I'm hearing the people who lament that they'll never see a female president in their lifetime and I'm tempted to respond with the soothing deflector that "these things take time."
I bite my tongue. Partly that's so somebody else doesn't bite my head but in fact I agree: "these things take time" is an evasion. "Time" can turn into "forever," and forever is a long time. Also, I have to acknowledge that I never have been that crazy about Hillary. Respect, yes; even vote for her if it came to that. But not with enthusiasm.
Yet there may be some solace in the long view. I'm too lazy to do the homework myself so I will restrict myself to the rhetorical form. How many female senators do we have now? How many female governors? I'm not certain, but I know it is a whole lot more than we had in 1984. And it cannot be more than a few years until they are a majority in office, just as they are in life. The bench just gets stronger every year.
Remarkably, the same cannot be said for blacks. Once, we had Ed Brooks in the senate; now we have Barack Obama.
Still, we do have Barack Obama. I think Obama, too, is an imperfect candidate. but how often have we had a perfect candidate? A free trip to the Paris for the first person to name even one. Okay, George Washington, but you can't name another.
And for perspective, take a second look at 1984. Then we had Jesse Jackson and Geraldine Ferraro. Today we have Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton. I'd say we've come a long way.
Fn,: And FWIW, I'd say that for the moment at least, Jackson is conducting himself with a good deal more dignity than Ferraro.
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