The Minnesota congresswoman has made the gender card central to her closing argument. She’s urging voters to embrace the idea of a “strong woman in the White House” and is molding herself as “America’s Iron Lady” in the vein of former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher.

It’s a play that carries as much risk as potential reward because some of the ardent religious conservatives she’s aggressively courting have traditional views about gender roles…

“I’m an Iowa girl. And one thing I remember about Iowa is we are a state of strong women,” Bachmann told the lunch crowd at a 50s-themed burger joint in Mount Ayr. “We need a strong woman to turn this country around, right?”…

“I’ve noticed that when her name is mentioned sometimes that there’s a lot of men that wouldn’t vote for a woman,” said Kinkade, who counted herself among the undecided after visits by a few candidates this past week. “A lot of them are the head of the households in these farming communities.”