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In the search for Mitt’s Number Two, perhaps Beth Myers will try to pitch South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley or Gov. Susana Martinez of New Mexico. Either woman would bring both diversity and southern-state gravitas. And there’s U.S. Sen. Kelly Ayotte of New Hampshire, Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer, Condoleezza Rice — plenty of seemingly qualified conservative women to choose from.
But Romney won’t choose any of them. He’s playing it safe. And after Election 2008, safe means Mr. Wonder Bread. (Pack those bags, Rob Portman.) Picking a woman may make people think of what happened four years ago — that gamey-changey stuff — and Romney does not want that. At all.
Thanks, Sarah.
Being a woman in the world of politics was a hard enough endeavor to begin with. But now we are feeling the full brunt of the additional Palin Factor: Whatever a candidate’s political liabilities may be, they seem somehow amplified by the lack of a Y chromosome.
“I do think that the extent to which Palin had liabilities as a candidate and as a public official has had some implications as to what we think of all women in office,” said Kay L. Schlozman, a political science professor at Boston College.
Palin wasn’t the only one who had a hand in creating this situation, of course. Sexism in American politics, both the overt kind and the silent variety that lies hidden like black mold in a dank basement, is as old as this nation. But as a candidate, Palin not only had a responsibility to her party not to catastrophically implode; like it or not, she had a duty to women.
Schlozman recalled that during her education and early career in the ’60s and ’70s, “I and my friends always felt a special pressure that we couldn’t fail. If we did, then we’d fail all women. Our failures would have implications in the way other women are perceived in the future.” That is a responsibility I and many other women have felt. And we weren’t even running for national office.
And for all Palin’s failures, there is no question that she was also a victim of sexism. Politics is a full-contact sport, but for women the attacks are extra-personal. How much have we heard about Palin’s hotness, or Hillary Clinton’s pantsuits, or Nancy Pelosi’s alleged fondness for Botox? Newsflash: Here in Washington, the men’s foreheads don’t move, either. But that goes unnoticed.
Palin wasn’t exactly treated kindly by those in her own corner, either.
“A very legitimate case can be made that, in addition that whatever liability she brought to campaign, she was also thrown under the bus by other people in the campaign,” Schlozman noted.
Who could blame any woman for not wanting to win the veepstakes?
But no need to worry — no woman is in the running. They’ve come a long way in politics, but they suffered a U-turn a few years back.
Article URL: http://www.bostonherald.com/news/columnists/view.bg?articleid=1061128117
