The economic sense of possibility was so great when I was growing up that my parents had no question that I could do anything I wanted to do, even as a girl. I've always believed that the economics of a story intersects with the women's story - that stuff often happens at the time it happens because of the economy.

The history of American women is about the fight for freedom, but it's less a war against oppressive men than a struggle to straighten out the perpetually mixed message about women's role that was accepted by almost everybody of both genders.

Sarah Palin is an heir to the women's movement. She has not been constrained by gender. At no point in her life has she thought, 'I can't do that because I'm a woman.'

Hillary Clinton almost got to be president. The reasons why she didn't become president had to do with bad judgments about how to handle the early caucus states, which is not a gender-specific trait.