September 1, 2004

Dick Morris on the "female state of the union address."

I don't consider myself to be in some kind of special position to say whether Laura Bush came through last night and said what women need to hear about the presidential election, so let me consult this column written by Dick Morris:
Her incredible speech reached women voters in a way that other speakers at either convention have failed to do.

Unlike her husband, the first lady drew explicitly the connection between the offensive operations in the War on Terror and the work to defend our families from the threats that haunt them

Her speech was almost a female state of the union address — taking each of the administration's policies and relating them to the concerns of the half of the electorate that the male political establishment doesn't understand and rarely appeals to.

Women, you see, can't really grasp foreign policy unless you restate it and couch each point in terms of the effect on the family. Men—other than Dick Morris, that is—really don't understand that.
Like presidents do in state of the union addresses, she brought Bush's policies home to each of us by naming real people, real families and real soldiers working for our freedom.

Dick, if you're going to praise a schoolteacher, use good grammar!
George needed to relate his education reforms to the average parents worrying about their children in school. Laura did it.

George had to explain why sending troops to Baghdad protected our families at home. Laura did it. …

Thanks for making appealing to women sound like translation for the mentally challenged.

Unlike the shrill sloganeering of Hillary Clinton and the ritualized comments of other wives of presidents, Laura Bush explained her husband's policies with a clarity and simplicity that reached everyone who watched it — except for the shortsighted and self-involved male commentators who didn't get it and put her down after it was over.

See, I would not have known that without the help of the un-self-involved commentator, Dick Morris. Here she was, reaching out to everyone, and I was thinking about where they got that crazy shower curtain backdrop and whether her amateurish delivery was charming or just boring. But apparently, she said a lot of things about children and family that really had a big effect on my half of the electorate.

No comments: