Thank you, Hillary

    

Puerto Rico

Originally uploaded by Hillary Clinton

I’ve known for weeks, maybe months, now, that Hillary Clinton would not win the nomination to be the Democratic Candidate for President of the United States. So when I read the news this morning that Senator Obama has enough delegates to win,  I don’t know why it made me sad. But it did.

Maybe it’s because, like the girl in this picture, I had hoped to have a woman in the White House.   I had hoped to have change. 

The 19th Amendment of the United States Constitution says I can vote.  With 39 simple words, it declares I have the same right as men to decide who will lead me. 88 years after it’s ratification, we have yet to elect a woman to the White House.   Israel, India, Great Britain, France, Denmark, Netherlands, Ireland, New Zealand, Finland, The Philippines, Mocambique, Mongolia, Chile, Argentina – led now or in the past by women heads of state.    

There are 192 members of the United Nations and 2 independent states outside, a few self-declared de-facto independent states and many self-ruling depencies. 19 have got female leaders at the moment.  Less than 10%.

And maybe I’m sad because 130 million women worldwide, and 2 million every year, are victims of Female Genital Mutilation.  

I have no idea if these statistics are linked to each other in some way.  But in my mind, I can’t help but wonder if more women led the world, would we still cut on little girls as a means to control them later in life.   Would we in America be so complacent, so complicit in this brutality. 

For me, Hillary’s candidacy meant hope.  It meant that my god daughter might not have to be satisfied that the wage gap has closed from $.63 to the dollar to $.78 in the last 30 years.  Or be content that women in management today take home only 62.7% of what male managers earn (Gallup,  American Management Association).

With more women heads of state, would Benazir Bhutto still be dead.  

Or maybe I’m sad because I  wanted someone like me to be chosen to lead.