Falk’s basic argument is that in each case, the media ignored or distorted female candidates’ personalities and positions. Hill Chisholm (1972), Patricia Scott Schroeder (1987), Lenora Branch Fulani (1988), and Elizabeth Dole (2000). In between, Erika Falk examines how newspapers covered the campaigns of Victoria Woodhull (1872), Belva Bennett Lockwood (1884), Margaret Chase Smith (1974), Shirley St. Woman for President begins with Victoria Woodhull’s campaign for the president in 1872 and ends with that of Carol Moseley Braun in 2004. Is there something so uniquely misogynist about our political culture that even Hillary Clinton, arguably the most competent woman to ever run for national office, still incited such distaste among both women and men? Why hasn’t the United States elected a female president? Why has our society been so resistant to female leadership when countries as various as Turkey, Ireland, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Canada, France, and England have embraced women presidents and prime ministers? In Woman for President, Erika Falk raises this important question. Urbana and Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 2008, 171 pp., $19.95, paperback Women for President: Media Bias in Eight Campaigns, Why hasn’t the United States had a female president
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