Geraldine Ferraro and Sarah Palin joined FOX News Channel analysts Megyn Kelly and Bret Bair on election night in 2010.
KELLY: Joining me now—two women who know a thing or two about politics: FOX News contributor Sarah Palin, John McCain's vice-presidential candidate in 2008, and long-time FOX News contributor Geraldine Ferraro, Walter Mondale's running mate back in 1984. They are only two women who have been named vice-presidential nominees. They are sharing the screen for the first time ever. All right—have at it [laughing]. Do you feel nervous?
FERRARO: [laughing] Not at all. We're perfectly comfortable here.
KELLY: All right, Gerry, let me start with you because we heard a little bit from the governor before. But I want to start by just getting your perspective on what we've seen so far tonight.
FERRARO: Well, I think two things. One is that it is not the political earthquake that people had predicted or the tsunami that everybody was looking for…
KELLY: No tsunami?
FERRARO: No tsunami.
KELLY: Not even in the House with projections of sixty [unintelligible]?
FERRARO: No, no. I don't think anyone expected that it would not go the Republican majority, but it's not even going be the big numbers. The other piece of it is, which is a truism that I've found every time there are congressional races, is that when push comes to shove people go in to the polls and they vote for their member, and it's only when they're really mad at their member—they could be furious at the rest of the world, they could be furious at both parties—but when they go in, they take a look at what their members are going do or have done for them in most instances. I was disappointed to see some of the races they came down where people tended to forget were a lot of those people who were in the Congress had done really good things for their district. And I'm sitting here thinking still about Wisconsin, though that still is not decided yet.
KELLY: We don't know yet.
FERRARO: But certainly, you know, Feingold has been incredible for the state of Wisconsin.
KELLY: We've seen, Governor, you know, a little bit of a pattern emerging here with some of these more moderate Democrats getting voted out of the House, in particular Democrats who voted for the health care reform law, now, and some who initially voted against it but then were pressured by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to voting for it and they were held to account for that by the voters today from the look of it.
PALIN: Yeah, I think that Obamacare was instrumental in causing some the shift that we saw tonight. Pretty much it was a given that if you had voted for Obamacare despite perhaps on even having read the bill, as a lot of legislators had admitted to, and not knowing exactly what was in there and then the ramifications of the adoption that bill, the revelation showing what actually is in it. There's been a lot of frustration across the country because of that. So that frustration then, is, I guess, the victim of that frustration has been these candidates who had voted for it.
FERRARO: Well, the other piece of that on the health care bill was I think that the administration and the members in many instances did poor job talking about what actually was in the bill. I mean there's….
KELLY: Really?
FERRARO: …there's real good stuff. Yeah! You know, I said to my husband…. about a
KELLY: They talked about a lot.
FERRARO: They talked about a lot, but it was not a real positive thing.
BAIER: He spoke about it a bunch.
FERRARO: I did?
BAIER: No, the president did.
FERRARO: He did, too, and I did, too.
KELLY: You did all you could.
FERRARO: I did everything I could. But you know, if you take a close look at some of the stuff that was in there…. You know how many elderly people have said to me, from Florida, I don't understand how they voted for Rubio, they turned around and they said to me, "Do you know that there is this donut hole in this Medicare coverage…"—this was a couple of years ago. And I said, "Why don't you do something…" And they said, "I'm not running for office. I can't do anything about it." But you know, that's what the bill was. This health care bill closed that donut hole. That's $2500 to these numbers, to these people who are participants in Medicare. But that's not the only thing. It's the pre-existing conditions, it's coverage for.
BAIER: But people around America clearly didn't buy it. In the exit polls they…
FERRARO: Well, because I don't think they really understand….
BAIER: You think it was a good thing?
FERRARO: I do. I do.
PALIN: Well you know who should have perhaps talked about it was the Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi. Remember she said, though, well, we don't, basically she was suggesting we don't know what's in it. You gotta pass it then we find out what's in it. That was a bad message right there.
FERRARO: Yeah, well, you know, perhaps. But I think what the—and I would agree, I'm sure that she knew what was in it—because I've known Nancy a long time. She's smart as hell and she knew what was in that bill. She knew that the benefits that were in there on pre-existing conditions and so many other things where there. You know, I think when you get the people who are going down now, Sarah, who are saying things like, you know, "we're going to go down there repeal it," they have not a clue on how the Congress works.
BAIER: Geraldine, I do want to ask you a question about Governor Palin. She has endorsed a lot of female candidates around the country. She calls them mama grizzlies. Kelly Ayotte, a big winner in…up north. And Nikki Haley, we haven't called, in the governor's race in South Carolina. What about the GOP outreach to women and powerful Republican women, as you see it, from your point of view?
