Jeb! Is Desperate

[Content Note: Misogyny.]

I have seen some cynical pandering to women on the presidential campaign trail in my day, but goddamn is this some cynical shit:

Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush hinted on Tuesday that he is considering a female running mate in 2016.

"Should I be elected president, I would have my vice president — I think she will be a great partner," the Republican White House hopeful said in Waterloo, Iowa.

Bush quickly walked back the remark.

"I mean, did I say that out loud?" Bush asked. "We always talk about this with one gender in mind. I think we've reached the point in our country where maybe we should be a little less gender-specific about this.

"Frankly, the one important element of selecting a vice presidential candidate is whether he or she is qualified to be president. Everything else is secondary," he added.

Wow. WOW.

Jeb's candidacy is swirling around the bottom of the bowl, and his party is constantly (deservedly) criticized for being hostile to women, so he implies he's considering a female vice-presidential candidate if he gets his party's nomination, in a desperate bid to appeal to women, in order to get that nomination.

There is zero chance that Jeb Bush has in mind a specific individual woman whom he'd choose as his running mate. It's a cynical pretense, in which he is exploiting the appeal of a female vice-presidential candidate without any meaningful commitment to choosing a specific qualified woman.

That is some deeply objectionable shit.

If Bush wants to demonstrate that he gives a fuck about women, then perhaps he could support policy that is good for women, instead of conjuring an imaginary female running mate in a pathetic ploy to pander to women.