There are a number of reasons why someone might be opposed to electing Hillary Clinton President.  They range from a Clinton political dynasty to Benghazi, to personal e-mails.  Some people simply don’t like her and find her cold and calculating.  And while I certainly understand the reasons why someone wouldn’t vote for her, there are at least three very compelling reasons to vote for her.  1) She is very intelligent.  2) She is qualified and has the experience necessary to do the job unlike our current President when he took the helm in 2008 and 3)  Our country needs a female President.

Now that President Obama has broken the barrier for people of color, it’s time for the gender barrier to be broken. It’s almost unfathomable to think about how much men disrespect women around the world.  From servitude to gang rape, to stoning for adultery, lives of women in the third and developing world is as dangerous as ever. Hillary’s election would send a message.

But even in the United States of America, women have faced a long history of oppression.   Men of color were given the right to vote when the Fifteenth Amendment was ratified on February 3, 1870, only five years after the end of the Civil War.  It states, “The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.”  Of course “citizens” didn’t include women.  It would be another fifty years before women would receive the right to vote in the 19th Amendment, ratified on August 18, 1920.  Think about that.  As we prepare for another long and tedious election season, women have had the right to vote for less than a century of our 239 year history.

Women still earn only $.77 on the dollar vs. their male counterparts and face much discrimination in the workplace. Male executives are “tough negotiators”, women are “bitchy and aggressive”  Breastfeeding in public spaces should be a non issue in 2016 and yet it still stirs much controversy.  Should men have the right to dictate to women what they can and can’t do with their bodies? Perhaps a law should be passed requiring an unmarried man to use condoms or face severe penalties for impregnating a woman out-of-wedlock?!   For too long, attorneys used the argument that women tempted men by dressing provocatively as an argument to explain why women were raped.  Essentially, “they were asking for it”.

Men have had their chance and they have screwed it up.  The world has never been in worse condition.  That is not to say that men haven’t done great things in terms of science and technology but not in terms of leadership.   Historically, men have done far more harm than good.  Too much blood on their hands and they must be forced out by voting for capable and competent women. Women are far less likely to enter into unnecessary wars and to perpetrate violence as they are the givers of life and therefore understand how precious it is.

Much of the discrimination and oppression of women stems from religion.  Regardless of religious affiliation, all religion was created by and is still dominated by men.  There have been some changes but they have been slow in coming.  And while organized religion hasn’t been all bad, i.e. feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, it has a negative record overall and has simply served as a way that men could control other men and more importantly, women.  There is no serious or important role for women in the Catholic hierarchy and women in devout Judaism and Islam must sit in the back or above, at religious services, separated by curtains and/or distance.  This separation has absolutely no religious basis whatsoever.  Men consider women to be a distraction and therefore they must accept their second-class status.

Finally, there have been and continue to be many great women in power, (Golda Meir, Margaret Thatcher, Angela Merkel) to name just a few and they have proven to be every bit as effective, and competent, as their male counterparts, more so in some cases.  The election of Hilary Rodham Clinton to the highest office in the land, will once and for all turn the page on what has been a less than stellar record on women’s rights in this country. It will force other male dominated societies to have no choice but to deal with her; The President of the United States; the Most powerful leader in the world.  Most importantly however, it will open the eyes of young girls and women to the possibility that they too can become the leader of the free world if they so choose.

That is why Hillary must win!