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Editorial: A long way?

March is Women’s History Month, a fact that prompted us to search our archives for inspiration on the progress women have made.

Real progress. Today’s woman takes voting for granted; her grandmothers won that right less than 100 years ago. Today’s woman starts a business, purchases a house, attends a service academy or law or medical school, as a matter of ability and merit regardless of gender. Her forebears won those rights for her also.

Virginia Slims cigarettes burst on the scene in 1968 with the slogan "You’ve come a long way, baby," and women’s lib was here.

And yet … how much progress have women really made? One can almost see finger-shaking members of the Virginia General Assembly going right into the doctor’s office with a woman and interfering with her decision-making process. (And we thought conservative legislators disapproved of the so-called "nanny state.")

Commentators have long felt the urge to gui...

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