what did they change, and what will we think about women — what will the press say about women — when the women in politics are — gasp! — Republicans?

47 comments:

The Dude said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 10/12/10, 9:48 AM
MadisonMan said...: I will not cry if female Barbara Boxer loses.; 10/12/10, 9:49 AM
Scott M said...: Oh, roughly the same thing that gets said about blacks and hispanics/latinos that are conservatives and outspoken.

Has the term Aunt Tom ever been used?; 10/12/10, 9:49 AM
Unknown said...: Do we get to sing, "Ding, dong, the witches are gone"?

Scott M said...

Oh, roughly the same thing that gets said about blacks and hispanics/latinos that are conservatives and outspoken.

Has the term Aunt Tom ever been used?

I think the phrase, "She's not a woman", is substituted.; 10/12/10, 9:51 AM
ndspinelli said...: What are you talking about, prof? Barbara Boxer showed us retarded midgets can become a US Senator.; 10/12/10, 9:51 AM
Chennaul said...: If Meg Whitman wins she will be the first female governor of that Conservative state-

California.; 10/12/10, 9:51 AM
Scott M said...: I will not cry if female Barbara Boxer loses.

That's SENATOR female Barbara Boxer to you, you prol. She's worked extremely hard to become the train wreck she is.

As an aside, is the character Doctor Girlfriend (The Monarch's main squeeze) not brilliant?; 10/12/10, 9:52 AM
George said...: Women will finally have achieved equality in politics when we just as easily vote out crappy female legislators as we do crappy male legislators.; 10/12/10, 9:55 AM
Linda Seebach said...: Specifically, edutcher, it's likely they'll say the same sort of things they said about Paula Hawkins, who was elected in Florida in 1980 (and served only one term) -- she's a Republican, so she doesn't really count as a woman.; 10/12/10, 9:57 AM
Chennaul said...: I will not cry if female Barbara Boxer loses.

Fred Barnes had an excellent piece on that race yesterday.

the Most Important race of 2010

**************************************

as an aside-

Dear NRO if you find yourself linking to MSNBC about Whitman and Fiorina and are finding "common cause" you probably have a problem.; 10/12/10, 10:00 AM
Tank said...: Shockingly enough, many of us don't care whether our reps are black, white, brown, men, women, etc.; 10/12/10, 10:01 AM
The Dude said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 10/12/10, 10:03 AM
Kensington said...: This one's easy to predict. The MFM will insinuate that the new Republican women who win office aren't real women.; 10/12/10, 10:07 AM
Kensington said...: And, somehow, the journalists who take that route will manage to sleep at night.; 10/12/10, 10:08 AM
Chennaul said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 10/12/10, 10:15 AM
Chennaul said...: The last time the media got excited about the prospect of California finally being Progressive enough to vote and get their first female governor was when it was -

Kathleen Brown running against Pete Wilson.

Here's an abstract or blurb on an article about that;

In the White House, they call it the most important election this year. For Bill Clinton to have a Democrat in the governor's mansion in Sacramento would go a long way towards winning him California's 54 electoral votes when he seeks re-election in 1996. The president's spin merchants can now breathe a little easier. The Democratic candidate who will square off in November against Pete Wilson, the Republican governor, will be the telegenic Kathleen Brown, daughter of one Californian governor (Pat) and brother of another (Jerry).

Couple of things, it was back in 1994, and she was the sister of Jerry Brown.

More importantly California is integral.

Not only electorally but because it is something like the eighth largest economy in the world.

Try fixing the nation's economic woes without that piece, with California still conducting the Great Liberal Experiment.; 10/12/10, 10:22 AM
Clyde said...: I won't shed a tear for any liberal Obama-enabler who gets sent packing on November 2nd, male or female, red or yellow, black, white or brown. But I will be sad that Nancy Pelosi will still be there.; 10/12/10, 10:32 AM
Scott M said...: But I will be sad that Nancy Pelosi will still be there.

OMG why? It's actually perfect that she'll still be there. She will have to personally suffer not only a GOP Speaker, but, I'm betting, a different Dem as minority leader. Double-whammy.

I'm also willing to bet that these things are more on her mind than actually doing the business of the people. She's got an exit plan if things tank as badly as Soros seems to think they will for the Democrats.; 10/12/10, 10:37 AM
George said...: "More importantly California is integral.

Not only electorally but because it is something like the eighth largest economy in the world.

Try fixing the nation's economic woes without that piece, with California still conducting the Great Liberal Experiment."

