We’re NOT off to a good start….
November 16, 2008
by The New Agenda
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Barack Obama and Gregory Craig
We’re NOT off to a good start as President-elect Obama begins to name his appointees.
As The New Agenda recently stated in a press release:
The only thing Bill Clinton and George W. Bush may have in common is that they appointed more women than any of their predecessors. This is progress our nation must build on to regain our economic strength.
During George W. Bush’s first term, eight of his top 18 staffers were women and Condoleezza Rice was the first woman to ever serve as national security adviser. Bush also put women at the helm of EPA, Labor, Agriculture and Interior.
In Clinton’s first term, women comprised nearly 40 percent of the first 500 appointments in the cabinet and large federal agencies. Over his two terms 27 people held top cabinet positions and five of them were women. Notably Secretary of State Madeline Albright and Attorney General Janet Reno succeeded in traditional male domains.
President-elect Obama has picked three white males for appointees over this weekend.
- Gregory Card – White House Counsel
- Ronald Klain – Chief of Staff to Joseph Biden
- Philip Schiliro – top liaison to Congress
Does this seem a bit foreboding?
We should expect parity in President-elect Obama’s appointments. In other words, women should have a representation in the same percentage as our percentage of the population – 52%. We should settle for nothing less.
Stay tuned for our next actions! If you are not already a member, please join us by sending an email to JoinTheNewAgenda@yahoo.com so that you will receive our action alerts.
Here is a great article. It discusses the need and value for having more women in leadership. The New Agenda’s goals and strategies are totally in line.
http://www.iht.com/articles/ap.....er-Gap.php
Here are a few lines from the article:
“Greater representation of women in senior leadership positions within governments and financial institutions is vital not only to find solutions to the current economic turmoil, but to stave off such crises in future,” Klaus Schwab, founder and executive chairman of the World Economic Forum, said in a statement.
Tyson said the research shows “a strong correlation between competitiveness and the gender gap scores.”
“Countries that do not fully capitalize effectively on one-half of their human resources run the risk of undermining their competitive potential,” she said in a statement.
“When we interpret these percentage changes at the societal level, we see that hundreds of thousands of lives are impacted, and at the economic level, we see enormous potential competitiveness gains,” Zahidi said.
Women Count pac has initiated a petition calling upon the incoming Obama administration to create a Presidential Commission on Women within his first 100 days in office. I believe the idea of the commission is one that is modeled after a similar commission created by JFN which Eleanor Roosevelt chaired:
http://womencount.org/its_our_time
Sorry: JFK, not JFN (I’m bad about proof reading before posting).
I’m not so enamored with the idea of a Presidential Commission on Women given the short shrift that women got during the compaigns and the sexism that was rampant on the Dem side.
JFK had a very different view than the current President elect. I’d be afraid that the commission would be named just so he could say he did something and that would be the end of it.
I believe that this forum has the capacity to hold his feet to the fire and to gain some early concessions i.e. ERA – that is what is needed
Joanelle – Great point! I also got to thinking about this and feel that looking to men to solve the issue, so to speak, may be misguided. However, that said, it’s just not simple. But I do agree, that in this specific instance, you have raised a very important point which is that Obama can just use such a commission as window dressing and nothing more. Thanks for sharing your perspective!
But this is what change looks like guys…a bunch of white dudes
11/18/08 – MSN is reporting that Eric Holder all but has it cinched for Att. General -
I’m having a difficult time with “parity”. I think that Obama needs to elect whoever he thinks would do the best job and work with others (including women).
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