Why We Want to Meet the Missus

摘要

One nice thing about howard dean is that he does what journalists tell him to do. The New Republic wrote that: he was too secular, and he immediately found religion. In the past week reporters and pundits have started raising eyebrows about the near total absence of his wife, Dr. Judith Steinberg Dean, in the primaries. She has probably been the most absent spouse in the history of presidential campaigns. And he would probably like to change that. But it's not up to him, is it? In the 1954 movie Woman's World, three businessmen up for a big promotion are judged on the basis of who has the best wife for the job. We are no longer impressed with the notion of the woman behind the man. Lady Macbeth-never a good role model, to be sure-looks less like a brilliant schemer and more like a needy victim of unequal opportunity. In many states, it is now illegal even to ask whether a job applicant is married. Politics is not quite as advanced. Although women are streaming into elected office, plenty are still loyally trailing along after their politico husbands, chatting up voters and practicing their Nancy Reagan smiles-even if they have to do it after putting in 40 or 50 hours a week at their day jobs. Hillary Clinton said she was not going to bake cookies or be Tammy Wynette standing by her man, and then did the biggest Wy-nette in political history (although the last chapter of that story has not yet been written).