Suburban Guerrilla

May 20th, 2008 at 11:08 am by Susie

Shorter Richard Cohen:

Why won’t that ~~stupid bitch~~ woman just quit?

BTD has even more.

Posted in Media, Politics As Usual

21 Responses to “Why She Fights”

on 20 May 2008 at 12:19 pm1snuzy mandrake

it’s really offensive to attribute every critique of clinton to sexism. i mean, i don’t like richard cohen, and i don’t agree with his column today, but lamberts habit of summarizing every time someone inquires whether clinton should end her campaign as “why won’t the bitch quit” just ends up minimizing the actual sexism that has regularly reared its head in this race. i mean, clinton really has been called a “bitch” in this race. that’s a lot worse than cohen’s sloppy column in which he pretends that he isn’t part of the anti-clinton bandwagon.
on 20 May 2008 at 12:40 pm2Bob

I don’t care if Sen. Clinton spends the next 10 years campaigning. I do care if she continues to hurt the Democratic Party in the process. Her latest gambit is to cite noted independent Karl Rove as proof of her electability. Giving him ANY credence is a slap in the face to every liberal in the country. He is as sleazy as they come and deserves NO respect from any Democrat ever.
on 20 May 2008 at 12:55 pm3Stuart

Susie, I think you (and others who are seemingly rabidly anti-Obama) missed this last sentence:

“And when that happens, Hillary Clinton — who will be only 65 in 2012 and four years after that still will be younger than McCain is now — will be positioned to run for president, not as someone’s wife, but as a gritty fighter who just would not quit. ”

When I read that personally I thought it made the whole piece sound like some (ok, admittedly grudging) respect for what hrc is doing.

But maybe that’s just my misogynist self over-reading the piece.
on 20 May 2008 at 1:40 pm4memyself

Obama has opened up a 16-point lead over Clinton in the latest Gallup daily tracking poll of Democrats and Democratic-leaning voters. The cross tabs show Clinton’s core demographics moving to Obama, including women. While sexism by the media is probably (hopefully) perceived widely, I really don’t think the Obama as a sexist meme is felt strongly outside a hard core circle.

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2008/05/20/poll-obama-gaining-support-with-key-clinton-demographics/
on 20 May 2008 at 1:49 pm5Zon

Snuzy, I agree with some of what you said. I agree that “it’s really offensive to attribute every critique of clinton to sexism”. I also agree that it’s really offensive to pretend that sexism didn’t exist in the campaign, as Cohen does in his poorly written excuse for a column.
on 20 May 2008 at 2:44 pm6votermom

it’s really offensive to attribute every critique of clinton to sexism.

It’s really offensive to hear men tell women what things are and aren’t sexism.
on 20 May 2008 at 3:10 pm7zuzu

“And when that happens, Hillary Clinton — who will be only 65 in 2012 and four years after that still will be younger than McCain is now — will be positioned to run for president, not as someone’s wife, but as a gritty fighter who just would not quit. ”

When I read that personally I thought it made the whole piece sound like some (ok, admittedly grudging) respect for what hrc is doing.

And one problem is that despite her two terms in the Senate, she’s still — as Cohen and you accept implicitly here — considered to be running now “as somebody’s wife.” IOW, she doesn’t get to run on her own record regardless.

As for why the “GET OUT NOW!” crap is sexist — no other candidate has ever faced the pressure she’s facing to get out. Teddy Kennedy went all the way to the convention despite Carter having enough pledged delegates to win the nomination; moreover, Kennedy’s run actually did damage Carter (and gave us the superdelegates). Yet where was the constant drumbeat for him to get out? Where was the constant drumbeat for Gary Hart, who wasn’t even as close to Mondale’s delegate totals but a hell of a lot closer than Kennedy was to Carter’s, close enough that the nomination was decided by superdelegates, to get out?

Her latest gambit is to cite noted independent Karl Rove as proof of her electability. Giving him ANY credence is a slap in the face to every liberal in the country.

