Women. (Photo: Associated Press)

Today, linguist Deborah Tannen and journalist Sally Quinn met for a morning summit at Georgetown waterfront restaurant Sequoia to discuss the state of women. Tannen is a Georgetown University professor who produces popular books named after gendered linguistic cliches like "You Just Don't Understand" and "That's Not What I Meant!" Quinn is a storied Washington Post columnist who made a career by reporting on (and playing) the Washington social scene; now she writes about God.

Topics discussed, in front of a crowd of hundreds, included: Nipples in the office; the Bill O'Reilly make-up room double-standard; discovering Elizabeth Warren's hidden babe. After the jump, Tannen and Quinn's top 20 insights into the ladies:

20. At the Washington Post today, THERE'S SORT OF AN ANDROGYNOUS QUALITY about the young men and women. And there are a lot of gay people who are out now . . . And they're all the same. There's an equality now in the way they are interacting with one another." - Sally Quinn

19. "One thing I've noticed is that HIGH-POWERED WOMEN TODAY ARE ALL TAKING THEIR HUSBANDS' NAMES. These women are in their 20s and 30s and sometimes in very high-powered positions. When I got married, I never would have considered taking my husband's name . . . I think it's a good thing. I think it shows that women feel more comfortable with their power." -Sally Quinn

18. "If you look around the room at the range of hairstyles for men and women, the range for men is very limited. For women, the range is so vast, that THE CHANCE THAT ANYONE IS GOING TO MAKE THE RIGHT CHOICE FOR EVERYONE IS VERY SLIM. You can always look at a woman's hair and say she would look better with her hair shorter, longer, pushed forward, pulled back, different color, not colored." -Deborah Tannen

17. "Katherine Weymouth projects an image of power. It says, "I can dress like a woman. I can dress like a girl. I DON'T HAVE TO DRESS LIKE A MAN, because I'm the publisher of the Washington Post." - Sally Quinn

16. "In the wake of this whole Christine O'Donnell thing, THE WICCANS ARE CRAZED. The wiccans are actually great, because they believe in nature . . . the believe in kindness and gentleness and that sort of thing." - Sally Quinn

15. "When we dress for the workplace, the question hovering over us is "Sex." HOW SEXY ARE WE? Sex is a cultural expectation of being a woman in a way that it's not for men. Women have to dress sexy enough that we're seen as good women, but not so sexy that we're not taken seriously . . . It is a challenge we confront and men don't." -Deborah Tannen

14. "My liberal friends wonder why I agree to go on Bill O'Reilly's show . . . I tell them, THEY HAVE THE BEST MAKEUP PEOPLE. Whenever I'm on Bill O'Reilly, people say, 'You looked so great on FOX last night.' But when I ask, 'What did you think about what I said?' they go blank. THEY HAVE NO IDEA WHAT I WAS SAYING." - Sally Quinn

13. "Whenever I'm on the show, I'll be in the makeup chair for 45 minutes. In that time about 10 men will come in, get a little bit of makeup, and leave . . . People are paying attention to what they're saying BECAUSE THERE'S NOTHING TO LOOK AT. But when a woman goes on television, people can immediately say, 'Why is she wearing those earrings?'" - Sally Quinn

12. "I did go on [Bill O'Reilly's show] once and they were talking about the economy. I wanted to say, 'I don't know anything about the economy, why did you bring me on?' So eventually I said, CAN WE TALK ABOUT DANCING WITH THE STARS?'" - Sally Quinn

11. "How many hours did I think about what I was going to wear here today? I considered I might wear a frilly dress, but I thought, there will be businesswomen here and I should dress like a businesswoman. . .  PEOPLE SAY I LOOK OLD WHEN I WEAR BLACK." - Sally Quinn

10. "In so many people's minds, God is a male. They want to see a male figure as a spiritual leader. But some of the most spiritual people I know are women . . . My son is getting married in 2 weeks, and the idea that my husband is involved in any way in the planning of that is ridiculous . . . IT'S GOING TO BE AN AMAZING SPIRITUAL EXPERIENCE." - Sally Quinn

9. "All these tacky self-help books about how to bring out the goddess in you . . . I kind of like it. The fact is that WOMEN HAVE ALL THE POWER. We just haven't figured out how to take it. There is a goddess in all of us. If women ran the world, it would be a different place, a better place . . . I know I'm going out on a limb here." - Sally Quinn

8. "At the beginning of the feminist movement, it was women taking power back and it was really heady stuff . . . then it got out of control, as all revolutions do. THEY GOT MILITANT . . . there was a period there where it was embarrassing to get pregnant." - Sally Quinn

7. "When I was pregnant, a friend came up to me and said, 'You're not going to breastfeed. IT'S VERY UNFEMINIST TO BREASTFEED.' I said, 'Well yes, I think I'm going to.' She said she found that 'disgusting' . . . It didn't sound right to me." - Sally Quinn

6. "A lot of women don't identify as feminists today only because IT'S USED AS A PEJORATIVE. It's not the dictionary definition of the word, it's how it's used in a social context . . . I spoke with one student who had gotten into an argument with a boy. She called him a male chauvinist pig. He called her a feminist. She didn't want to be called something that was used as a pejorative." - Deborah Tannen

5. "WOMEN GET SCREWED IN EVERY RELIGION." - Sally Quinn

4. "Sarah Palin's femininity contributes to why many people don't take her seriously . . . she's attractive and flirtatious, and I understand her greatest supporters are working class men. I imagine that wouldn't be the case if she wasn't so attractive and so flirtatious. On the other end, HER BEING SO FEMININE REINFORCES PEOPLE'S PERCEPTION THAT SHE'S NOT SERIOUS." - Deborah Tannen

3. "Sarah Palin is sexy. And it's hard to separate out her sexiness from her political beliefs . . . The question is, CAN A REALLY SEXY WOMAN BE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES?" - Sally Quinn

2. "At the Washington Post, I worked with a Style reporter who was always flaunting her stuff. She would wear see-through blouses with no bras. THIS WAS WHEN FEMINISTS WERE NOT SUPPOSED TO WEAR BRAS. It was very distracting. But she got some great assignments." - Sally Quinn

1. "Elizabeth Warren has got that very short bob, little or no makeup, and little glasses . . . I thought, 'SHE IS A BABE, BUT SHE'S A BABE IN DISGUISE' . . . I started thinking, "What would she look like with long hairr? With her glasses off?" She would be a real babe. But would people take a babe seriously as a consumer czar? And then I thought, 'THAT'S A LITTLE DEPRESSING, THAT SHE CAN'T LOOK MORE LIKE THE BABE THAT SHE IS.'" - Sally Quinn