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hillary-as-role-model bump;)

This is not about Dick Morris' latest book, Condi vs. Hillary: The Next Great Presidential Race. The issue today is "Should America have a woman President?"

I reply, "Of course, and not a moment too soon. But shouldn't we put a LITTLE thought into which woman would be good for the job?"

The woman/White House issue is, of course, raised by the new ABC program "Commander in Chief," starring Geena Davis.

A "Woman President"? But Which One?
Special to FreeRepublic ^
22 October, 2005
John Armor (Congressman Billybob)

It isn't that they can't see the solution. It is that they can't see the problem.

G. K. Chesterton

Reviews of "Commander-in-Chief" mislead; they suggest that this new ABC offering, this electuary of suds and psychologizing, is optional for missus clinton, that Rod Lurie's latest clinton agitprop is nothing more than the icing on missus clinton's inaugural cake.

The reviews miss the point of the show, (i.e., the show is not optional but necessary (though hardly sufficient) if clinton is to prevail), because the reviews fail to identify missus clinton's problem in the first place. And circular reasoning compounds the error.

THE PROBLEM

While America appears not to be ready for a female president under any circumstances, the post-9/11 realities pose special problems for a female presidential candidate. Add to these the problems unique to missus clinton. The reviews make the mistake of focusing on the problems of the generic female presidential candidate running during ordinary times.

These are not ordinary times. America is waging the global War on Terror; the uncharted territory of asymmetric netherworlds is the battlefield; the enemy is brutal, subhuman; the threat of global conflagration is real.

Defeating the enemy on the battlefield isn't sufficient. For America to prevail, she must also defeat a retrograde, misogynous, troglodyte mindset. To successfully prosecute the War on Terror, it is essential that the collective patriarchal islamic culture perceives America as politically and militarily strong. Condi Rice excepted, this requirement presents an insurmountable hurdle for any female presidential candidate, and especially missus clinton, historically antimilitary, forever the pitiful victim, and, according to Dick Morris, "the biggest dove in the clinton administration."

It is ironic that had the clintons not failed utterly to fight terrorism... not failed to take bin Laden from Sudan... not failed repeatedly to decapitate a nascent, still stoppable al Qaeda... the generic female president as a construct would still be viable... missus clinton's obstacles would be limited largely to standard-issue clintonisms: corruption, abuse, malpractice, malfeasance, megalomania, rape and treason... and, in spite of Juanita Broaddrick, or perhaps because of her, Rod Lurie would be reduced to perversely hawking the "First Gentleman" instead of the "Commander-in-Chief."

Mia T, 10.02.05
HILLARY'S COMMANDER-IN-CHIEF PROBLEM

COMPLETE ARTICLE
see descriptor morphs