by Frank James
President Barack Obama on Wednesday signed an executive order creating a White House Council for Women and Girls to focus the federal government's efforts on advancing the interests of a group that has long done less well than men by a number of measures.
The council, which expands on a similar effort during the Clinton Administration, would give the administration a centralized way to track how efforts at federal agencies impact the lives of women and girls. The president made the announcement at a White House event and his signing of the executive order was part of the president's marking of International Women's Month.
"Its purpose is very simple," Obama said. "To ensure that each of the agencies in which they're charged takes into account the needs of women and girls in the policies they draft, the programs they create, the legislation they support. It's not enough to only have individual women's offices at individual agencies or only have one office in the White House.
Obama cited a number of areas where women still don't fare as well as men because of gender discrimination or societal norms as a reason to establish the council.
"... When women still earn just 78 cents for every dollar men make, when one in four women still experiences domestic violence in their lifetimes, when women are more than half of our population but just 17 percent of our Congress, when women are 49 percent of the workforce but only 3 percent of our Fortune 500 CEOs, when these inequalities stubbornly persist in this country, in this century, then I think we need to ask ourselves some hard questions." Obama said.
The council will be comprised of cabinet secretaries and cabinet-level officers. It will be chaired by Valerie Jarrett, one of Obama's senior advisors and one of his numerous aides from Chicago.
The Clinton Administration had an interagency effort on women which was headed by Madeleine Albright who served as that administration's Secretary of State, the first woman to hold that post.
Comments
"Yes, little girls, you can be anything you want, as long as you don't want to be President or Vice President of the USA."
Love, Barack...
Posted by: Bemused | March 11, 2009 6:41 PM
All the little girls have to do, bitter Bemused, is learn to run a campaign.
Posted by: Flo | March 11, 2009 8:55 PM
....
Yes, little girls, you can be anything you want, as long as you don't want to be President or Vice President of the USA."
Love, Barack...
Posted by: Bemused | March 11, 2009 6:41 PM
...
Quit your crying you whiny PUMA blowhard.
Hillary lost because she ran a crappy campaign, period, end of story.
Get Over It!
Posted by: Teresa | March 11, 2009 10:39 PM
Yes, self-loathing women like Flo and Teresa are sure to help the cause of equality. The media's love affair with Obama had nothing to do with the campaign. Or the rampant misogyny that still exists both in the media and in society (which your hero Obama acknowledges with this announcment - or maybe women should just "get over it"). We're not bitter - we're enlightened. Ignorance is bliss, I suppose, so you folks go ahead and enjoy the delusion. Enjoy your lower pay and glass ceiling while you're at it, ladies. At least a man is "looking out for you."
Posted by: Bemused | March 12, 2009 7:29 AM
You need to open your eyes, Bemused; you're still in the 19th century. We're working for equality, but please stop whining. Obama is not your enemy.
Posted by: rupert | March 12, 2009 9:25 AM
Bemused, you know nothing about me (beyond that I supported Obama over Hillary), yet you continue to make a fool of yourself by trying to describe me--inaccurately every time. We're probably for the same thing, but your comments are no help.
Posted by: Flo | March 12, 2009 10:08 AM
Bill Clinton wishes he would've thought of this, a council full of interns, even!
p.s. Rupe, I think actual women know who their enemy is better than you do. Anyone who sat ahead and not only watched but promoted the misogyny of the Obama campaign really has no credibility.
Posted by: Jeff | March 12, 2009 12:32 PM
Perhaps so, Jeff; and 90% of the actual women I know are feminists and would not agree with Bemused, who is hardly objective; they do not consider Obama their enemy and happily voted for him. I'll go along with Flo and Teresa.
Posted by: rupert | March 12, 2009 2:08 PM
He had to find a something for Valerie Jarrett to do. Wonder if Ms. Jarrett's pay scale is in line with her male counterparts in the White House? Just curious.
Posted by: vla | March 12, 2009 2:15 PM
Bemused.....enjoy your stay on the pug side of the fence you dog. You are so far from enlightenment but I guess the crazy ones are the last one to see their own folly.
Get over your failed theories already. You sound like a pug with paranoia. I know many feminists that voted for Obama and are VERY happy with his decisions.
Posted by: Xcellentform | March 12, 2009 3:47 PM
Not disagreeing with you, Rupe, but hanging around with people that believe the same thing as, vote the same as you, and give money to the same politicians as you does not a representative group of the entire female sex make. Same goes for you, xcellent.
Posted by: Jeff | March 12, 2009 5:43 PM
My community is very diverse, Jeff; even conservatives are allowed. And the name isn't rupe. But have a good one, buddy.
Posted by: rupert | March 12, 2009 7:31 PM
Now, via, don't ask dangerous, paranoid questions like that. You'll incur the wrath of "true" progressives. Fact, Obama paid his female Senate staffers less than his male Senate staffers. Fact, McCain paid his female Senate staffers more than his male Senate staffers. Fact, the media doesn't report the wage disparity between male and female White House staffers. Guess we'll just have to go with "we're working on it" as the Obamapologists want us to believe. Oh, and to the freaks who want to insult the intelligence of those who question words when actions speak louder, kindly look at the absolute misogyny being piled on against Bristol and Sarah Palin on a separate post here. Not a word of protest by Obama supporters of treating women with dignity. The so-called progressives and so-called feminists here are completely intellectually dishonestly and morally bankrupt. The venom in your attacks really tell me that the old Democratic party of tolerance and real equality is dead. Fear the truth, haters.
Posted by: Bemused | March 12, 2009 7:46 PM
So bemused doesn't care about poor Levi, but anything said about Bristol is automatically misogyny. If a man opens a door for Bemused, she probably accuses them of misogyny. It's the only word she knows; it's a higher priority than the economy and the war. Go on over to the Republican party, Bemused; campaign for Palin; and see how they treat you when you whine all the time.
Posted by: Flo | March 13, 2009 7:56 AM
Bemused: You don't have to like Obama, but it is completely untrue that he paid his female staffers less than his male staffers, which you can see if you go look at the online public record of the wages paid to Senate staff members.
Obama paid his male and female staffers the appropriate wages for the work that they did. He a few more male than female staffers in upper level positions, so the average salary for a male staffer was slightly higher than the average salary for a female staffer. McCain had a few more women than men in upper level positions, so in his office the average female salary was a little higher than the average male salary.
McCain actually employed more women in upper level positions than Hillary did, so the average female salary in his office was higher than the average female salary in hers.
Again, I am not trying to convince you to like Obama, but if you are not going to like him you should have the facts straight, and that claim simply wasn't factually true (had it been, McCain and Palin definitely would have had it in all their ads, I'm sure).
Posted by: Claire | March 13, 2009 8:25 AM
They can start by giving us deadbeat dad legislation that works, or at least an advocacy office
right now we have zilch
I have a deadbeat who has been working at the NSA for the past 30 years - and I am getting absolutely nada help to nail this guy
Posted by: shari Hodges | October 19, 2009 12:26 AM