Donna Brazile, who might be the smartest woman on cable news, or on all of TV, or maybe in the whole country, paid a visit to the University of Kansas last night to give a speech titled "Women in American Politics: Are We There Yet?" Most of her prepared remarks were canned "women have come a long way but we have farther to go" sentiments reheated for the capacity crowd who'd filled the student union's Woodruff Auditorium to hear the CNN commentator, Al Gore presidential campaign manager and author of Cooking with Grease: Stirring the Pots in American Politics talk on themes related to Women's History Month.
Fortunately, she spent most of her time off script. She'd clearly told a lot of her jokes before -- hence the perfect comedy timing followed by the chin-to-chest, eyebrow-raised, searing-eyed "you know what I'm talking about" expression. But the humor was welcome nonetheless, especially in these dreary times.
"In Washington right now, people are complaining that President Obama is working too hard! He's working so hard that Congress has to work harder!" she said. "Students are getting ready to go on spring break, but Congress has been on spring break for eight years!" That got a big laugh, as did her description of herself as "a cable call girl with Anderson as my boo." And her observation that Democrats had no need to interfere when Republicans and Rush Limbaugh were their own "circular firing squad."
But she had some hard words for the women in the room, too.
"Women sometimes lack ambition," she said at one point. "We need to fill the gap for women in public office. It won't be easy, but I do believe we can break the old patterns of the past, break the glass ceiling, break the patterns within ourselves." She urged women to build coalitions with women of all backgrounds, noting that "poor women deserve a seat at the table." Visibility equals viability, she noted -- before launching into one of those pointedly hilarious digressions.
"I was on TV last year when there was a conversation about PMS. I was the only woman on the panel. There was a discussion when Clinton was emotional. One of my male colleagues wondered aloud if she had PMS. I said I'm a woman. I know PMS. That was no PMS," she said, echoing Lloyd Bentsen's famous diss of Dan Quayle.
Anyway, Brazile's message was serious.
"Here in Kansas, you have some work to do," she said, before noting that while Kansas has two women elected to statewide office, only 13 of the state's 40 senators are women, as are only 32 out of the state's 120 representatives.
"I need you to serve. I need you to run. It's time for women to take
their position at the table, even if we have to bring folding chairs."
Point taken. But I'm not one of those gals who believes we should all support each other just because we're women. After all, what good does it do to elect women if they're mean and cold-hearted?
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