Centerfield

I'd like to hear from the women bloggers you mention who have "dropped out". Why did they do it? Family life, work, distate for contact politics? Maybe people stopped paying much attention to some of them because they were harsh and obnoxious (Ann Coulter or Maureen Dowd, anyone?).

On the level of actual "pundits" (i.e., Beltway wags who regularly pontificate on national issues), many of those in that line of work have long experience in government or other major levels of the media before they can actually become "pundits". Perhaps the dearth of women in that field, then, is because of a lack of the historical lack of women in the ranks from which pundits traditionally come.

There are certainly some high-caliber female pundits. My favorite among the more liberal set is Cokie Roberts, who generally remains pretty calm and rational, 2 qualities I look for in all pundits.

Just a few of the top of my head:

Ilkya Damen
Michele Catalano
Natalie Solent
Meryl Yourish
Sheila O’Malley

There are a lot of high quality political commentators who are female and who write blogs. Over at PK we've got some of them on our blogroll. There's also the Progressive Women Bloggers webring...which you can find at the bottom of PK's front page. Most of them blog about politics on a daily basis. The number of blogs in the ring is just over 100 now.

I think it's likely that there are more male bloggers. But are there more quality male bloggers? Not from what I've seen.

But are there more quality male bloggers? Not from what I've seen.

If I may indulge in a Yogi Berrism, we're not looking for quality writers, we're looking for political moderates. I've contacted Michele Catalano, who is a moderate (and quality writer), and she is welcome to contribute if she wishes, though I think her soapbox is already taller than our own. I don't believe that Natalie Solent and
Meryl Yourish are centrists. I'll look into the other names, which are unfamiliar to me.

I don't believe the nastiness theory for a second. The Profesora is always telling me about hammer-and-tongs arguments going on in women-oriented blogs.

Nor do I believe talent arguments - there are plenty of excellent female political bloggers.

I do think that women and men are fundamentally different in what we're interested in, especially after growing up in a culture long enough to be old enough to blog. I'm not too interested in the blogs the Profesora hangs out in, and she finds Centerfield only interesting enough to be worth an occasional read.

This seems perfectly reasonable and fine to me, and nothing to panic about. Women should blog what they're interested in, since it is a HOBBY (except for Wonkette), after all, and men should blog what they're interested in, though I never mind hanging with women...., so I'm happy if they're around, and also like the slightly different approach they have.

Rick,

Both Solent and Yourish are centrists in the mean. They are certainly closer to the center than you are. They are both rather conservative on foreign policy issues but left of center on social issues. But you would know that if you read more than just the first few posts. You probably just read a few posts that support the war and assumed that this makes them right wing. These two would provide the perspective of the “war liberal” that is missing from this site.

..and given the blogosphere, there should be ever-decreasing claims that the alleged dearth of female pundits is due to a lack of access. Pull up a keyboard and start punditizing, ladies.

And if time passes and the gap persists, won't that be decent evidence that the gap is due,at least in part, to choice.

And if the gap closes, then problem solved, right?

BTW, Ellen Goodman is a hack among hacks at the Globe, like Derrick Jackson and Thomas Oliphant. They should dump her and give the infinitely superior columnist Cathy Young the #1 chair. She writes more good columns is a month than the rest of the entire Globe editorial staff writes in a year's time.

I'm not actually female, but on the internet I can be anything.

Female blogger reporting for duty... and for what it's worth, I think part of the problem is that with newspapers dying a slow and painful death, the budgets aren't there to nurture new talent. I've dealt with that with the two papers in my market, both of whom have published my freelance column but neither of which has brought on a new columnist in ages -- one has one woman columnist, the other has none... columns, I would guess, are the surest route to big league punditry... cheers.