FERRARO: It was interesting because after the '84 campaign, one thing that republicans did, they outdid us, was that they ran ahead of time in picking out women candidates to run for the state senate and for the state assembly and put them in the pipeline. Democrats didn't do that for a while, until 1992. But what ended up happening in this race was that a lot of the Tea Party candidates, you know, lost. Look what happened in Delaware. Look what's going to happen in California with Barbara Boxer. Look what's going to happen in Nevada. I mean, these are women who are out there. You know, I look… I'm torn sometimes because someone said, "Well women don't have any representation the corporate world. They don't make money," and you look at the money that some of these women have made--$150 million dollars—that was just thrown away, by Linda McMahon.
KELLY: But does it disturb you at all…. Can I just ask, does it disturb—this is to both of you—at all, the attacks we've seen a lot these women? Forget the partisan stripes for a minute. But you know—Christine O'Donnell, brutally attacked. Nikki Haley, brutally attacked. Meg Whitman, brutally attacked. I mean, it just seems like there's been an effort to marginalize. And it's happened across the aisle. I actually interviewed this Democratic candidate for Congress, Crystal Ball is her name—for real, and in Virginia—and she had some moronic college photos they came out about her. She's a Democrat. And it was used against her to marginalize her, and she really thought it was sexist. And we've seen so many brutal attacks on women in this cycle. Is that just going to be par….
FERRARO: No, nothing new, Megyn. It was…. I had the same thing happen to me in 1984. It's just been going on. One of the things that happened when Sarah ran. I never, ever criticized her as a woman. Her policies, obviously, I don't agree with.
KELLY: Fair game, right? That's fair game.
FERRARO: I don't agree with. And I would criticize her policies just as I would anybody else's. But you know, I was so outraged by how Hillary had been treated during the primary that I turned around and I said, you know that's not what you do. The unfortunate thing is that's happening in both parties, and its…and in Alaska, as a matter of fact, where Mikulski…
KELLY: It's where it started. Well, I don't know where it started, but Governor Palin was attached grossly during the presidential election and they came out later and admitted a lot of it.
PALIN: You know, and Geraldine had also be grossly attacked back in '84. I remember as a young college student, watching what it was that you were going through….
FERRARO: Oh, don't tell me how young you were then [laughing].
PALIN: And listen, and knowing that—and more power to you for busting that glass ceiling, you know, and standing on the shoulders of Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony and others who had come before you of, course, so many years ago and then you busting through and then the opportunity that I and other women following you have been able to seize it, that's just been wonderful. It's been great for our nation. It's been so…. But it kind of seems, yeah, Geraldine, like some things haven't changed. There are still the Neanderthals out there who pick on the petty, little, superficial, meaningless things like looks, like whether you can or can't work outside the home if you have small children, all those type of things….
FERRARO: Oh, I got that, too.
PALIN: …where I would so hope that at some point those Neanderthals will evolve into something a bit more with it, a bit more modern, and a bit more understanding that, yeah, women can accomplish much.
BAIER: Last question for you both real quickly. What about the possibility of a female president in our time?
FERRARO: Well, I, you know, there might be some people running in 2012 or in 2016—in which event I do hope that you invite me on the show to make comment. [all four laughing]
KELLY: Whoever could you mean?
FERRARO: Ah well, there are a couple—in both parties.
KELLY: Whoever could you mean? I just have to ask because you said something, Governor Palin, that I thought was so interesting. When you watched Geraldine Ferraro back in 1984, did you ever picture that it might be possible for you, too, to actually be a vice presidential contender?
PALIN: You know, I thought that I was going to be a sports commentator and maybe the first commissioner of the NBA or NFL back then. But I tell you, it's just such a privilege, it's an honor to, not to speak to you on the telephone as we have in the past, but to be with you in person.
FERRARO: Thank you.
PALIN: I admire all that you've accomplished.
FERRARO: Thank you. I appreciate that.
KELLY: All right, guys. I have to say, I think it's great for little girls watching right now. Women from both parties—strong, confident, smart. There is no glass ceiling, girls. Bust it wide open like the women before you.
FERRARO: [laughing] There you go, Megyn.
BAIER: Oh by the way, Governor Palin, there was another vote count tonight.
PALIN: Oh…the vote that mattered, yes.
KELLY: Oh right—this is a big one. This is a FOX News Alert.
PALIN: Yes. Bristol Palin is safe, so now I can concentrate on all these other votes going on.
FERRARO: What's going on?
BAIER: On "Dancing with the Stars."
PALIN: On "Dancing with the Stars," she wants to….
FERRARO: [laughing] Oh. Different vote! That's one of the things…that's one of my goals…one of my goals that's left…Dancing with the Stars.
PALIN: [clapping] All right….
KELLY: Listen, I'm sure we have some beautiful graphic that they're working up right now, to demonstrate exactly how she did it.
BAIER: Ladies, thank you very much. It was a pleasure.
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