Friday, October 3, 2008
On Aug. 26, 1920, women gained the right to vote. 88 years later, the U.S. faces the possibility of electing a woman as its next vice president.
Clarissa Unger, Colby senior and a Democratic delegate for Kansas, said this year had been an exciting one for women politically. Unger traveled to the Democratic National Convention in Denver and watched Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-N.Y.) speak on Aug. 26 about women’s rights and how far the nation had come since then. Clinton ran what Unger called a very successful campaign until conceding the Democratic presidential nomination to Sen. Barack Obama.
“It’s great to see what’s been happening with the women candidates this year,” Unger said. “Women can run for president and become president if we want to. I think that’s a great and powerful thing.”
Unger said it was also great to see a woman in Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin’s position, but said she thought Palin was chosen for the wrong reasons.
“I feel like she was chosen because she’s a woman,” Unger said. “And she’s doing a major disservice to women because she hasn’t been a major advocate for women in the past.”
Don Haider-Markel, professor of political science, said the U.S. had fallen behind many other countries in regards to its number of serious women candidates for high office.
“In other countries they require 30 percent of their parliament to be women,” Hider-Markel said. “We don’t have anything like that in the United States.”
Carrie Lindsey, president of the League of Women Voters in Douglas County, can’t say much about Palin, but has been very excited about the national election.
“It’s been an interesting year, both with gender and race issues,” Lindsey said. “It’s so great to be a part of the league because of the level of participation in the process.”
The league currently has 115 members and was ratified as an official organization in 1947, and became the first League of Women Voters in Kansas. Lindsey said that the league was a nonpartisan organization that focused on action, education and advocacy.
“The league has been a very structured organization aimed at not only helping women learn to vote, but also to help them become informed about issues and the candidates themselves,” Lindsey said.
Lindsey said it was all about the process of the issue itself rather than the person in the office. That is why, she said, the league didn’t endorse political candidates. She said it asked all candidates the same questions on all the issues.
“Voters need to look at the issues that are important to them,” Lindsey said. “They need to see where they stand before deciding on something so important.”
Lindsey said that it was interesting when an election became about a candidate’s personality, which made it more difficult to get to the issues.
“From the league’s perspective, that’s what’s important — how the issues affect you and your life,” Lindsey said.
The league is publicly endorsing keeping the T, Lawrence’s public transit system, up and running.
The next forum sponsored by the League of Women Voters of Douglas County on the issue of the T will be held from 7 to 9 p.m., Oct. 8 at the Plymouth Congregational Church, 925 Vermont St.. Regardless of what happens in November, Haider-Markel said the country is ready for a woman to be vice president.
“I would even argue that it has been ready since 1984,” she said. “The glass ceiling is no longer there — it has been broken for a female vice president.”
— — Edited by Kelsey Hayes
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