Spreading the Dough (Page 3)

That feeling of "sisterhood" is evident throughout the EMILY's List candidate training. Women share information and laugh about common problems--especially the particular forms of insecurity and overpoliteness that plague some female candidates. At a training session last spring in Arizona, Ann Liston of EMILY's List asked participants to role-play candidates asking donors for money. (EMILY's List asked that I protect the participants' anonymity.) First, Liston gave the group a pep talk about how Ellen Malcolm has raised tens of millions of dollars in her career. Her method: Break the ice, chat about your shared political goals, then cut to the "ask"--very directly, for a specific amount of money. Then stop talking. Don't say another word.

It sounds easy. But as the candidates began trying to do it in the role-playing session, it was anything but. They ran right over the "ask," apologizing, even bringing up reasons the donor might not want to support them. A shy woman with long dark hair choked when the "donor" asked why she shouldn't support her opponent. "Oh, she's a master of manipulation!" she blurted out, turning beet red. "The phone is your friend," Liston said kindly. "If you blush a lot, stick with the phone." Another candidate began her role-play by folding her arms across her chest and declaring, "You all can't laugh at me!"

In each case Liston followed the same script: Get the group to comment first on what the candidate had done well, then ever so gently work in some constructive criticism. "You have to make sure you're not talking down to these women," Bjork explains. "You don't want to undermine their confidence." Even the most unsteady neophytes improve dramatically with practice, she says, and can blossom into great candidates. Take it from Ellen Malcolm, who was not always a fundraising legend. "I used to be scared to death," she says. "My knees would shake. I'd think, I hope nobody notices."

The fundraising success of EMILY's List had made it a model even for the right. "We copied some of their tactics, especially the concept of bundling small contributions," says David Keating of the Club for Growth, a conservative PAC that supports candidates who favor tax cuts and smaller government. But while EMILY's List is mainly concerned with getting more women to run for office--and win--PACs like the Club for Growth, and like the Progressive Majority on the left, support candidates who reflect a political ideology. EMILY's List focuses on winning more seats for prochoice, Democratic women. Period. Which raises a legitimate question: Are these women leading the country in a more progressive direction?

The EMILY's List offices take up most of the eleventh floor of a big building on Connecticut Avenue in Washington, DC. The walls are lined with the photos of women the group has helped elect. No longer political outsiders, many of these women now represent the mainstream of the Democratic Party--Hillary Clinton, Dianne Feinstein, Mary Landrieu. Even on choice, the only litmus-test issue for EMILY's List, some of them--most notably Hillary Clinton (she of the "sad, even tragic choice" speech)--have retreated, rhetorically at least.

Malcolm is careful not to criticize Hillary, except to say that Democrats have, in her view, "misread" the polling on "values voters" after 2004. If Senator Clinton runs for President, EMILY's List will be "delighted," Malcolm says--behind her 100 percent. "If you want a more progressive America," Malcolm argues, "your best bet is to elect more prochoice, Democratic women." But surely there's more to it than that.

In some races EMILY's List has actually backed the less progressive candidate. In last year's gubernatorial primary in Washington, for example, the group helped knock out King County executive Ron Sims, who favored abolishing the regressive sales tax in favor of a more equitable statewide income tax. The EMILY's List candidate, Christine Gregoire--who won after a long recount--was the more cautious, centrist candidate.

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