January 5, 2009: America’s Women Deserve a Chance to Serve
For Immediate Release
January 5, 2009
Contact: Amy Siskind
NewAgendaPress@yahoo.com
(484) 844-2996
Obama: America’s Women Deserve a Chance to Serve
President-elect Barack Obama has been given another opportunity to answer history’s call. Governor Bill Richardson’s withdrawal from consideration as Commerce Secretary means Obama could raise the number of women in top cabinet posts.
The New Agenda co-Founder Amy Siskind said: “Women make up 46 percent of our workforce and 52 percent of our population and need adequate representation in our nation’s leadership. President-elect Obama now has a second chance to help move his cabinet forward in the right direction by picking a qualified woman for Commerce Secretary.”
To date, Obama has appointed only five women out of 21 total cabinet and cabinet-level positions. (See the “Cabinet Watch Scoreboard” at www.thenewagenda.net for details.)
The New Agenda recommendations include:
• Former eBay CEO, Meg Whitman
• Former Hewlett- Packard CEO Carly Fiorina
• Former U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Comm. Chair Brooksley E. Born
• Former President, Morgan Stanley, Zoe Cruz
• Princeton University economics professor Cecilia Elena Rouse
• Former Citigroup, Inc. Executive Sallie Krawcheck
The President’s cabinet is traditionally comprised of 15 members, the Vice President, and a small number of cabinet ranking officials. Presidents Bill Clinton and Bush both expanded the participation of women. In Clinton’s first term, he appointed seven women to cabinet level positions and Bush appointed four, according to the Center for American Women and Politics. Although these were record numbers they still fell far short of 52 percent – the percentage of women in the population.
Two women have held the top post at the U.S. Department of Commerce in the past. The first was Juanita Morris Kreps, who was the 24th United States Secretary of Commerce, from January 23, 1977 until October 31, 1979, under President Jimmy Carter. Barbara Hackman Franklin was the 29th United States Secretary of Commerce under President George H.W. Bush, holding the post from February 27, 1992 until January 20, 1993.
Appointing a woman as Secretary of Commerce would do much to ensure that women are not left out of job creation strategies in the coming years. As the UNIFEM report, Progress of the World’s Women 2008/2009 (http://www.unifem.org/progress/2008/politics.html), observed:
“Higher numbers of women in [government] generally contribute to stronger attention to women’s issues. A 2008 study of UK politics, for example, confirms that since the number of women in parliament doubled to 18.2 percent since the 1997 election, issues of particular importance to women – such as childcare and social protection – have received more attention.”
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