Posted on 04/07/2006 9:40:04 PM PDT by CAWats
Sorry, but I wouldn't vote for a drag queen in the White House
Helen Rumbelow
THIS WEEK WE GOT to see how Americans think it would be to have a woman in the Oval Office. In the new TV drama Commander in Chief, which has just started in Britain, Madam President is more than 6ft tall, talks in a gravelly voice and has a mouth so inflatably large and laden with lipstick that voters would never have any trouble reading her lips. In short, Geena Davis does not play the first woman to lead the free world, but the first drag queen.
Of course the show makes great play of this girls-on-top fantasy. There is a sharp exchange between Davis and a rival who questions her ability to lead. “Well, not only that,” she mocks him, “but we have that whole ‘once a month will she or won’t she press the button’ thing.”
He responds nastily: “Well, in a couple of years you’re not going to have to worry about that any more.”
And there is a rather nauseating moment when the President’s young daughter spills her drink over mommy on the way to the inauguration speech. You know, the average pressures of balancing work, life, the national budget and your baby’s Ribena.
But never once in the tumultuous process of taking office does Davis betray any emotion. She remains cool, clipped, aloof and vaguely unlikeable. Although the programme-makers do their feminist best to show a woman succeeding at being in charge, in doing so they unwittingly identify the problem of being a female politician. They are drag queens of a sort, their femininity a mask, their humanity hidden.
Take the lunch I had with a minister when I started to cover politics. Here was a woman I had never met, but found irritating on television. She seemed cold, at best a little “nannyish” and dull, at worst patronising. I am hardly giving away clues to her identity here — how many women in government can you think of who do not fit this description? So imagine my surprise when she approached, swearing like a trooper at her lateness, a smile making her almost unrecognisable. On every point I had got her wrong: she was warm, very funny and surprisingly passionate about her cause.
I came away disturbed by my bad judgment of character. How could I have been so turned off by her public persona, but so bowled over by her in private? Yet the more female politicians I met, the more I encountered the same mystery — alter egos so different and so much more likeable that it was difficult to understand why they were kept concealed. When the demeanour of these women was criticised in conversation with friends, I would try to persuade them that really, underneath, they were fantastic. They didn’t believe me. It was, as I observed those suffocatingly safe performances in the Commons, hard to believe it myself.
Now, everyone separates their home and work selves to some degree. But the change is normally subtle: when you see a male politician droning on in public, it is a near certainty that he is a dullard in private. For many women in power the opposite is true — their work selves are the kind of disguise that would give Oscar-winner Geena Davis a run for her money.
I know why they do it. Their gender means their status is more in doubt, the scrutiny upon them greater, the margin for error smaller. They cannot afford to do a Mo, or an Edwina — careers sunk on a surfeit of “character”. So they keep to the line, and keep their jobs. But it also keeps them back. When David Cameron this week mouthed off about the UK Independence Party (“fruitcakes, loonies and closet racists”), it made him seem strong. Tony Blair, as his advisers at the election realised, is at his most convincing when sweating with panic among a hostile studio audience.
For a leader to be truly engaging, it is not enough to be good at his or her job. They have to reveal something of themselves, something for their public to connect with on an emotional level. That is why Bill Clinton is such a consummate politician, and why his buttoned-up wife Hillary — the current best chance of a real Madam President — is not.
We will have true equality when the word charisma is used about women in power, not just men. One day we won’t just aspire to have a woman in the White House, but a human too.
no way are those hillary's legs???!!!
Then why did she specifically mention it? BTW, I think Geena Davis is very good-looking.
most men, except short ones usually, like tall women
Usually it's the short guys who really like tall women. Most of the tall men chase tiny women. And most tiny women won't date a guy under 6 feet tall. Over the years I've conducted my own unscientific polls on this. ;P
You got that right. That's been my experience. Even back 30 years ago, in my better-looking days, that was the case. When I actually gave more of a d@mn about it, I wanted a guy at eye level or above... but most of the attention I got was from the really short guys.
Seems to me that most tall men don't seem to appreciate having a woman up at eye level. I've been to tall clubs, and there's not as much pairing-off as you might hope for.
When I took singing lessons years ago, one night a fellow student and I went to a lounge where they had an open mike. There were two pro musicians playing there... a 6-foot guy and a guy who was maybe 5 feet in his elevator shoes.
It was the really short guy who made a beeline to introduce himself to me, and who had a girlfriend my size. The tall guy ignored me; his girlfriend was some really tiny woman.
hmmm. interesting.
I was only lukewarm about having kids most of the time I was young enough to do so, but had I met someone like you, I probably would have had some.
So, my question for you is: do you have any single daughters?
Well, if I did have any daughters, I'd tell them to e-mail you! :) I sincerely hope you find someone out there who is nice, tall, and wants to have kids with you.
So, how's the weather up there ? =running away=
[spitting]
It's raining.
*snickers*
;-)
I've heard bull$hit like this my whole life... and I'm d@mn well sick of it......F-CK you and the horse you rode in on!
I guess swearing like a sailor doesn't make you unfeminine, either....
All men are brothers until the day we die,
It's a wonderful word" - Randy Newman
What does that have to do with voting against him?
It's bad enough that 99 percent of what the Dino Media pushes is undisguised left wing propaganda, but does so much of it have to be unfocused, meaningless, navel-gazing drivel as well?
I wish Elizabeth Dole was taken more seriously. I met her when her husband was running, and she was very pleasant and graceful...the complete opposite of Shrillary. She is also an ex-democrat, worked with the handicapped for years, was the former President of the American Red Cross. She seems to have values that would appeal to both sides.
I wouldn't watch the show, but I always thought Geena Davis was hot, especially in Transylvania 6-5000 and Tootsie. With me being 5'6", tall girls tended to avoid me, but I always thought volleyball players were the sexiest girls on campus.
Yes, I have a very favorable opinion about her, actually her husband, too, but everything hinges on if you are "electable" now, sad to say.
If you had taken loads of ridicule from other people for a physical trait over which you had no control, you might be just a wee bit curmudgeonly about it too when some other a$$hat drags it out yet again to fling it at someone else.
She's been one of my favorite actresses.
With me being 5'6", tall girls tended to avoid me, but I always thought volleyball players were the sexiest girls on campus. In high school, every girl wanted a tall guy. It was only later that some of them adjusted their expectations a little.
I've heard from some short guys that they had a much harder time getting dates with tiny women than with Amazons.
And nearly all the men I've met (either in person or on-line) who absolutely prefer Amazons are under 6 feet tall themselves. What a weird world. Have known a couple of guys in the 5'3" to 5'5" range who had been involved with women in the 6'2" to 6'3" range.
One tall club woman married a 5'6" guy and had to leave the tall club, because the rules were that both halves of a married couple had to qualify for membership.
I used to work with a 5'8" woman who refused to date any man shorter than 6'6" tall... it was because he had to be tall enough to tower over her by at least 6" when she was wearing 4" heels. Met a couple other petite women, over the years, who claimed they couldn't get "turned on" by any man shorter than about 6'6".
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