It's Who You Know

So which of the current presidential candidates is probably going to be best for women?

Now, some folks will argue that blah blah it's possible to have the utmost respect for women, of course, without actually, you know, giving them jobs. And as we all know, there really just aren't that many women out there who really care about politics or who've reached the very top of their professions, and this fact has nothing to do with discrimination, necessarily--maybe women just choose to do other things with their time. Like shopping and cooing over infants, for example. And it certainly isn't the candidates' fault if, for reasons of their own, women are happy earning less than $9000/year or doing things other than being interested in who governs the nation.

Still, though, with all those necessary caveats in place, it seems reasonable to assume, as a starting point, that

the relative influence of women within presidential campaigns can be partially gauged by gender ratios among salaried operatives playing strategic leadership and advisory roles, the top twenty best-paid individuals, and staff who were paid more than $9000 in the last quarter.

Right? I mean, even though there's no reason why men can't represent women's issues just as well as women, and it's nothing more than rampant reverse sexism to assume otherwise, it doesn't seem entirely crazy to guess that probably, on average, women are probably slightly more likely to care about women's concerns.

Of course, we all know that ideally, there'd be no such thing as "women's issues". And I'm sure we all know enlightened individuals who are completely indifferent to gender and think that paying attention to this stuff just undermines equality.

Okay fine.

Now let's talk about the real world.

For those of us who haven't entirely evolved past noticing that people have bodies and that these bodies actually make a difference in the world, the Huffington Post released some interesting information a few days ago:

The campaign of Republican Mike Huckabee achieves the closest gender balance at a near 50% division between men and women on all measures (it is also the smallest of all the major campaigns). The campaigns of Democrats Hillary Clinton and Bill Richardson, and Republican Mitt Romney are also fairly balanced, with Clinton's somewhat favoring women and Richardson's and Romney's somewhat favoring men. The most gender-skewed campaign, in contrast, is that of Rudy Giuliani.

In the campaign of the former New York mayor Giuliani, there is only one senior female staffer, who holds the title of Communications Director. Fewer than one-third of Giuliani's staff who earned $9000 or more in the last quarter are women, and just a quarter of his top twenty paid staff are women.

The Democrats' campaigns are more gender-balanced than Republicans'. Just over thirty percent of Republican senior staffers are women, compared to just under 33% of Democratic senior staffers. And there are ten more top salaried women in Democratic campaigns: 32 of 80 (40%) compared to 21 of 74 (28%) in Republican campaigns.

Kudos to Mike Huckabee. Still, given his hostility to women's reproductive rights, well, nope.

Romney? Nope.

Richardson passes. So, needless to say, does Clinton.

If you're one of those hyper-enlightened souls who thinks that caring about gender in politics is just as sexist as the fact that, oh, every president throughout American history has been a white man, then fine; vote "purely on the issues." (Actually, in all seriousness, OnTheIssues is a good site for that kind of research.) If you're a straw woman who "only" votes based on gender equity, then hey, cast your ballot for Huckabee.

If, however, you live in the real world, realize that a given candidate's issues will flex (or not) in the context of party politics and actual day-to-day governance, and give a shit about women's equality, then consider Richardson if you like. If you're only paying attention to the frontrunners Obama, Edwards, and Clinton, then keep in mind that, as Matt Yglesias points out,

one of the most important legacies of a Hillary Clinton administration would [likely] be bequeathing to the Democratic Party a network of powerful plugged-in insiders that winds up containing substantially more women in senior roles than we have right now, along with perhaps a higher number of men comfortable working with power female colleagues and superiors.

That shit matters, people.

I know I'm on the record as leaning towards Edwards, actually, but I keep thinking I might change my mind. In any case, I'm consoling myself by--or maybe reassuring myself about--knowing I'll be voting for Clinton in the general election.