Obama Bundler Worried About New York Businesswomen

Leonore Blitz, a bundler for Barack Obama and an advocate for women in politics, called to say she is picking up on what she considers a disturbing vibe among Democratic women in the New York business community: supporters of Hillary Clinton are considering voting for John McCain over Obama.

"I've been sensing an undercurrent in New York and then the Ferraro thing just set it off for me," said Blitz, referring to remarks Geraldine Ferraro made in Monday's New York Times. (She called Obama "sexist" and suggested that she might not vote for him.) "There is not a great deal of enthusiasm for Barack Obama and some are considering voting for McCain, others are saying let's wait and see, we don't know him yet."

One of the issues, said Blitz, is that some women feel there aren't enough women in the leadership of the campaign. Blitz said that just about everyday she receives email messages sent out by Clinton aides Ann Lewis and Maggie Williams (she made personal donations to the Clinton campaign early on). From the Obama campaign, she said, all the updates come from men.

Blitz said she found it heartening that Clinton's former campaign manager, Patti Solis Doyle, reportedly held informal talk with Obama's chief strategist, David Axelrod.

"It's a good thing," she said. "We need senior women operatives to migrate from the Clinton campaign to the Obama campaign."

The Clinton campaign puts a good deal of Clinton's disastrous post- February 5 showing on Solis Doyle.