Wave of women 20,000 strong are preparing to run for office.

Women's march

Courtesy of Refinery 29: 

There are now 20,000 more cracks (and counting) in the glass ceiling. Emily’s List announced at the Women’s Convention in Detroit on Saturday that more than 20,000 women across the country have thrown their hat into the ring to run for public office. “It was this convention that pushed us over,” Emily’s List president Stephanie Schriock tells Refinery29. “We were at 19,000 last week and basically the past few days we shot up.” 

There is a continuing wave of interest in running among progressive women that started almost immediately after Secretary Hillary Clinton’s loss in November. “Over 1,000 women hit the link on our website [to learning how to run] within four weeks of the election,” Schriock says. For the entire 2016 election cycle, which had been the group’s biggest to date before last November, Emily’s List heard from a grand total of 920 women. 

Roughly half of the women who’ve reached out to Emily’s List, which was founded in 1985 to elect pro-choice women to office, are under age 45. All 50 states are represented. Schriock estimates that around 40% are looking to run in local races, such as city council and school board in their communities. Others are eyeing congressional races, some as soon as 2018.

This is a byproduct of the election of Donald Trump that is perhaps the most positive.

Personally I can hardly wait for the women to take over.

Because let's face it, the men have certainly not been doing such a great job so far.

Think the GOP "War on Women" is over? Emily's List would beg to differ.

Courtesy of TPM:  

A Friday memo by Jess McIntosh, the group's communication director, points to several off-the-wall statements made by Republican pols and candidates in the last two weeks that has "effectively re-opened the wound that caused the historic gender gap in 2012." 

A number of conservatives raised eyebrows for claiming that female breadwinners are antithetical to nature, that women "don't want" equal pay, that working mothers ruined the American education system and that "hormone levels created by nature" drive sexual assaults in the military. 

"It’s tempting to write these statements as outlier rhetoric, but this is what the current slate of Republican elected officials actually believe – and it’s backed up by the Republican Party’s priorities," notes McIntosh. "These aren’t just words, they’re a legislative agenda."

You know I may be classified as a traitor to my gender but I ALWAYS think it is a good idea to include women in traditional male dominated areas. And that includes getting more of them into Congress and the Senate.

I just feel that with more women involved we would be less likely to start unnecessary wars and spend our money on defense rather than social needs and education.

But I also think that having women around makes men less...what is the word I am looking for...stupid!

Now most of my employment history has been in occupations where women made up at least half if not the majority of my fellow employees, so I may see this somewhat differently than many of my male counterparts.

However I have worked in very male dominated workplaces as well, and I can tell you from experience that we are not at our best in that environment. 

I once worked at a car dealership where business lunches were conducted at a local strip club and female customers were leered at as if they had jut walked into an all male penitentiary instead of a place of business. The jokes and remarks bandied about in that environment would have made any self respecting woman storm out of there in disgust.

To put it bluntly the men were pigs.

However as times changed, and the first female car salespeople were brought in, as well as female parts store employees, things changed. The men were far more civilized, their jokes far less misogynist, and their attitudes far less Cro-Magnon.

So while I don't believe that having more female representatives in Washington will solve ALL of our problems, I have to say that it will undoubtedly help when it comes to addressing things like inequality, human rights, and many social issues that men simply do not feel connected to.

Emily's List and I are certainly in agreement on this point, Sarah Palin must be stopped.

From Boston.com:

SARAH PALIN is the enemy who must be stopped.

That much is obvious to Stephanie Schriock, the new president of EMILY’s List, the fundraising network committed to electing women who support abortion rights. The former governor of Alaska and unsuccessful Republican vice presidential candidate may or may not run for president. In the meantime, she is a one-woman money machine who can raise millions for Sarah’s List: conservative candidates, male and female, who threaten the liberal agenda.

Palin “represents a set of values that are way out of the mainstream and arguably out of the mainstream of the Republican Party,’’ said Schriock during a recent visit to Boston. The movement Palin represents is “anti-government. Government can do nothing right. They are turning up the anger and it’s very dangerous.’’

“I think it’s time to get the story of the 2010 elections straight — and to call out Palin’s efforts for what they are: an attempt, in the name of ‘feminism’ to turn back the clock on women’s rights and to set American families back,’’ Schriock wrote recently on the Huffington Post. “I think women voters will choose progress, not Palin, this cycle.’’

Of course, EMILY’s List mostly defines feminism and “progress’’ the old-fashioned way — as unyielding commitment to abortion rights. Palin’s anti-abortion stand makes her poison to EMILY’s List. But at the same time, it makes her the queen of Sarah’s List.

This is war.

Yes it is. And it will take dedicated people digging for the truth and calling Sarah Palin out on that truth who will make the difference.

Once people, even supporters, learn the truth about Sarah Palin it will be almost impossible for ANYBODY to support her any longer.  Her influence will dry up and her flaws will be highlighted like never before.

However as long as there are people like Dave Weigel willing to run interference for Sarah Palin, and help to keep her darkest secret under wraps, it just makes that job all the more difficult. (By the way I was going to deconstruct Weigel's Daily Dish post the other day however back to back distractions interfered with that endeavor.  Fortunately Litbrit  did such a great job that I think instead I will simply direct you over to her wonderful blog instead.)