I had the privilege and fun of spending the past day and a half at the California Women’s Conference in Long Beach. The conference, which attracted 15,000 paying attendees this year, draws a wealth of female talent across the political spectrum.
Yet for all the opinions represented, there were no Mama Grizzlies here. The women who have been most commented upon in this election cycle were notably missing. At a conference advertising itself as presenting “the world’s most influential and authentic voices,” that’s unforgivable.
Mama Grizzlies, after all, campaign on their credentials as women who are mothers, or could be mothers, while eschewing the usual causes such candidates almost always espouse. Many are running on platforms decrying President Obama’s health care reform plan and have records of speaking up against everything from child care subsidies to legalized abortion. Their method of protecting our children? Lowering the deficit and getting government out of our lives-steps, they say, which will allow us to best take care of our own. I, for one, would have liked to have seen how this message played to a predominantly female, but by no means activist, crowd.
