A Woman President

During a class discussion of gender discrimination in employment today, I was asked by one of my students what I would think of a woman President. Another student pointed out that the job of President is elected; so I didn’t have to make the point that employment discrimination law does not apply. Another student mentioned that both Hilary Clinton and Condoleezza Rice are being discussed as candidates in 2008; the first student then asked my “personal” opinion. My response was:

How do I, personally, feel about a woman President? I’ve got no problem at all with the idea. There are some people out there who would resist the idea, but the proportion of those people to those who would accept a female President’s leadership are diminishing over time. The problem is that no good female candidates, from either party, seem to be on the scene right now. The two leading candidates, Clinton and Rice, are both seriously flawed (in my opinion). One suffers from a craven willingness to cloak her true political sentiments for the purpose of being elected and thus does not inspire trust or respect; the other suffers from a singular lack of breadth of experience which renders her unqualified to address any issue which is not directly related to national security and foreign policy. I suppose that in theory either handicap could be overcome, but that does not seem likely to happen. That’s my $.02 on those two candidates. Of course, there are few male candidates I would be happy with, either.

This got me thinking. I say that I’m ready to accept a female President, and most everyone I talk to says that they personally are, too. But nearly every woman I talk to says that that they don’t think the country is read for a woman to be President. No man I talk to will say that he is not yet willing to accept a woman as President, but virtually no woman will say that she thinks that other Americans are willing to. There seems to be a lot of individual willingness to vote for a woman but a lot of doubt about others’ willingness to do so.

What accounts for this disparity — nearly every American is individually ready, but there is still significant distrust that other Americans are. Are men secretly unwilling to have a woman be the leader of the country? Are women less confident about their place in the public sphere than they should be? What exactly is it about the idea of a woman President that is still causing so much resistance in 2006? While I’m not particularly happy about either of these candidates, that doesn’t mean I couldn’t get behind some other woman candidate.

It’s significantly possible that Hilary Clinton will get the Democratic nomination, which would mean she would have a very realistic shot. I don’t see her being able to achieve it; no one on Earth polarizes the country more than she, and the right wing will mobilize in force to elect anyone but her. (Even Rudy Guiliani or John McCain.) But in 2012 or 2016? That’s a long time from now and it’s entirely possible a good candidate will come along. I’m convinced that we will have a woman President within my lifetime, for sure — a woman will probably not be the next President, but maybe the one after that. Hopefully we find a good one.