McCain Hopes to Woo Hillary's Forlorn

mccain wants hillary's crowd, the ones who won't vote for the democratic man but will vote for the republican one. as a woman i truly have no idea how sexism made them hate obama. he certainly hasn't been sexist. i hope that they come to their senses but i'm guessing they don't like obama for other unspecified reasons that i'm not interested in writing about anymore, at least not now. on the upside, i don't think there are many of these hardcore women voters who haven't already signed on to the obama camp.

ny observer: The major newspapers now regale us with stories about the many women, especially but not limited to the Geraldine Ferraro generation, who threaten to withhold their votes from Obama. Such angry and disillusioned female Democrats seem, for the moment, to be everywhere.

But even if we accept that this phenomenon is real (even if encouraged by Clinton herself), the question going forward is this: Will these voters will really turn tail on the Democratic nominee and vote for John McCain?

Recent history suggests that the idea of a mass female defection to the Republican side is more than a little unlikely: In 2000 Al Gore carried women voters 54-43 percent, and John Kerry carried them 51-48.

More significant, though, is the fact that John McCain doesn’t appear to have much innate ability to appeal to female voters in the way, for example, Bill Clinton did. McCain doesn’t have the patience to feel anyone’s pain, and he would, if left to his own devices, talk 24/7 about foreign policy rather than issues, like health care, that resonate strongly with women voters.

So is it at all reasonable to believe, even if lots of women are mad at Obama right now, that McCain is the guy to reel them in?