Obama’s called the Republicans “the party of ideas,” praised Reagan, and said that he would consider having Republicans in key positions on his Cabinet. Were you screaming about the harm that did to the party when Obama said all those things? I’m guessing not.
on 20 May 2008 at 3:42 pm8brendancalling

“It’s really offensive to hear men tell women what things are and aren’t sexism.”

Why? Are men incapable of recognizing sexism simply because we’re men? If so, that’s a pretty sexist statement.
on 20 May 2008 at 3:50 pm9James Guglielmino

“It’s really offensive to hear men tell women what things are and aren’t sexism.” Tjat is as sexist as it gets and TOTALLY inappropriate. I personlly hoped to be able to vote for Hillary Clinton. It would please me to have the oportunity to vote for a woman…if she proved herself to be the best candidate. I have been terribly disappointed with the direction Hillary Clinton has taken her campaign. It is my sense that she has embraced the kinds of bull shit stuff Rove has always done and it has turned me off badly, even angered me. There was (almost) never a moment when I entertained one second thought that I would’t vote for her if she got the nomination but it would have been grudgingly and with little hope that we would see any change from what we can expect from McSame…hmmmm…no, she is clearly brighter than him…No matter, you get the point. I wish you wouldn’t do THAT. We are supposed to be progressives here. My disdain for what Clinton is exactly that.
Gug
on 20 May 2008 at 4:17 pm10Stuart

Zuzu,

“And one problem is that despite her two terms in the Senate, she’s still — as Cohen and you accept implicitly here — considered to be running now “as somebody’s wife.” IOW, she doesn’t get to run on her own record regardless.”

Well, if she is claiming that time and experience as First Lady is a reason that she is the better candidate, then yes…she IS running (at least partly) “as somebody’s wife”. After all, the only way to become First Lady (or First Spouse if she does manage to get the nomination and go on to win the general) is to be married to the President. So far it has only been women who performed that duty. Someday it may well be a man who could then conceivably run for President himself. If he then claimed that part of his experience was based on being First Spouse, how would that be any different?
on 20 May 2008 at 4:18 pm11Bob

zuzu: “As for why the “GET OUT NOW!” crap is sexist — no other candidate has ever faced the pressure she’s facing to get out.”
What you are really arguing regarding past primaries is bloggers weren’t yelling for the second-place candidate to step aside, which is hard to argue as the internet was in its infancy or didn’t exist. I’ve read you repeatedly using the “never before in history…” argument and shake my head in disbelief every time. In 1980 the “media” environment was a mere sliver of what it is today. I am 50 years old and in 1980 lived near a major city. I couldn’t get cable TV (it existed but only served major cities at the time) so my reception was all of 4 channels. I subscribed to a local newspaper and the New York Times. Those were my sources of day-to-day campaign coverage. Today – every day – I open this crazy old internet and read the opinions of everybody from Pulitzer Prize winning journalists to people commenting at blogs. Guess what – I’m exposed to far more voices then ever before. And I consider that a good thing. I don’t consider it a good thing when people use that difference to claim “never before in history…” but it’s a good thing over all. Please stop confusing the proliferation of voices in the internet age with the paucity of voices in an expensive to produce and broadcast opinion recent, but pre-internet, age.
You even – this time around – present one of many proofs of how incorrect your statement is in the same sentence “moreover, Kennedy’s run actually did damage Carter (and gave us the superdelegates).” Now think about that for a minute. In 1980 Kennedy DID face enormous pressure from within the party hierarchy to step aside, as a casual stroll through NYT back-issues will reveal. What’s more, party insiders were so livid over what Kennedy had done that they “…gave us the superdelegates” Yes, that’s the point. Party insiders wanted Carter to be campaigning against Reagan which he couldn’t do as he was too busy fending off Kennedy and as a result created a non-democratic method of cutting off such a challenge in the future. Which ironically enough you and other Clinton supporters now grasp at in a last ditch effort to aid the challenger. The SuperD’s were not created for that purpose – they were created so the party insiders could cut the process off short and anoint the preferred candidate early. Which is why I’ve been arguing against reliance on these most non-democratic delegates while smiling bemusedly at the clueless Clinton supporters arguing the SuperD’s should come to her rescue.
“Obama’s called the Republicans “the party of ideas,” praised Reagan, and said that he would consider having Republicans in key positions on his Cabinet. Were you screaming about the harm that did to the party when Obama said all those things? I’m guessing not.”
No, zuzu, I didn’t scream about any of that. He made the rather bland observation that the Republican Party did indeed present broad new ideas at a time when the Democratic Party existed pretty much in reaction mode. Now, I’m not saying that’s etched in stone, but it’s a standard interpretation taken up by a wide range of journalists, poly sci types and historians, liberal, conservative, and all other stripes. He never praised Reagan – he referred to him as a “transformational” president – which he was – and in the same speech he went on to criticize the very policies which were so damned transformational. Put down the Kool Aid long enough and some of this will become clear to you.
And Republicans in his cabinet. Well I’m SHOCKED beyond belief. Imagine a candidate for president espousing bland calls for bi-partisanship. Once again “…never before in history….” Sorry, I’m laughing too hard over that last one to bother spelling it all out for you.
The bottom line is simple. The problem is – as I said before – I don’t care if Clinton stays in the race. I do care if she does so in ways that increase the possibility of McCain winning and/or grant legitimacy to a loathsome piece of shit like Karl Rove. Giving credence and weight to the statements of Karl Rove helps who? The Democrats? Right. Enjoy your Kool Aid.
on 20 May 2008 at 4:30 pm12brendancalling

