So far, though, Kerry seems to be losing women voters, with less than a month until Election Day. After the Democratic National Convention, polls showed that women voters favored Kerry by as much as
14 percentage points, and if
several recent polls are accurate, the race is now even.
Penn State political science professor and dean of the College of the Liberal Arts Susan Welch said there is a gender gap, but she's not ready to declare an end to it, despite recent polls, because "anything can happen" until the election.
Green said she thinks Kerry will pull through with the women's vote once again because he is also for a women's right to choose, health care for all Americans and increased funding for schools, while President George W. Bush, she said, was not for all of those things.
Centre Country Democrats Chairman Bob Shepherd agrees with Green.
"It's always stressful for us to admit it, but women are smarter than us, and smart people are going to vote for Kerry," Shepherd said. "Kerry's smart, capable, honest, open and knows what will work for the greatest number of people."
While recently, women seem to support the Democratic candidate, men tend to support the Republican.
College Republican chairman Andy Banducci said drawing gender lines is difficult in determining which issues are important to which sex.
In general, though, men tend to be more conservative and care more about defense issues, he said.
"It's difficult to paint things one way or another," Banducci said. "Bush has been very successful with the 'W stands for women' slogan, and it's been an important part of his campaign in showing that women do care about domestic security issues."
Green agreed with Banducci and said domestic security was a universal concern on people's minds this Election Day.
"Women care about Iraq; they may have sons or daughters fighting and they want them to come home," Green said.
Welch said women have historically been less concerned than men about issues such as weapons spending and national defense, but said this has changed since Sept. 11, 2001.
"Whether they feel security will be better with Kerry or Bush, that remains to be seen," Welch said.
Shepherd said he feels that women, along with men, will come to see that Kerry is the right man for the job.
"There's no doubt about it that the world will be safer with Kerry in office," Shepherd said.
Banducci said the gender issue is secondary to the conclusion he feels people are coming to about Kerry as he gets more exposure during prime time, such as at the convention and during the current presidential debates.
"I believe the more people see Kerry, and the more they hear what he stands for, the less likely they'll be to like him," he said.
