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Should McCain nominate a female for VP??

ProfJohn

ProfJohn

Lifer
Here is the short of it.

Women make up a huge part of the electorate, a FAR bigger share than blacks.

Hillary herself got 50% of the Democrat vote in the primaries.

Despite this Obama decided to go with a man and essentially ignored female voters.

Could McCain capitalize on this by naming a woman himself and thus becoming the choice for middle of the road independent females? A popular middle of the road female could almost guarantee that McCain wins.

Here is why: In 2004 Kerry took the female vote 51% to 48%. In 2000 Gore took the female vote 54% to 43%. Kerry lost the popular vote and Gore barely won it. Which means the Democrat candidate needs to win the female vote by perhaps 5% in order to have a chance at winning the election. Right now Obama is leading the female vote by only 2%, and Biden is not going to help him get more female voters.

Therefore, if McCain puts a female on his ticket and increases his share of the female vote by only 1 or 2% that may be all it takes for him to win in the fall.

Dick Morris's take on this:
link
It doesn't take a political genius to realize that Barack Obama needed to nominate a woman for vice president. Obama's key problem is that there is no gender gap. In the most recent Zogby poll, he runs only 2 points better among women than among men. A Democrat should be running 10 to 15 points better among women.

If Obama is to have a hope of winning, he needs to improve his performance among female voters. The Fox News poll indicates that only about half of those who backed Hillary Clinton in the primaries are voting for Obama and that fully one in five is now planning to back McCain. Attractive to women voters because of his maverick positions on issues and his willingness to defy the Republican orthodoxy, McCain is garnering votes from women who should be part of Obama's core constituency.

So why didn't Obama name a woman? He couldn't nominate Hillary because she came with such baggage that he'd be spending his entire campaign swatting away charges directed at the Clintons. It would be priceless to see Obama trying to justify Bill's refusal to publish the names of the donors to his library or to explain what Bill is doing in Dubai and Kazakhstan.

But what about Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius? While not a national figure, she is attractive and articulate, and would have made a fine candidate. But Obama was terrified that the Clintons would wreck vengeance if he named a woman other than Hillary. But it was all a bluff.

Hillary's delegates would have celebrated the selection of a woman and would not have held it against Obama that it was someone other than Hillary. Hillary, for her part, would have had to grit her teeth and support Sebelius or risk alienating her core constituency. But Obama didn't dare do what he needed to do. He wimped out.

The fact that Barack Obama named Joe Biden as his vice presidential candidate will have relatively little impact on the strategic framework of the race. Biden was the best of the names on Obama's short list. His experience in foreign affairs, his tough advocacy of the Democratic agenda and his skill at handling himself will all help Obama's campaign, but not decisively. The other options were worse. Tim Kaine, governor of Virginia, had as little experience as Obama. Evan Bayh, senator from Indiana, is way too soft spoken and mild for a rough and tumble campaign.

But the most important thing is that Obama did not choose a woman. He needed one. With Hillary's evident availability for the nomination, his failure to name her or some other woman stands out starkly to women voters. It doesn't matter to them that he chose Biden over Bayh or Kaine. What matters is that he did not choose Hillary or another woman.

Now, John McCain can take advantage of Obama's blunder by coming back with a woman nominee for president. Texas Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison would be an excellent choice. She's been around for decades and is not going to start making mistakes now. Her nomination would be a signal to American women that McCain takes their aspirations seriously, even if Obama does not. Hutchison is not charismatic. But her circumstances would be if she were nominated. The prospect of a woman vice president would electrify women throughout the nation.

I have previously written about the advantages of Joe Lieberman for vice president. His nomination would send a signal of bipartisanship that would be notable and would hasten Democratic defections. But conservatives would be horrified by the choice of Lieberman. And Obama's failure to nominate a woman is such a glaring misstep that McCain should pounce and take advantage of it.

The ticket will nominally be Obama-Biden. But, to millions of American women it will be Obama and not Hillary.
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in theory, I like the idea and I think whatshername from Alaska might be a good choice.

but the democrats would immediately pounce on it, calling it a gimmick move ala Geraldine Ferraro.
 
