Ground Broken, But Not Glass Ceiling

If Barack Obama wins the presidency, we’ll have broken a major barrier—but not the glass ceiling, writes Anne Kornblut in the Washington Post. Hillary Clinton claimed millions of votes and Sarah Palin energized a lackluster conservative base overnight, but as their candidacies descended into chaos, Kornblut asks "whether the first woman's path to the White House was eased this year—or whether Clinton and Palin simply unearthed the land mines without defusing any."

The trajectory of the campaigns has sparked quandaries for feminism: do we back the best-equipped candidate, or “promote and elect women everywhere”? And after a grueling race in which Clinton professed "We won't know until we try," the question remains: When will the country finally be ready to elect a woman?
(More Election 2008 stories.)