Hillary most qualified?

Kay Steiger says the question of Hillary's experience should be examined through a gendered lens:

[A]fter reading the [Patrick Healy] article, there was something left unsaid: Hillary Clinton has great experience for a woman. There are few women as qualified as Hillary Clinton for a candidacy. There's a smattering of female governors, a mere 16 female senators (two of whom were elected in 2006 midterm elections), and a handful of high-ranking and high-profile secretaries. There just aren't a lot of "qualified" women to pull candidates from.

What does this matter, you might ask? Well it matters if you've decided that the next president simply has to be a woman. If you're not of that opinion--and I'm not--then it's probably worth pondering the extent to which this sort of gender-driven camaraderie, and any countervailing gender-driven antagonism, will impact primary results.

But on the merits, I think this gets things pretty wrong. Assuming that we're only talking about Democrats here, I can probably name a dozen women--in either the House, Senate, or Governor's mansions in the states--that have more experience qua experience than Hillary Clinton. Many of them are not, as Kay insinuates, riding the coattails of their husbands. Hillary by contrast....

Anyhow, I'd only go so far as to acknowledge that, yes, Hillary Clinton is indeed the most experienced woman in either field of primary candidates. But then again, I'd also be so harsh as to claim that Hillary Clinton is the least experienced woman in either field of primary candidates. What this says about how you should vote I'll leave you to decide.