Women!

The NYT has an article about Kerry's appeal to women, and I'm having trouble reading it because that picture there with the article is driving me nuts. Why are these women so ecstatic? It strikes me as freakish and scary. I don't even like when people act that way about pop stars. It looks like the way models act horrifyingly happy in ads for credit cards or soda or rental cars. When I see people reacting ecstatically to a politician, I think about terrible things.

The other reason I'm having trouble reading this article is that I detest candidate attempts to appeal to women. You know women, they care about health care. Who knows why? Men don't get sick? It seems to me that it's men, not women who have the problem of a shorter life span caused by illness. Or is it just the word "care" in "health care." Women just care, right? I have a good Kerry slogan to compete with Bush's "W stands for Women": "Kerry stands for Care."

But let's look at the article.

In the last few weeks, Kerry campaign officials have been nervously eyeing polls that show an erosion of the senator's support among women, one of the Democratic Party's most reliable constituencies.

How to explain this development?

Democratic and Republican pollsters say the reason for the change this year is that an issue Mr. Bush had initially pitched as part of an overall message - which candidate would be best able to protect the United States from terrorists - has become particularly compelling for women. Several said that a confluence of two events - a Republican convention that was loaded with provocative scenes of the Sept. 11 tragedy, and a terrorist attack on children in Russia - had helped recast the electoral dynamic among this critical group in a way that created a new challenge for the Kerry camp.

See, you terrorists, what happens when you go after children! It makes women want to vote for Bush. Show me some "provocative scenes" and then some suffering children and, suddenly, I am caught in a estrogen undertow sweeping me to the right.

Help, Mellman! What can be done to save Kerry from the mindless love of children and safety that grips the feminine mind? Don't worry, is the message from Mellman (the Kerry campaign pollster):

"I don't define it as a problem,'' Mr. Mellman said. "I define it as an opportunity.'' He noted that a group of widows of Sept. 11 victims endorsed Mr. Kerry last week and offered that as evidence that the women "thought he was better able to protect the country.''

We'll just get our own grip on that pliable feminine mind! We've already shown our moves on those six 9/11 widows last week!

The campaigns talk about women the way people who thought women shouldn't have the right to vote talked about women.