Can the GOP Appeal to Women?

Apparently, far right columnist Jennifer Rubin is trying to get herself exiled from the Republican Party.  How else to explain her spate of columns taking the GOP to task for its embrace of ignorance and bigotry - translation: the Christianist and Tea Party - and it's refusal to accept that the world and nation are changing and that the GOP must change as well.  In her latest column in the Washington Post she looks at the GOP agenda that is increasingly forcing women who haven't had a lobotomy into the arms of the Democrats.   Rubin's position is a far cry from egomaniac Phyllis Schlafly who wants the GOP to focus only on white voters per Right Wing Watch:

Eagle Forum’s Phyllis Schlafly is riled up about comprehensive immigration reform, and she has hardly been hiding the reason why. Last month, Schlafly predicted that comprehensive reform would be “suicide for the Republican Party” because immigrants “come from a country” where they expect “a handout” from the government. 

Then, she claimed that Mitt Romney lost the presidential election not because of eroding support for the GOP among people of color, but because “his drop-off from white voters was tremendous” – which is just blatantly false.

But in an interview this week with conservative radio program Focus Today, Schlafly just came right out and said it. Calling the GOP’s need to reach out to Latinos a “great myth,” Schlafly said that “the people the Republicans should reach out to are the white votes, the white voters who didn’t vote in the last election.”  

Let's be candid.  Schlafly is a racists and she is a long time opponent of fully equality for women (other than herself, of course).  In contrast, here are highlights from Rubin's column:

The Post reports:

In a trend accelerated by the recent recession and an increase in births to single mothers, nearly four in 10 families with children under the age of 18 are now headed by women who are the sole or primary breadwinners for their families, according to a report released Wednesday by the Pew Research Center.

This has significant implications for all facets of American life, from child-rearing to culture to economics. And it should wake up Republicans to the need to recalibrate their message.

So how badly are Republicans doing with women?  .  .  .  . [Mitt Romney] lost women overall by a 44 to 55 percent margin.

The message that too many women heard from the GOP (and that Democrats exploited) was negative – finger-wagging at contraception and demeaning women in the military (as Rick Santorum did), commenting in outlandish ways about rape and decrying gay marriage. For those women not already in sync with Republicans, it came across as harsh, off-putting and mean spirited. They concluded that the GOP had nothing for them and, if they were single mothers, that Republicans didn’t really approve of them.

The message that focused on entrepreneurs, tax cuts and repealing Obamacare was not that attractive either. Most women don’t own or start businesses.

Put it this way: The image of the fiery, ferocious conservative warrior that the right-wing media applauds is precisely the type that turns off women voters who aren’t already die-hard Republicans.

I suspect that the GOP will ignore Rubin's message and embrace that of Schlafly.  The GOP base is increasingly insular and demands that the GOP focus only on the wishes and wants of the Christofascists - i.e., special rights - and the demented members of the Tea Party who make Neanderthals look like rocket scientists.