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In case you haven’t met her yet, Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-WA), the highest ranking GOP woman in the House, has become a firebrand for Republican women.  The Congresswoman has served two terms as vice chairwoman of the House Republican Conference and serves as co-chair of the Congressional Caucus for Women’s Issues, and she has made it her primary goal to speak to women and bring more of them under the GOP fold.

As I wrote about a lot during midterm season (see here, here and here), the gender gap is becoming a thing of the past – something that hasn’t gone unnoticed by McMorris Rodgers.  What’s more, she knows that last November women favored Republicans over Democrats for the first time in two decades.  According to ABC, the GOP gained 12 percent of women during the midterms who originally voted for President Obama in 2008. 

More importantly, McMorris Rodgers understands why. In an article today in The Daily Caller, the Congresswoman explains that women “understand firsthand the impact of regulations, tax policy on starting a new business….The health care bill that passed last year is not popular among women…[who[ make the health care decisions for many households.” More to the point, women “don’t like the idea of the federal government in the way of them being able to make those health care decisions.”

Certainly IWF couldn’t agree more. For far too long national women’s groups on the left have found their purpose — and controlled the conversation — by standing behind two pillars: a robust, cradle-to-grave economic agenda and unfettered abortion rights. Today as more and more women surpass men in educational achievements and professional success, the image of “women as victim” is no longer consistent with reality.  

At the heart of it, McMorris Rodgers understands that Obama’s – and by extension Democrat’s – failed economic agenda of the past two years puts Republicans in a strong position to win over large numbers of women in 2012.