PALIN & PELOSI

What are women to learn from the two most prominent women in politics in 2009?

First there are the contrasts: Palin is old school, sweetheart queen, barely educated, appeal to the emotions and cry if you don't get your own way. Pelosi is smart, savvy, pay your dues, play with the big boys and best them at their own game.

Both strategies come in for huge criticism from the opposing camp; especially the men. Palin never makes it into the big boys club and suffers the casual derision that masquerades as a pedestal while never being taken completely seriously. Pelosi is respected and even feared as a player but never accorded human female status and suffers the awed but equally derisive admiration of skill but "I wouldn't want to have her as a mother/wife."

And what does the striking similarity - careful, impeccable dressing - say?

While I am sure that there are friends and family who know the multidimensional women Palin and Pelosi, most of the world sees the one dimensional reflection in the face of the powerful and the media.

Perhaps those reflections are accurate. But it is more likely that they are partly true, partly false and wholly a product of our continuing inability to move women, especially public women, into the human race with all its variety of roles, looks, opinions and relationships.

What can we learn from the two most prominent women in politics in 2009? That the fight for equality is far from won.