I am encouraged to see women are being elected in Chile, Argentina, Liberia, Ireland. More is more.
I think a lot of presidents learn to be president by being president.
On the day I started college in 1979, no woman had ever been on the United States Supreme Court or served as the Speaker of the House. None had been an astronaut or the solo anchor of a network evening news broadcast. Not one had been president of an Ivy League college or run a serious campaign for president.
1992 became known as the 'Year of the Woman' because so many of us were elected to public office that November, including a record six to the United States Senate.
To compare Whitewater to Watergate is a travesty.
The first time I met Bill Clinton was actually 1988.
The exposed nature of life in the public square affects leaders' attitudes toward risk - and failure.
Obama has become too dependent on formal speeches and set town halls. His idea of mixing it up is taking off his jacket.
I'm a baseball freak.
No reporter is flying around in borrowed twin-engine airplanes.
It isn't fate but fecklessness that has shoved Sarah Palin to the sidelines of national politics. The real tragedy is that she's taken a lot of other serious Republican women with her.
President Clinton intentionally created a structure that was a little loose. And one that kept him a little in the center. He didn't want one person filtering all the information that went to him. He had always operated with a lot of information coming in and a lot of stuff going out.
Palin was a political Hail Mary, a long bomb in the closing minutes of a game that John McCain and Co. were certain to lose. They didn't care if she had the policy or political or emotional capacity to serve as vice president, let alone president. They were willing to drive the country off a cliff, if that's what it took to win.
One thing I think is least realistic is that there were five people that made decisions in the fictional 'West Wing.' In real life, there are about five million people that weigh in.
During my years as a press secretary, I developed a powerful internal filter, which worked to strip all things 'off message' from my thoughts before they came out of my mouth. It didn't always work, of course, and I said more than a few things I regretted.
Women communicate differently and process information differently, which leads them to resolve conflicts differently.
In the run-up to the 1992 Democratic convention, Clinton's campaign realized that voters thought the young governor had a privileged upbringing. They didn't buy his alleged concern for the middle class.
Every press secretary faces an enormous amount of information. Events move really fast. You're responsible for a tremendous amount of information, and again, a tremendous amount on competing agendas. Not everybody grease in the White House.
There's no question almost press secretaries talk about the sense of serving two masters. On the one hand you want to protect the president's interests, and you represent his interests to the press. And the press is a proxy for the American people.