I still want to know if men are incapable of recognizing sexism simply because we’re men.
I think the woman I live with might disagree with you. Of course she’s an Obama supporter, so maybe she doesn’t count.
on 20 May 2008 at 4:40 pm13snuzy mandrake

It’s really offensive to hear men tell women what things are and aren’t sexism

am i saying what is or isn’t sexism?

cohen didn’t use the word “bitch” in his column. other people have referred to clinton as “bitch.” if anytime someone wonders whether it would be better for clinton to suspend her campaign gets recharacterized as a sexist attack, then it minimizes all sexist attacks.

and don’t get me wrong, i am not defending cohen’s column. richard cohen has long been a leader of the clinton-hating faction. and not just hillary, he seems to have a bug up his ass for bill as well. it’s just that cohen’s sad excuse for a column can be addressed on its own merits. you don’t have to make it seem like he used the word “bitch” when, in fact, he doesn’t. there’s plenty of hay to be made with the stuff he said

As for why the “GET OUT NOW!” crap is sexist — no other candidate has ever faced the pressure she’s facing to get out. Teddy Kennedy went all the way to the convention despite Carter having enough pledged delegates to win the nomination; moreover, Kennedy’s run actually did damage Carter (and gave us the superdelegates). Yet where was the constant drumbeat for him to get out? Where was the constant drumbeat for Gary Hart, who wasn’t even as close to Mondale’s delegate totals but a hell of a lot closer than Kennedy was to Carter’s, close enough that the nomination was decided by superdelegates, to get out?

the difference is that the campaign season was much shorter in 1980 and 1984. the entire primary season in those days was only a few months long before the convention. now it’s over twice as long, raising the concerns that longer contentious primaries means more damage to the party’s eventual nominee. and so, in recent history, anyone who falls behind ends up getting a rash of calls to drop out. i remember quite well when everyone seemed to be calling howard dean to drop out after he lost iowa and new hampshire in 2004. if you don’t want to go back that far, plenty of people talked about getting richardson, biden, and dodd to drop out before even the first vote was cast in late 2007. the day after john edwards came in second in the iowa caucus (clinton came in 3rd), talk started about how he should drop out. that only intensified after his loss in new hampshire. at that point, edwards had more of a chance at the nomination than clinton does now.

the primary calendar has been lengthening with each presidential race, as it gets longer, the races seem to be endless and there’s a real concern that extended primaries hurt the eventual nominee. and so in recent races, commentators have called for the candidate who is behind to drop out.

