What do women want?

Today's prod to panic comes via Katharine Seelye in the New York Times, who tells us

In the last few weeks, Kerry campaign officials have been nervously eyeing polls that show an erosion of the senator's support among women, one of the Democratic Party's most reliable constituencies. In a New York Times/CBS News poll conducted last week, women who are registered to vote were more likely to say they would vote for Mr. Bush than for Mr. Kerry, with 48 percent favoring Mr. Bush and 43 percent favoring Mr. Kerry.

Wow. And here I thought that Kerry campaign officials were dismissing the NYT/CBS poll as an outlier, skewed by a reliance on an inaccurate party distribution in their sample (as usual, see Ruy Teixeira for the details).

But hey, Seelye is a real live fact checked, line edited journalist with access to actual Kerry campaign officials, right? Not some wild eyed blogger relying on the buzz of all night internet surfing and too much coffee. Right?

Mmmmnope...

She did talk to some Kerry campaign officials. Here's what they had to say...

Mark Mellman, a pollster for the Kerry campaign, said that the campaign was not especially disturbed by the reduced support from women.

Hmmm. "...not especially disturbed..." vs. "...nervously eyeing..." Well, she must have meant some other Kerry campaign official, right? Maybe this one...

Diane Feldman, a pollster for the Kerry campaign, said she did not accept that Mr. Kerry was losing among women and insisted that the campaign's own polling showed Mr. Kerry winning among women.

Oops. Not that one, either. But those are the only ones Seelye cites, which leave us wondering about that lede.

Well, not really wondering. Because the NYT/CBS poll is an outlier. Duckman GR, in a piece taking Cokie Roberts to school on the same issue at The Left Coaster, points out that Pew has the most recent breakdown of women voters favoring Kerry by a 48/43 margin, not too far from the latest ARG details offered up by Oliver Willis, which have the split favoring Kerry by a 50/42% margin.

So, what do women want?

Kerry.

Because no matter Seelye says, W stands for wrong.