Media Curmudgeon

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December 09, 2006

It's Time

Julia and I went to a party last night given by fly-fishing aficionados, Alan and Nancy Zakon, and met Sarah Low, a female fly-fishing guide I had used a couple of years ago. While talking to Sarah and her business partner, Karen Kaplan, I mentioned that I was going to write a blog about the fact that it’s time for the country to have a woman as president, this year of the woman in politics, and found out she comes from a political family in Rhode Island. I urged her to run for political office because I said she’d be a shoo in—the country is ready to vote for women in politics!

My point was that ordinary U. S. citizens are ready to vote for a woman for president because as a country we are ready for cooperation and compromise, and a woman president couldn’t possibly screw up the country any worse than a bunch of old white men have in the last couple of years. I said I know a couple of people who have worked with and for Hilary Clinton and that she is an exceptionally bright woman, and one that is certainly going to try to run for president; however, I don’t think she’s electable—too much baggage, too many people who hate her, and because she waffled on Iraq and other things. If not Hilary, who then?

On the Democratic side, I think because Hilary has amassed so much money, has such a lead, and has the greatest political campaigner and strategist in recent history as her advisor and husband, that no woman can snatch the nomination from her. That leaves the job to the hated (according to the recent elections) Republicans to get a woman elected. Certainly not Condi Rice who is tainted now as a Bush loyalist. How about Christie Whitman, a strong environmentalist and an independent thinker who quit the Bush cabinet as director of the EPA because she disagreed with the Bush anti-environment policies and neglect? She seems to me to be the only Republican woman with credibility, plus she’s smart and experienced (as much experience as Bush as an ex-governor).

A Republican ticket of Christie Whitman and John McCain (he’s so desperate, he’d probably take #2) could possible beat Hilary Clinton and Barack Obama (he’s also so desperate, it seems, that he’d probably take #2).

At any rate, I urge Sarah Low to run for office, but not Christi Whitman—she might win, even though I do think it’s high time for a female president.

It’s Time, Part II

If it’s time for a female president of the United States, it’s time for a woman CEO of one of the big media giants. I’m getting tired of Murdoch being so smart and building up a media behemoth for his younger son to take over (the older son quit in disgust). Redstone will never give CBS to his daughter, Parsons has anointed Jeff Bewkes (who seems to have anointed Randy Falco) as his replacement, Iger is too young and probably too timid to give Disney over to a woman, although Meg Whitman interviewed for the job and would have been a good choice, and Brin and Page are too young and too rich to leave Google. That leaves Yahoo, which this week announced Sue Decker would become #2 and who the NY Times touted in a puff piece indicated would succeed current CEO Terry Semel when and if the board fires him or he retires (it looks like a race to see which comes first). Decker would be another female to head a major media company, if you consider eBay an entertainment company, which I don’t, and it’s about time, I think.

Some women have failed at big companies (Carly Fiorina at HP), but I believe the macho media world could use a woman’s touch, and, of course, I don’t mean drapes on the windows or tea and cookies; I mean cooperation, humanness, and compromise (unlike Martha Stewart). So lets’ hope both Microsoft’s Joanne Bradford and Yahoo’s Sue Decker get promoted and become CEOs of their respective companies. The media needs it.

Posted by Charles Warner at December 9, 2006 05:59 PM

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