Originally posted by: ProfJohn
-snip-

Women make up a huge part of the electorate, a FAR bigger share than blacks. Hillary herself got 50% of the Democrat vote in the primaries. Despite this Obama decided to go with a man and essentially ignored female voters.

-snip-
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If McCain doesn't pick a female VP can we expect to see a similar post from you about him ignoring female voters too?

 
Originally posted by: loki8481
in theory, I like the idea and I think whatshername from Alaska might be a good choice.

but the democrats would immediately pounce on it, calling it a gimmick move ala Geraldine Ferraro.
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I would love that there are many hillary supporters who thought the media and the democratic party were guilty of Misogymy. If they went after a Sara Palin calling her a gimmick it might push many of those hillary supporters right to McCain or make them stay home.

I hope McCain selects a woman VP anything that keeps Jimmy Carter jr. out of the white house.
 
McCain wont take that gamble.

It will be Romney, and that choice won't help him especially with the indy's wether male or female.

McCain can't chance it.
 
I think he should go with a female vp, energize the feminists, get elected and put 2 scotus judges in and overturn roe vs wade. I'm just sayin it would be funny.
 
Dems don't need the female vote if they make it up elsewhere. For example, with black voters. This is assuming you did the math right, however, which the OP failed to do correctly. Gore and Kerry's advantage in female votes is more than made up for by Obama's landslide in black voter edge, and the vast majority of female voters considering Obama won't go to McCain just because his VP might be a woman, who in all likelihood won't be qualified for office.
 
Originally posted by: Evan Lieb
Dems don't need the female vote if they make it up elsewhere. For example, with black voters. This is assuming you did the math right, however, which the OP failed to do correctly. Gore and Kerry's advantage in female votes is more than made up for by Obama's landslide in black voter edge, and the vast majority of female voters considering Obama won't go to McCain just because his VP might be a woman, who in all likelihood won't be qualified for office.
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Any woman VP McCain would pick palin or Hutchison is just as qualified as Obama. That is not an argument you really want to get into considering Obama has almost 0 experience.
 
Originally posted by: Evan Lieb
Dems don't need the female vote if they make it up elsewhere. For example, with black voters. This is assuming you did the math right, however, which the OP failed to do correctly. Gore and Kerry's advantage in female votes is more than made up for by Obama's landslide in black voter edge, and the vast majority of female voters considering Obama won't go to McCain just because his VP might be a woman, who in all likelihood won't be qualified for office.
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Actually Obama won't really help with the percentage of the black vote, he might help with turnout though. That's whats so funny when people talk about black voters being racist by voting for Obama at about 90%. It's because they were too dumb to look back at previous elections and look at what percentages of the black vote Gore (90%) and others got. Kerry's black vote percentage was actually really low for Democrats.

That all being said, McCain's not picking a woman.
 
Originally posted by: quest55720
Originally posted by: Evan Lieb
Dems don't need the female vote if they make it up elsewhere. For example, with black voters. This is assuming you did the math right, however, which the OP failed to do correctly. Gore and Kerry's advantage in female votes is more than made up for by Obama's landslide in black voter edge, and the vast majority of female voters considering Obama won't go to McCain just because his VP might be a woman, who in all likelihood won't be qualified for office.
Click to expand...

Any woman VP McCain would pick palin or Hutchison is just as qualified as Obama. That is not an argument you really want to get into considering Obama has almost 0 experience.
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Kay Bailey Hutchinson would be an interesting choice. She has been a fairly conservative Republican but occasionally goes independent on some of her votes, confounding her support base. That just might make her fit right with McCain.

I'm surprised the polling is so close between McCain and Obama (within error rate in all the polls I've seen), so I wouldn't necessarily say McCain has an uphill battle whether or not he chooses a woman VP.
 
Most of the sour grapes wrt Hillary isn't from honest Hillary supporters, at all, but from the fifth column Rush sent out to try to derail the Obama nomination. They're still working on it. McCain's female constituency is mostly in country clubs and the single issue voter fundies- after that, he's got nothin'...

Dick Morris? Heh. There's no shill like a turncoat shill, and Morris epitomizes that.

McCain pick a woman? Like who? Anne Coulter? Condi? Repubs don't vote for blacks, even though they appoint some... I'm sure that the average redneck would be thrilled to death at the prospect of a black woman as prez should McCain keel over... Yeh, they're real keen on on that prospect...
 
