About
Sarah, Michelle, Hillary, and the Shaping of the New American Woman
Leslie Sanchez is taking the assumptions and myths about women in politics and turning them on their heads. YOU'VE COME A LONG WAY, MAYBE (Palgrave Macmillan; October 2009) tackles hard-hitting questions like: Can women handle the stress and confrontation of life in the political limelight? Why are women judged in terms of factors like fashion and approachability? How did the media manage to boil down three complex women into the ditz, the bitch, and the darling of Election '08? D.C.-based Leslie Sanchez lives in the hotbed of high level politics, and can answer these questions with unparalleled authority, experience, sass, and candor.
Election '08 was a nonstop whirlwind that seemed to finally propel the modern political campaign into the 21st century. New media and the age of instant news led the way. Young voters seemed finally energized. And most importantly the roles not only of race, but of gender, seemed utterly redefined. At the heart of the tumult were three women who were equally captivating in very different ways: Sarah Palin, Hillary Clinton, and Michelle Obama. These women continue to hold a prominent place in the news, whether via media obsession with First Lady Michelle Obama's every well-heeled move, speculation over Sarah Palin's decision to step down from the governorship, or Hillary Clinton's oft-analyzed moves as Secretary of State. But is all that attention good or bad? As a Republican strategist, popular pundit, and frequent columnist, Sanchez spent the 2008 presidential election as part of CNN's award-winning team analyzing what it meant for all Americans, and what it meant for women specifically. YOU'VE COME A LONG WAY, MAYBE not only takes a hard look at the skewed media coverage and public scrutiny that these women have undergone during their journey in a male-dominated arena, but Sanchez further examines voting patterns, social networking trends, and the media cycle to reveal what the groundbreaking election of 2008 says about how women treat each other on the political battlefield and how that impacts the future of women in politics.
Rep. Tom Cole of Oklahoma once said of Leslie Sanchez: “She breaks all the stereotypes. It's hard to look at her and think, ‘That's a three-piece-suit Republican.'” Sanchez begs us to do the same for Sarah Palin, Michelle Obama, and Hillary Clinton—eschew the old stereotypes and think outside the box of yesterday's expectations of conventional womanhood. Like the women in it, YOU'VE COME A LONG WAY, MAYBE'simpact is sure to resonate for years to come. Leslie Sanchez is the founder of IMPACTO Group LLC (a premium communications firm for clients targeting the Latino/a market). In 1999 she created the first-ever multi-million dollar ad campaign aimed at Hispanic voters for the Republican National Party, and also served as executive director of the White House Initiative on Educational Excellence for Hispanic Americans. She has been seen on Hardball with Chris Matthews, Fox News Channel, CNN, NPR, PBS, NBC's Today Show and Nightly News, CBS's Early Show and ABC's World News.
