21 January 2020 — 1105 mst
American men & women agree
Women handle education and health care better,
men handle national security and defense better
These finding, from the Pew Research Center’s massive (n = 4,587) Women and Leadership 2018 study, are pertinent to our presidential election, and to elections for officials responsible for education and health.
First, the numbers.
The public doesn’t see either gender as having a significant advantage over the other in handling several key policy issues. On immigration, gun policy, the economy and the budget deficit, majorities of Americans say there’s no difference between male and female political leaders in their abilities. And among those who do see a difference between men and women in these areas, opinions are fairly evenly divided.
There are two exceptions, however.
By a margin of 42% to 4%, the public says women in politics do a better job handling social issues such as education and health care. The opposite pattern holds for dealing with national security and defense – 35% say men are better on these issues, while 6% point to women.
The Presidency is uniquely concerned
with national security and defense
Governors can order state militias to quell riots and stack sandbags on flood threatened levees, but they cannot unilaterally send state, let alone federal, military forces into combat with foreign nations, nor do they have the authority to authorize the launch of nuclear weapons. The President is commander in chief of our armed forces, and the highest obligation of the Presidency is keeping our nation safe.
Americans, by a wide margin, believe men do that better than women. Why? Pew’s survey did not answer that question. But the answer is obvious. The instinct to aggressively protect and defend is hard wired into the male of the species. Examples abound. When the hijacking of Flight 93 was thwarted, men organized and rushed the cockpit. In mass shooting after mass shooting, men, not women, rush the shooter. Husbands protect their wives, sons protect their mothers, brothers their sisters, and men and boys protect women they don’t know.
That immutable truth of human nature puts women seeking the Presidency at a permanent disadvantage. A woman might serve as a competent commander in chief, but the electorate is predisposed to prefer a man for the position. Ergo, she might never get the chance to prove she can do the job.
The gender of a presidential candidate might not matter in heavily Democratic states such as California, New York, and Massachusetts, but it will matter in states where there is strong support for traditional sex roles, and where there are fewer crusading feminists who assert that the only difference between men and women is the shape of their skins.
Whether Elizabeth Warren and Amy Klobuchar, the Democrats endorsed for President by the New York Times, can overcome the disadvantage of having two X chromosomes is a fair question — and for Democrats whose highest priority is defeating Donald Trump, it is a vital question that must be considered no matter how infuriating their party’s gender identity caucus finds it.
Can a woman defeat Trump? In theory, yes. But it won’t be easy, let alone a sure bet. Trump is a both a bully and, to many, a strong father figure. Our nation is at war. Heather Hurlburt observed in 2015, “ that in anxious times women candidates don’t guarantee women’s votes.” When Warren and Klobuchar advance their womanhood as a strength, they actually call attention to a weakness. Everyone knows they are women. Their best approach would be never mentioning gender and instead discussing issues. But even that might not be enough.