When New York Governor David Patterson named upstate congresswoman Kirsten Gillibrand to replace Hillary Rodham Clinton as the state's junior senator, he introduced a political figure who will seem, in some respects, oddly familiar: a woman of limited political experience, who won a hard-fought election and is now quite popular among her constituents, who is just 42 years old and married with children, including an infant. Just like 42-year-old mother/politician Sarah Palin was when we first met her back in September, Gillibrand is considered an "up and comer" within the party, in part because of policy stances that at times put her at odds with that party's majority (in Gillibrand's case, she's a Dem the NRA loves, which introduces another parallel to gun-totin' Sarah).
So it'll be interesting to see whether any Republican commentators, who were so taken with Palin's plan to storm Washington with several kids in tow (including the supposedly still breastfeeding Tripp), will similarly cheer Gillibrand as a role model for working mothers. Whether they cheer her or jeer her, she'll still be facing the same challenges any woman does who balances an extraordinarily stressful career with parenting small children -- in her case, a five-year-old, Theodore, and a six-month-old, Henry. (At the very least we know her children will not spark the intense interest of those fascinated by wacky baby names!)
It's likely they won't have any comment at all, given the overshadowing nature of her appointment's backstory. The New York Times today published an editorial nicknaming Patterson the "oaf of office" for his bungling of the senate choice, and the papers will likely spill a lot of ink over the next few weeks trying to figure out what led the leading candidate, Caroline Kennedy, to abruptly drop out of contention Wednesday night. Whatever they report, and whatever you think of Gillibrand's blue dog Democrat politics, any working mother knows it can feel like a mixed blessing to get a major promotion when one of your kids is just tackling kindergarten and the other is perhaps just beginning to sleep through the night. She's got a lot on her plate and we wish her well.
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