no doubt some people who call for her to drop out are motivated by sexism. but some people honestly believe it is damaging to the party for reasons that have nothing to do with sexism. and so it’s wrong to assume every argument about clinton dropping out must a priori be motivated by sexism.
on 20 May 2008 at 4:50 pm14k

I think men who say that women don’t like Clinton and therefore there must be no sexism don’t fucking get it.
on 20 May 2008 at 4:52 pm15memyself

Umm OK - here it comes from this 57 YO white woman:

It absolutely is offensive to attribute every critique of Clinton to sexism. In fact it is blatantly sexist and considerably detrimental to efforts to expose and wipe out actual occurrences of sexism. Every time you cry “sexist!” when it is a only partisan ploy, you cause more men and women to begin to have doubts about valid cases of sexism.

When I was the only woman majoring in Physics in my college in the 1970’s the most sexist language I ever heard came from the women on campus who most loudly self proclaimed themselves to be feminists. It took many, many years for me to take another look and embrace the feminist movement because of those women.

Crying wolf will NOT help the cause. Too much of what I have heard and read about sexism aimed at Clinton has really been bogus spin. That sort of bull just belittles the very real sexism we should all be fighting.
on 20 May 2008 at 5:20 pm16Zon

Brendan:
I still want to know if men are incapable of recognizing sexism simply because we’re men.

No, men are not incapable of recognizing sexism simply because they are men. Thankfully, I know a bunch of men who try their best to recognize sexism and call it out when they see it.

Still, it rankles to hear a lot of men insisting that women are imagining sexism or that women are “crying wolf” when they bring up sexism. Granted, there is no scientific test that proves that a particular incident is sexist, so opinions can differ. Still, it would be totally awesome if the guys could take seriously what women are perceiving and why they are reacting that way, rather than ridiculing or dismissing it. Of course, that may be impossible in the current context, in which any discussion of sexism immediately gets read as either a defense or critique of My Candidate.
on 20 May 2008 at 5:22 pm17zuzu

Well, if she is claiming that time and experience as First Lady is a reason that she is the better candidate, then yes…she IS running (at least partly) “as somebody’s wife”.

You might have a point if she were merely running on having been married to the president, rather than on what she herself did as First Lady. I don’t think many people would write off Eleanor Roosevelt’s experience as First Lady as that of “just a wife.” Clinton may have come to national attention as the wife of the president, but she went with the Eleanor Roosevelt model of being an activist First Lady, versus the Mamie Eisenhower role of being the White House hostess.

It’s the refusal to acknowledge that she’s not simply an appendage of her husband, and that she’s not only capable of gaining independent experience and knowledge rather than simply relying on her husband’s reflected glory that’s sexist. Someone (possibly Peggy Noonan) sneered that you wouldn’t want the plumber’s wife to come fix your pipes. However, what if the plumber’s wife had worked as an apprentice to her husband for eight years, and then worked as a journeyman plumber? That’s the difference here.

the difference is that the campaign season was much shorter in 1980 and 1984. the entire primary season in those days was only a few months long before the convention. now it’s over twice as long, raising the concerns that longer contentious primaries means more damage to the party’s eventual nominee.

“Over twice as long”? Really? I didn’t know that we’ve gone back to the old calendar, missing July and August, where “September” is so named because it’s the seventh month of the year. 1984’s primaries went from February to June, and the convention was in mid-July. The 1980 convention was in August, and the primaries started in February.

And again, it’s widely acknowledged that the Kennedy candidacy was nasty and brutal, and that Teddy’s performance at the DNC was as nasty as they come. Yet that gets handwaved as just politics, while Clinton — who stands a far better chance than Kennedy ever had of pulling out a win — gets accused of “hurting the party.”

And yet nobody can ever specify exactly how she’s harming the party (other than the accusations of “using right-wing framing,” which are ridiculous coming from Obama backers, considering that he kicked off the season by putting Social Security into play, praising Reagan, suggesting that not only should the Dems not fight the Republicans, but that he should have them on key national-security positions in the cabinet, and using anti-choice rhetoric to talk about choice). How is her candidacy hurting the party? The voters sure as hell are energized. Registrations are way up, as is turnout (yes, even in Florida and Michigan).

