Letter to the President-elect

A lot of folks are tracking President-elect Barack Obama’s appointments, including my colleague Rock, the African American Political Pundit, and Public Citizen.

The Liberal Journal (h/t AAPP) writes:

His major appointments seem to be fairly representative racially of the United States population at large. If Obama has fallen short, it may be in appointing women. One appointment in particular stands out to me—his education choice. Would Obama have chosen Arne Duncan if he wasn’t from Chicago, or would he have instead chosen a Linda Darling-Hammond?

There’s growing frustration that Obama’s governing coalition is leaving behind qualified women. So, a coalition of women leaders has sent a letter to the President-elect:

As leaders of women’s organizations and advocates for women’s equality, collectively representing over 14 million women, we are writing to elaborate on the need for historic levels of women’s appointments and the need to restore and strengthen executive branch offices for women.

We applaud your initial appointments of talented women and we encourage you to further gender balance your White House, Cabinet, and executive appointments. The U.S., with women composing just 17% of the members of Congress, ranks 71st among the world’s parliaments in representation of women. With women so underrepresented in Congress, we believe it is crucial for women’s representation to increase dramatically at the executive branch of decision-making. Many of us will be submitting names of excellent and diverse women for your consideration.

What do women want? They want Obama to address gender disparities:

In this spirit, we urge you to create a Cabinet-level Office on Women that will deal not only with the status of women, but with the many inequities women face in our society, our nation, and our world. Such an office is even more necessary today, because of the increased disparities and backward movement of the past eight years.

Women helped bring Obama to the party. And they’re not settling for a dance card that’s half-empty.