A: There was a survey the other day where people were asked, 'Do you think we're likely to have a woman president by the year 2000?' And the majority of people said yes, which is encouraging. But a majority of them also said Jesus Christ would make his second coming [by then]. They seemed to think that it was slightly more likely there'd be a woman president.

You keep hearing 'America isn't ready for a woman president,' but what they're really saying is that men aren't ready. The party leaders and bosses aren't ready and aren't willing to take the chance of [supporting] a woman for a change.

Q: All of this doesn't sound very encouraging. Do you have any encouragement to a woman in college now?

A: I don't think it's a wonderful time. You're embarking into the real world and a period in which feminist questions are back on the table and the challenge is to keep them there.

Women have become more involved to speak up and blow the whistle. In another sense, it's a tricky and dangerous time, in that all this ferment over women's causes could be pushed out of public discourse by the media. We also have this economic situation which has the effect of making people more cautious.

Q: What was important in your life that somehow made you feel confident enough to combat the backlash?

A: Discovering journalism for me was very liberating because it allowed me to use the printed page in a way I was much more reluctant to do as an actual public speaker.

I think a lot of women have this experience of having two personae, the polite good girl who doesn't say much in class and the writing persona, which I think is the true one and which can be very opinionated and crusading. Writing is a way of speaking honestly without being interrupted.