Well then, can we all agree that the Great Liberal Experiment" has failed, and failed miserably, because it wasn't that long ago that California had the SIXTH largest economy in the world?; 10/12/10, 10:41 AM
MadisonMan said...: I won't shed a tear for any liberal Obama-enabler who gets sent packing on November 2nd

That's too restrictive. I won't shed a tear for any incumbent who loses.; 10/12/10, 10:43 AM
Chennaul said...: George

because it wasn't that long ago that California had the SIXTH largest economy in the world?

Gaaaaa!!! Excellent point.; 10/12/10, 10:44 AM
Big Mike said...: ... what will the press say about women — when the women in politics are — gasp! — Republicans?

I won't be shedding tears for most of the women who are departing. The only tears I'll shed is due to the fact that the little troll Mikulski will still be in the Senate.

What will the press say about female Republicans? Expect stories about voting while suffering from PMS, for one thing.; 10/12/10, 11:03 AM
AuntPittypat said...: Most national polls I have seen show women, who have overwhelmingly voted Dem for decades, moving into the Rep column this year.

This is just a ploy to tug at the heartstrings of those women -- Gee, it would be a shame to lose all those real women. Nevermind that there are a lot of Rep women running -- they are not real. They want to run your womb.; 10/12/10, 11:12 AM
Bruce Hayden said...: WTF could all these women have been inspired by the election of a sexual predator to the White House in 2002?

The older I get, the more I realize that I will never understand women.; 10/12/10, 11:18 AM
Hagar said...: Bringing up Anita Hill as the inspiration for women winning public office? Where did that come from?; 10/12/10, 11:28 AM
Kirby Olson said...: I like Clarence Thomas. I liked his memoir, too -- especially the description of games he played in the streets of Georgia as a child.

"We rarely had a backboard, and our basketballs were leaky and lopsided. This made it hard to dribble, but that didn't matter, since the dirt lane on which we played was covered with rocks, glass, nails, and other debris. We also played one-handed touch football, 'half-rubber' (similar to stickball), and a game of our own devising that we called 'send back.' We almost always played in the street or the lane behind our house, meaning that we had to watch out for cars, trees, and poles. In between games we tinkered with our bikes... We also played with hula hoops and yo-yos, shot marbles, and played hopscotch and jacks. When it rained we made paddleboats to sail in the puddles" (16-17).

Oh, but the thread is about a generation of women politicians who hate Clarence Thomas.; 10/12/10, 11:42 AM
Jim said...: If you ran for office using serial liar and false accuser Anita Hill as your inspiration, then your fifteen minutes was up about 18 years ago. It's long past time to leave the public stage.; 10/12/10, 11:45 AM
Chennaul said...: If anyone is interested Investor's Business Daily wrote an excellent piece here:

Golden State Outsourced by Senator Boxer; 10/12/10, 12:06 PM
victoria said...: Here is the reality, for all of you who don't live in California. I, even as a liberal, hold out hope that Meg will be elected. She will either clean house or she will be crippled by ineffectiveness like the other Republican governor, Ahnold, who did nothing over the last 6 years. Changing governors, a republican for a republican, will do no good unless Meg has the teeth to do what is necessary.
As for Fiorina, I will be totally surprised if she is elected. She is, next to Mitt Romney, the most unlikeable candidate to grace the state of California in many a year. She pisses people off before she even opens her mouth. And, being a slave to the Tea Party movement, takes up positions that even the most conservative of Californians cringe at. No way, no how.

I may vote for Meg, but totally not for Carly.

Vicki; 10/12/10, 12:16 PM
cubanbob said...: That Victoria admits that she is going to vote for Meg Whitman is astounding. There may be hope for California after all. I can actually understand her position on Fiorina, she does irritate me as well and I a man of the right. The real question for Whitman is will she be able to take on the public sector unions? If not, then there is no point in her running.; 10/12/10, 12:36 PM
cubanbob said...: That Victoria admits that she is going to vote for Meg Whitman is astounding. There may be hope for California after all. I can actually understand her position on Fiorina, she does irritate me as well and I a man of the right. The real question for Whitman is will she be able to take on the public sector unions? If not, then there is no point in her running.; 10/12/10, 12:39 PM
Scott M said...: I can actually understand her position on Fiorina, she does irritate me as well and I a man of the right.

Maybe. But the loathing for Boxer runs deep and it began long before the current congressional overreach.; 10/12/10, 12:41 PM
former law student said...: I do not care for Barbara Boxer --I voted for Matt Fong and I voted for Bill Jones -- but on the principle of "First, do no harm," I prefer her to the Me-First Carly Fiorina -- Machiavelli in a pantsuit.

