Giuliani's 'Gender Gap'

In June, the Los Angeles Times was reporting a "gender gap" in the support levels for most of the leading Republican candidates for president.

Rudy Giuliani enjoyed the support of 35% of Republican men, but only 21% of Republican women were backing his candidacy. Fred Thompson hadn't entered the race at that time, but the Times reported that the former Tennessee senator was supported by 33% of Republican men but only 15% of Republican women favored him. Mitt Romney wasn't getting much support from either group, with only 5% of Republican men and 14% of Republican women on his side.

According to a Gallup Poll released last Friday, Rudy seems to have narrowed his "gender gap" in the last three months, with support from 34% of Republican women and 31% of Republican men.

That still translates only into about one-third of the Republican electorate. If you're going to win the nomination to be the standard-bearer for a major political party, you have to do better than that.

Although it's hard to deny that Giuliani, who has a record of supporting the right to choose, gay rights and other issues that Republicans haven't been supporting since before Ronald Reagan was nominated (if then), is moving in the right direction with women in his party.

At first glance, it looks like he's slipping among men in his party, but that "slippage" is actually within the usual margin of error. It could be that Giuliani's support among Republican men has remained about the same while his support among Republican women has risen dramatically.

So dramatically, in fact, that he may be supported by more women in his party than men.

I wonder if these Republican women have heard the latest diatribe from Ann Coulter, whose newest extremist tome hits bookstores this week. In an interview with The New York Observer, the Queen of Mean claims that we'd never have another Democratic president if women were denied the right to vote.