Warren’s slippage?

The polls suggest that Elizabeth Warren’s support has slipped some in recent weeks. If so, I suspect, it has more to do with her gender than anything else. After all, winning the nomination and then the general election against Trump, is a more difficult climb for a woman than her male counterparts for what should be obvious reasons.

And yet, it strikes me that among some people who should know better there is a tendency to minimize this dynamic. It’s as if electing a woman, and in the case of Elizabeth Warren, a woman of outstanding progressive credentials, to the presidency for the first time in our country’s history, doesn’t encounter any gender specific barriers nor offer any historic opportunity. Neither seems to figure much, if at all, in their calculus.

One has to wonder if the thought that only a MAN can stand up to the “very manly” Trump enters into their (and many others) thinking at some level. It shouldn’t, but I’m afraid it does more than we might think. To what degree I’m not sure, but to simply dismiss this specific dynamic is not only folly, but harmful in the short and long term.