Luckily for Fiorina, Walter Hewlett could not prove that she had materially misrepresented facts regarding the Compaq merger. Nor could he show that Deutsche Bank voted the shares it held (but did not own) on behalf of the merger under threat of loss of future HP business.; 10/12/10, 12:49 PM
ndspinelli said...: I thought the Clarence Thomas hearings were about a conservative black man having the temerity to be a Supreme and liberals trying to show him who was boss. And, I was happy Thomas went toe to toe and won.

That said, I never thought what Anita Hill testified to was a tall tale. I have always believed it was substantially true.; 10/12/10, 12:51 PM
former law student said...: If anyone is interested Investor's Business Daily wrote an excellent piece

Of course I'm interested. The likelihood of IBD writing an excellent piece is the same as the likelihood of me finding a gold nugget in a bag of potting soil.; 10/12/10, 12:52 PM
Chennaul said...: Fiorina is closer to overcoming Boxer than Whitman is to defeating Brown in the current polls.

The best poll in Cali is The Field Poll, but they haven't conducted a poll in awhile.

Since they do a thorough poll in about nine different languages it might cost them pretty penny.

I think they'll do one about a week before Election Day.

btw-it might surprise you but Boxer has higher unfavorables than Fiorina.

It is ironic that Conservatives are more enthused with Angle and O'Donnell than they are with Fiorina and Whitman.

Both Fiorina and Whitman have a greater chance of winning than O'Donnell and you could make the case for Boxer being a proven Marxist rather than just a "Bearded Marxist".

Every time Conservatives bash Whitman and Fiorina as bad candidates even in the face of the given environment of California-somehow it makes me less likely to vote for Angle.; 10/12/10, 1:14 PM
Scott M said...: It is ironic that Conservatives are more enthused with Angle and O'Donnell than they are with Fiorina and Whitman.

Some conservatives. I'm far more interested in seeing Boxer removed from office than anything else (besides the overall numbers) in this cycle.; 10/12/10, 1:21 PM
Chennaul said...: Vicki

What's your chief complaint against Fiorina?

-I have an idea but I want to see what your answer is first.; 10/12/10, 1:23 PM
Chennaul said...: Scott M-

Ya, I should have amended that to Conservative bloggers, NRO and Conservative commenters-which is probably not a good sample pool to draw conclusions from.

There's also probably a big difference between the Conservative electorate in the primaries as opposed to the electorate-even Conservative-that shows up for the general.; 10/12/10, 1:26 PM
test said...: "It is ironic that Conservatives are more enthused with Angle and O'Donnell than they are with Fiorina and Whitman."

The difference in attention is mainly because Angle and O'Donnell stem from an unknown, the Tea Party. We've long seen and largely understood the extremely wealthy, self-funded politician. When something is new it draws attention, how fast can this thing reach 60 mph?; 10/12/10, 2:49 PM
Kirk Parker said...: edutcher,

The phrase you're looking for is "female impersonator". Somebody actually called Kay Bailey Hutchison that (though I forget exactly who it was.); 10/12/10, 3:02 PM
Kirk Parker said...: That is, I'm pretty sure it was some feminist icon or other, I just forget exactly which one.; 10/12/10, 3:12 PM
Anonymous said...: Way back in '92, a cartoon in American Spectator (or was it National Review?) pointed out that just two fewer women ran for Congress in 1990, but that year didn't get the "Year of the Woman" designation.

Of course, it also pointed out that a majority of the women running in 1990 were Republicans, while in 1992, the majority were Democrats.; 10/12/10, 3:29 PM
Chennaul said...: Marshal-

That might explain it, especially when you consider the lack of reporting on Ron Johnson.

We've long seen and largely understood the extremely wealthy, self-funded politician.

The only thing is it seems that Whitman and Fiorina are criticized for this more than Ron Johnson.; 10/12/10, 3:33 PM
I'm Full of Soup said...: I can't believe no one thought of the NYT headline from the future:

"World Ends! Woman and Minorities Hit Hardest!"; 10/12/10, 4:27 PM
The Crack Emcee said...: Buh-Bye!; 10/12/10, 6:19 PM
Bart Hall (Kansas, USA) said...: That generation? Not a bit. They're a bunch of old cats with the fur falling out. Stick a needle in 'em.

That sort of feminism was a religion, and its sacrament ... abortion.

They lost nearly all credibility in their non-response to Bill Clinton, and they lost the rest of in with their utter hatred of successful conservative women.

They are as anachronistic as an old-style segregationist in 1987.; 10/13/10, 8:50 AM