Advice for Picking a Lady VP Candidate (based loosely on political science research)
Pick a woman who has never disagreed with you; disagreeable women are unlikeable, and we’re going to need someone likable if she plans to run in 2024. (1/x) https://www.cnbc.com/2020/07/29/biden-allies-move-to-stop-kamala-harris-from-becoming-vice-president.html">https://www.cnbc.com/2020/07/2...
Pick a woman who has never disagreed with you; disagreeable women are unlikeable, and we’re going to need someone likable if she plans to run in 2024. (1/x) https://www.cnbc.com/2020/07/29/biden-allies-move-to-stop-kamala-harris-from-becoming-vice-president.html">https://www.cnbc.com/2020/07/2...
Pick a woman who is accomplished. We can judge a male candidate by his potential, but we cannot judge a female candidate this way. (2/x) https://psmag.com/economics/men-are-judged-based-on-their-potential-women-are-judged-based-on-their-past-performance">https://psmag.com/economics...
Pick a woman who has a pleasant and melodic speaking voice, without a hint of shrillness or vocal fry. (3/x) https://www.npr.org/2015/07/23/425608745/from-upspeak-to-vocal-fry-are-we-policing-young-womens-voices">https://www.npr.org/2015/07/2...
Pick a woman with slender ankles. The first woman to be nominated for vice-president was a size 6. We’d like to keep her in that ballpark. (4/x) https://www.economist.com/democracy-in-america/2011/03/27/geraldine-ferraro">https://www.economist.com/democracy...
Pick a woman who would make a good “work wife” so we can get a hint of warm fuzziness we used to feel about your platonic bromance with Barack Obama. (5/x) https://www.harpersbazaar.com/celebrity/latest/g7653/barack-obama-joe-biden-funny-photos/">https://www.harpersbazaar.com/celebrity...
Pick a woman who is a mother, but whose spouse does not call her “Mother.” (6/x) https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/social-issues/the-female-presidential-candidates-for-2020-are-putting-motherhood-front-and-center-breaking-with-norms-of-the-past/2019/02/25/446fb4de-3935-11e9-aaae-69364b2ed137_story.html">https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/soc...
Pick a woman who is not “reminiscent of Hillary Clinton” or “haunted by the ghost of Hillary Clinton.” Pick a woman who is not Hillary Clinton. (7/x) https://www.politico.com/story/2018/12/31/elizabeth-warren-hillary-clinton-1077008">https://www.politico.com/story/201...
Pick a woman who can win a debate without coming across as confrontational. (8/x) https://www.wbur.org/cognoscenti/2020/02/25/elizabeth-warren-anger-julie-wittes-schlack">https://www.wbur.org/cognoscen...
Pick a woman who isn’t trying to “sell herself” or “build her brand.” This skirts too close to prostitution for our taste. (9/x) https://www.thecut.com/2020/07/aoc-speech-ted-yoho-new-york-times.html">https://www.thecut.com/2020/07/a...
Pick a woman with an even temperament, who would never, for example, murder a popular political rival in an illegal duel and then flee south temporarily before returning to serve out the remainder of her term or raise an army to invade Mexico. (10/x) https://content.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,1834600_1834604,00.html">https://content.time.com/time/spec...
Pick a woman that we’d like to have a beer with, but like only if we were really thirsty and you were not available to have a beer with us. (11/x) https://www.thelily.com/when-did-we-decide-the-best-presidential-candidate-is-the-one-youd-want-to-have-a-beer-with/">https://www.thelily.com/when-did-...
Pick a woman who is competent, but not so competent as to spark a reckoning over our collective discomfort with women’s agency. That would be a bit distracting, don’t you think? (x)