73% expect a female president in next decade

According to a new Rasmussen poll out today, 73% of likely voters say they expect to see a female President by 2022.

Rasmussen says, “Voters are more willing than ever to elect a woman president, and most think there’s a good chance a woman will win the White House in the next 10 years.

“The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 82% of Likely U.S. Voters say they are willing to vote for a woman president. Just nine percent (9%) are not. (To see survey question wording, click here.)

“In December 2006, 78% of voters said they were willing to vote for a woman president, but that number fell slightly to 71% in February 2008 as Hillary Clinton battled Barack Obama for the Democratic presidential nomination.”

This is interesting.  A generic woman (in the 2006 poll) did better than an actual woman.   It is easy to tell a pollster that you favor “a woman” as president.  It becomes somewhat less easy to picture a specific woman as president.

Some believe that women would be more peace-loving Commanders-in-Chief than their male counterparts. Anthropologist Margaret Mead thought otherwise: when asked whether she favored women in combat, she replied, “No.  Women are too fierce.”  Indira Gandhi, Golda Meir and Margaret (“Don’t go wobbly on me, George”) Thatcher were all older women and all presided over wars.