Geraldine Ferraro

Former Vice-Presidental Candidate (the first woman to be one) Geraldine Ferraro died on Saturday around 10 am in Boston. She was 75. I do not plan to speak much about her accomplishments or her later decline in politics as you can Wikipedia her.

I did however want to bring it to the attention of anyone following this blog that she has in fact died (of pneumonia/bone cancer) because she was truly a pioneer in terms of women and the U.S. presidency. Her candidacy predated Hilary Clinton's run for President and Sarah Palin's run for the Vice Presidency (1st Republican and only 2nd VP run after Ferraro) by more than 25 years!

One thing I do want to note is that in addition to having her campaign as VP implode because of family scandals and later runs for lesser office in New York State be unsuccessful she didn't do herself a great deal of good as far as leaving a glowing legacy when she, as first female to run for VP, called out Obama as basically only being a credible candidate because of his race.

While I would like to acknowledge her for her accomplishment at being the one deemed worthy of that historic first by her running mate Walter Mondale I am disappointed in the race thing. Even though she was a strong (obviously, considering the Obama comment) Hillary Clinton supporter, the comment doesn't reflect well on her at all.

I myself was left at the end of the primaries in 2008 wishing that Clinton would have been the victor (the favored choice of an abundance of riches choice) but I'd like to think I was still happy for Obama. After all, I was also excited for his candidacy even when up against Hillary. The fact he bested her may have to do with history. After all, the 1st Supreme Court woman came after the black. By about 20 years!

So, I'll end by saying in spite of it all, congratulations Ms. Ferraro on your accomplishment regardless of what happened during the campaign and beyond. I'm sure everyone can agree that we can rarely predict what will happen.

Carmen