NEW YORK — The Democrats are having fun with the "Year of the Woman" this week
because the hottest electoral prospects are their own.
In an opening night of cheerleading at the party's national convention, most of the cheers were for Pennsylvania's Lynn Yeakel, five other women Senate candidates, and female stars of the party.
Yeakel spent her few moments of prime time last night drilling Republican Sen. Arlen Specter from a podium set up on the floor of Madison Square Garden.
Her fans and fellow delegates wearing Yeakelmania buttons cheered every word from the Pennsylvania delegation's high perch, whether they heard those words or not.
"Arlen, you're out of style. You're out of touch. And come November you'll be out of Washington," Yeakel hollered, although the high-tech amplifying system made parts of the six Senate candidates' speeches a muddle inside the hall.
"It was fantastic," said delegate Jerry Hodge of Beaver County, as Yeakel made her way through gridlocked aisles back to the delegation. "We know the lady, we don't need to hear the words."
Four of the six women - Yeakel, Carol Moseley Braun of Illinois and two Californians, Dianne Feinstein and Barbara Boxer, are leading in the polls. Yeakel, Braun and Boxer pulled significant upsets to get nominated in the first place.
Also speaking were longshots Gloria O'Dell of Kansas and Jean Jones of Iowa.
"This is the year of the woman because this is the year of change," declared Maryland Sen. Barbara Mikulski, that august body's only Democratic woman and a heavy favorite for re-election. "We, the Democratic women, will change the United States Senate fundamentally and forever."
In a convention where the Bill Clinton-Al Gore ticket is trying to engineer a near-seamless coronation, the delegates are drawing energy from women candidates.
Much of the activity occurs outside the convention hall, at events such as the fund-raiser today for EMILY's List, the successful women's fund-raising group that draws its name from the acronym, "Early Money is Like Yeast - It Rises." EMILY's has backed Yeakel, Braun and the California women.
Workshops on women candidates, their issues and campaign techniques fill the convention's daytime hours. While the emphasis in 1988 was on recruitment, the large number of serious women candidates has changed the focus this time to can-do efforts.
