The Year in Women

I Am Perky, Hear Me Roar
After barely surviving her second year in the CBS anchor chair, Katie Couric justifies her $15 million salary with a deftly withering interrogation of Sarah Palin.

Hijabulous! Ruqaya Al Ghasara, a 26-year-old sprinter from Bahrain, is the first Muslim woman to run wearing a hijab (covering everything but her face and hands), reaching the semifinals for the 200-meter sprint at the Beijing Olympics.

Cue My Big Fat Greek Joke
Arianna Huffington's eponymous blog seals its status as the election go-to for the liberal-leaning, catching 5.5 million unique visitors per month and reaching an estimated value of $100 mil.

But Too Bad Women Aren't Funny On the strength of 30 Rock, Baby Mama, a $5 million book deal, and doppelgänger Sarah Palin running for VP, Tina Fey rockets up the Hollywood power lists.

And You Should See Her Parallel Park Danica Patrick becomes the first woman to win an Indy car race in April, when she takes the checkered flag in the Japan 300.

While J.K. Rowling Was Busy Buying France With her Twilight series, author Stephenie Meyer rides the vampire trend to multimillionairehood, with 12.2 million books sold and a buzzy $37 million movie hitting theaters this month.

Can You Say "Celesbian"?
LiLo and Sam hook up...

... Ellen and Portia get hitched...

... and club music goes totally bi-curious with Katy Perry's "I Kissed a Girl."

Who Cheats on Christie Brinkley? Following tales of her husband's teenage girlfriend and $3K-a-month porn habit, the ex-supermodel gets custody of the kids and $80 million in real estate, platinum grin intact.

Angelina, Inc. She's not just the most sought-after drama mama, she's probably the most lucrative. By our math, Angie contributed an estimated $460 million to the U.S. economy last year, in tabloid sales ($100 million), box-office bank ($350 million), and salaries for security staff and a nanny for each child ($10 million) - to say nothing of the sensual massage oils she must use on Brad.

The rise of Sarah Palin found budding Gloria Steinems in surprising places. Dick Morris, Republican strategist said "A man would never have had to go through [what Sarah Palin endured]...It's the deep sexism that runs through our society. Glenn Beck, conservative pundit said "Can't raise kids and be a vice president? How irresponsible for this woman to do it? What a sexist thing to say."

Cringe-worthy lows on the road to glory.
Makes Us Miss Grand Theft Auto In a new Sony PlayStation game, Fat Princess, players stuff a damsel with cake until she's too fat for opponents to move her.

Can We Smack You Upside the Head Instead? "Mr. President, want to?" asks Olympic beach volleyball player Misty May-Treanor, inviting the leader of the free world to smack her rear during his post-game courtside visit.

Real Housewives of the Polygamist Compound A raid on the Yearning for Zion ranch in Texas reveals 19th-century fashions and a caveman level of female subjugation.

Maybe That's Why Yale Accepted Bush To balance the 58-to-42 female-to-male ratio in colleges, admissions officials woo men by designing butch brochures and accepting lower-achieving boys.

Not What We Meant by Equal Opportunity The new growth industry among women in the Middle East? Suicide bombing. This year in Iraq, at least 27 female bombers struck, compared to eight in '07.

Because Men Are Doing Such a Kick-Ass Job Running Wall Street In September, Sallie Krawcheck, the chairman and CEO of Citigroup's Global Wealth Management unit, is the last of three female chief officers on the Street to be pushed out.

And It Takes Years Off Your Vaj! The inventor of the G-Shot - a collagen treatment for your G-spot - has made $185,000 in sales in the past year.

Hot New Teen Accessory! Juno, Jamie Lynn Spears, Bristol Palin, and the sophomore class of Gloucester High make a worrisome trend of teen pregnancy.

If business goes south or the campaign hits the skids, nobody makes a better fall guy than a gal.
Marion Jones We get why the disgraced track star was stripped of her five Olympic medals after 'fessing up to doping. But explain to us why she's serving a six-month federal prison sentence when better-paid, higher-profile juicers still enjoy the champagne-room treatment. (We're looking at you, Roger Clemens.)

Samantha Power What happens when a Pulitzer Prize - winning Harvard policy whiz turned Obama adviser calls Hillary Clinton "a monster"? She gets the boot, and an estimable 15-year career becomes a two-word campaign-season epitaph: collateral damage.

Bold-faced philanderers had a banner year, and their wives stood by them - often just to the left of the lectern, bleary-eyed and pissed.
Silda Wall Spitzer A hot, Harvard-educated corporate lawyer quits her job to support her crusading husband's vice-fighting career; he repays her by hooking up with a 22-year-old, $4000-a-night call girl.

Elizabeth Edwards We can only hope that John's scuzzy infidelity with loose-cannon videographer Rielle Hunter took Elizabeth's mind off her terminal cancer.

Carlita Kilpatrick Thousands of text messages (some graphic) expose Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick's affair with his chief of staff. His wife, meanwhile, stars in ads touting her husband's family-values credentials.

Whether they failed, faltered, or fell off the radar, make no mistake - they're baaaaaack.
Carly Fiorina Three years after being ousted as Hewlett-Packard's chief executive, she returns as McCain's top economic adviser (though she still believes it's harder to run H-P than the USA).

The Original Supermodels Linda Evangelista, 43, beats out a pubescent waif for Prada's fall/winter '08/'09 campaign; Claudia Schiffer, 38, bumps various French ingenues to land Chanel; and 38-year-old Naomi Campbell stops assaulting others long enough to score Yves Saint Laurent's fall campaign.

Kathie Lee Gifford The left-for-dead chatty survivor lands a hosting gig on the Today show.

Paris Hilton The human punch line has a laugh at the expense of John McCain, who likened Obama's celebrity to hers. "Thanks for the endorsement, white-haired dude," she coos in her surprisingly funny Web video.

Dr. Elizabeth Blackburn After Bush fires the scientist from his Council on Bioethics for supporting stem-cell research, she wins a prestigious L'Oreal-UNESCO prize for her work on aging, which brings us closer to finding a cure for cancer. You're doin' a heck of a job, Blackie.

Politicians sure to make A1 headlines next year.
Ingrid Betancourt Will the former Franco-Colombian presidential candidate, held hostage for six years in the South American jungle, risk another run for Colombia's highest office? Can't be harder than being tied to a tree for 12 hours a day.

Mayawati Kumari The chief minister of India's most populous state is favored to become the country's first prime minister from the Dalit caste, India's lowest rung on the social ladder. Who's untouchable now?

Tzipi Livni Israel's foreign minister, a former Mossad field agent, is in line to become the country's first female prime minister since Golda Meir. Her goal: to make peace with the Palestinians. Here's hoping she's got a closet full of Kevlar pantsuits.

Number of Hillary Nutcrackers sold: 270,000
Her historic campaign, by the numbers
Amount spent on pizza: $43,127 . . . and on postage: $19,958,867
Number of books published about her since she announced: 22
Google hits for "Hillary and bitch": 2.6 million
Average cost of her pantsuits: $6350

There were 99 female billionaires in the world this year, 16 more than last year. Seven of them are under 40. Ten of the world's billionairesses are self-made. Ten years ago, none were.