Carly Fiorina, the lone Republican woman eying the White House, wants to block Hillary Rodham Clinton from playing the "gender card" in the 2016 presidential race. But to do so, Fiorina is taking a page from the gender politics playbook herself. A former business executive with limited political experience, Fiorina argues that if Republicans nominate her, it would neutralize any advantages the Democrats might get from having a woman at the top of their ticket.
Speaking of Clinton in an interview with The Associated Press, Fiorina said, "She wants to make it a gender-based campaign; she wants to talk about the war on women; she wants to talk about being the first woman president. She can't do any of that with me." Clinton, who launched her campaign last weekend, has been playing up her life experience as a mother and grandmother, along with her policy work on women's and children's issues. She's not yet directly highlighted the prospect she would be the first female president, something she played down in her failed 2008 campaign.
While Fiorina has yet to declare her own candidacy, she has been positioning herself for weeks as a foil to Clinton, the clear Democratic front-runner. She's been among the sharpest Clinton critics in the emerging Republican field, going after the Democrat's trustworthiness in light of revelations about her private email use as secretary of state, as well as her record as the nation's chief diplomat. "Like Mrs. Clinton, I, too, have traveled hundreds of thousands of miles," Fiorina said this week, reprising a favorite line. "But flying and traveling is an activity, it's not an accomplishment and unfortunately she didn't accomplish anything as secretary of state."
The 60-year-old Fiorina says she plans to announce whether she's running for president in late April or early May. She's put the likelihood of her running at "higher than 90 percent" and has been making stops in Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina — all states that vote early in the primary process. Fiorina is back in New Hampshire this week, joining a multitude of potential GOP presidential candidates at a two-day forum that could be an early test of who has breakout potential in the state that holds the nation's first primary.
Fiorina says she doesn't want to run based on her sex, but rather to focus on another factor that makes her an outlier in the Republican field: the fact that nearly her entire career has been in business, not the political arena. She was one of the country's highest-ranking female executives during her nearly six years as chief executive at Hewlett-Packard, but was forced out of the company in 2005.
Democrats say Fiorina's real legacy in business is the thousands of jobs lost at Hewlett-Packard during the merger she oversaw with Compaq. Democratic officials also contend that she supports policies that are bad for women, including the repeal of President Barack Obama's health care law, which expanded coverage for many preventive services for women. As for her own political experience, she ran for the U.S. Senate in California in 2010 but was easily defeated by incumbent Democrat Barbara Boxer. She was an adviser to Sen. John McCain's unsuccessful 2008 presidential campaign.
Fiorina remains unknown to many Americans. But Steve DeMaura, executive director of the super PAC Carly for America, said she can use Clinton's presence in the race to "leverage additional attention" for her own candidacy. "People say, 'Well, Hillary's running, what does the Republican woman think?'" DeMaura said. So far, Fiorina seems at ease playing the Clinton foil, said David Carney, a longtime New Hampshire political strategist, particularly compared with male candidates who can find it awkward criticizing female politicians — not that the GOP hopefuls have been shy about going after Clinton.
"You see some candidates when they attack a woman come across very badly," said Carney, who is not aligned with a candidate in 2016 but whose wife is working for Fiorina. "But it's not very awkward for Carly. She seems to pull it off very well."
Hey, this is exactly what TM was talking about a month ago. The Dems play a game with the American people. Barack Obama was and is to this day playing his race to the hilt, lying and deceiving while shaming anyone who calls him on it. Hillary is being stymied by Fiorina so far. TM
Carly Fiorina has a key role to play, she knows it and she's doing a very good job at it so far.
******* The world will not be destroyed by those who do evil ... but by those who watch them and do nothing. -- Albert Einstein
Quote: Frank Cannon wrote in post #3She ran HP into a disaster...
She also never met CHEAP foreign labor that she did not prefer to Americans, opposes 'amnesty' but supports the 'Dream Act', buys into the 'science' of climate change, ..........
Quote: truthkeeper wrote in post #4I don't want her as president. I just want her to rag all over Hillary.
I certainly don't expect the Hillary supplicants in the Poodle media to do it.
And, if the only two things she does are to rag on Hillary and keep Hillary from being the only woman in the race, good on you, Carly!
I feel like that as well! She's the perfect "foil" for Hillary! And the Republican men in the race, do need her critical voice and should learn to appreciate her presence.
My only concern is that Hillary's opposition peaks too soon. Hillary looks so very vulnerable to me right now,
so much so, that her weakness might embolden a stronger Democrat opponent, one harder to beat, to come forward.
******* The world will not be destroyed by those who do evil ... but by those who watch them and do nothing. -- Albert Einstein
Carly Fiorina says if she runs for president, she’ll take identity politics away from Hillary Clinton.
It was hard to tell who was more taken aback, former CEO Carly Fiorina, or the reporters assembled to question her, when one of them prefaced his question with the comment, “I’ve never met a presidential candidate who had fingernail polish on.” Without missing a beat, Fiorina said, “Well, there’s always a first.” [loving it!!! TM]
The remark, retro as it was, served to elicit an interesting response as Fiorina mused about what it would be like if Hillary Clinton were to face a female nominee.
"Fiorina has presented herself as the only person in the current GOP field who won’t really have to worry about inadvertently launching a war on women and the lone foil to Clinton’s “first woman president” claim.
“She wouldn’t be able to play the gender card,” Fiorina said. Clinton would have to run on her track record, “not identity politics.”
Yet, Fiorina’s public remarks are often peppered with identity politics. Fiorina has not officially declared her candidacy, but as the lone woman in the GOP’s large contingent of male contenders, she is unabashed about the virtues a woman brings.
“Get women involved in any problem, the problem gets better,” she said at one point during her breakfast meeting with reporters last week, sponsored by the Christian Science Monitor in Washington. “The data is clear.”
During a speech in New Hampshire last weekend, Fiorina responded to a Dallas city councilwoman’s recent comment that a woman shouldn’t be president because of her hormones.
“Not that we have seen a man’s judgment clouded by hormones, including in the Oval Office,” she said, a clear reference to a different Clinton.
Even when describing her personal story, Fiorina talks about how she started as a secretary and through an “act of generosity” by two men who noticed she could do more than type and file, her life was able to take on a new trajectory."