Originally posted by: Jhhnn
Most of the sour grapes wrt Hillary isn't from honest Hillary supporters, at all, but from the fifth column Rush sent out to try to derail the Obama nomination. They're still working on it. McCain's female constituency is mostly in country clubs and the single issue voter fundies- after that, he's got nothin'...

Dick Morris? Heh. There's no shill like a turncoat shill, and Morris epitomizes that.

McCain pick a woman? Like who? Anne Coulter? Condi? Repubs don't vote for blacks, even though they appoint some... I'm sure that the average redneck would be thrilled to death at the prospect of a black woman as prez should McCain keel over... Yeh, they're real keen on on that prospect...
Click to expand...

Why bother posting here, isn't Dailykos more for you?
 
Are there any qualified women? Only one I've even heard about is the Alaskan Gov and that was rather recent.
 
Originally posted by: Jhhnn
Most of the sour grapes wrt Hillary isn't from honest Hillary supporters, at all, but from the fifth column Rush sent out to try to derail the Obama nomination. They're still working on it. McCain's female constituency is mostly in country clubs and the single issue voter fundies- after that, he's got nothin'...

Dick Morris? Heh. There's no shill like a turncoat shill, and Morris epitomizes that.

McCain pick a woman? Like who? Anne Coulter? Condi? Repubs don't vote for blacks, even though they appoint some... I'm sure that the average redneck would be thrilled to death at the prospect of a black woman as prez should McCain keel over... Yeh, they're real keen on on that prospect...
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wow...

 
Originally posted by: loki8481
in theory, I like the idea and I think whatshername from Alaska might be a good choice.

but the democrats would immediately pounce on it, calling it a gimmick move ala Geraldine Ferraro.
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Palin is in some trouble. Meg Whitman is a neophyte. And Carly Fiorina, as all tech people should know, is a fuckin retard.

Who else can mccain pick? Hutchinson? Dole 🙂? He does not have any good choices from the female side. He needs to pick Huckabee and just move on with his life.
 
Originally posted by: lupi
Are there any qualified women? Only one I've even heard about is the Alaskan Gov and that was rather recent.
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held up against Obama, the bar for "qualified" isn't set very high.
 
Originally posted by: lupi
Are there any qualified women? Only one I've even heard about is the Alaskan Gov and that was rather recent.
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There's Pelosi, but that might not exactly be a winning ticket for McCain. I imagine Rice would make the short list.

McCain should nominate whoever is most qualified for the position.
 
Hard decision Romney or a woman. I think Romney is the "right" choice but a woman would give him a definite edge.
 
Originally posted by: eilute
Originally posted by: lupi
Are there any qualified women? Only one I've even heard about is the Alaskan Gov and that was rather recent.
Click to expand...

There's Pelosi, but that might not exactly be a winning ticket for McCain. I imagine Rice would make the short list.

McCain should nominate whoever is most qualified for the position.
Click to expand...

Dude, please fact check yourself first next time. 😛
 
Originally posted by: lupi
Originally posted by: Jhhnn
Most of the sour grapes wrt Hillary isn't from honest Hillary supporters, at all, but from the fifth column Rush sent out to try to derail the Obama nomination. They're still working on it. McCain's female constituency is mostly in country clubs and the single issue voter fundies- after that, he's got nothin'...

Dick Morris? Heh. There's no shill like a turncoat shill, and Morris epitomizes that.

McCain pick a woman? Like who? Anne Coulter? Condi? Repubs don't vote for blacks, even though they appoint some... I'm sure that the average redneck would be thrilled to death at the prospect of a black woman as prez should McCain keel over... Yeh, they're real keen on on that prospect...
Click to expand...

Why bother posting here, isn't Dailykos more for you?
Click to expand...


If you'd care to actually dispute anything I wrote, please do so. You're not Rush, so you can't screen the calls, and not O'Reilly, either, so you can't cut the mic... Successful female repub politicians are much rarer than their dem counterparts, successful black repub politicians almost nonexistent, and successful black female repub politicians even moreso...

There's reason for all of that, inherent in the basic headset of conservatives in general- they have a strong authoritarian streak, and authority figures, in our culture, are almost exclusively white males... father figures...
 
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