If anybody’s hurting the party, it’s the DNC, who’ve fucked up the process from the beginning through incomprehensibly punitive rulings on Florida and Michigan and allowing Donna Brazile to put her thumb on the scale while spreading misinformation about the rules and procedures of the delegate-selection process.

Besides, what the fuck is wrong with Democrats who don’t have the stomach for a fight?
on 20 May 2008 at 6:10 pm18Bob

In 8 years as First Lady Hilary Clinton never carried a security clearance. Just how active was she? Let’s see
- foreign policy discussions: couldn’t be in the room.
- budget discussions: couldn’t be in the room unless all that was being discussed was the most generic, broad-based figures.
- Any issue involving DoD, terrorism, the inner workings of the Justice Department, etc: couldn’t be in the room
And I’m just scratching the surface.
In short, claiming some sort of activist, hands-on role in the inner workings of the White House for someone not carrying a security clearance shows a rather shallow understanding of how the government works.
on 21 May 2008 at 9:16 am19snuzy mandrake

And yet nobody can ever specify exactly how she’s harming the party

sure they have. the concerns are many: the longer this goes on the more democrats built hostility towards the other candidate, that clinton’s campaign has portrayed obama as being anti-working class white and thus pried an important constituency away from him, that her campaign has used reverand wright and other such things to weaken obama as a candidate, etc. plus there’s simply the same example you gave: that kennedy weakened carter in the general election in 1980.

just to be clear, i don’t agree with all these reasons. a few months ago, i was concerned that a long primary would weaken the democrats in the general election, but now i’ve flip-flopped because i see a lot of up-sides in an extended race. but my point isn’t that i think clinton should drop out, but rather that it is wrong to assume the only reason anyone would say such a thing is sexism.
on 21 May 2008 at 2:20 pm20k

One could make a variation of all those claims of ways in which Clinton is harming the party’s chances in November against Obama. And nobody is telling Obama he should quit. (Except me, of course. And I was only saying it to make a point.) Why? People have been saying that Clinton should quit since way back when. Why?
Probably for the same reasons it was considered impolite for me to stand up and say any number of things, not just the example I was going to put up but deleted. Yes this is anecdotal, and therefore not amenable to “rational, scientific” discourse. It might not be the main reason for the majority, or it may just one of many reasons. But it’s there, and denying that it is there is just as harmful to the national discourse as saying that racism doesn’t exist.
I haven’t gone snooping around - are there images of Obama as slave, or hanging in a tree, floating about? We’ve all seen the Curious George t-shirts, but does it go farther? Does it go to images of physical abuse being inflicted on the man? Are they widespread, and laughed off as “just a joke?” And would the person who put such images up go without being prosecuted for encouraging hate crimes? Would they be treated as just a small part of the national discourse?
I have no issue with anyone disliking Clinton as politician. It’s that the attacks so frequently turn on her being female, and that that is supposed to be okay. Stay on the subject. Stay on her AUMF vote. Stay on healthcare, big Pharma, whatever. That’s fine. Calling her bitch or cunt or whore, or showing pictures of her dressed as a witch, or battered, or any number of other attacks is over the line. Do not tell me that this is so very different from my being thrown out of the pinball room because I was a girl, or being turned down for jobs because I was a girl, or being paid less, because I was a girl. Do not tell me that this same thought pattern is not going on, for a huge part of the electorate. Maybe not you. Maybe not the majority. But it is there, and running deep and silent.
Compare and contrast Don Imus and Keith Olberman, and public reaction.
on 22 May 2008 at 3:01 am21atalex

Since Teddy Kennedy has been in the news lately with his tragic illness, I have wondering what he truly felt about all this. Kennedy could have dropped out in ‘80 once it became clear that he couldn’t win and thrown his support behind Carter. Had he done so, it’s possible that the Reagan Revolution could have been prevented entirely. I suspect that fact has haunted him every since, particularly since we now seem bent as a party on repeating his mistake.

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Why She Fights

21 Responses to “Why She Fights”

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