Maureen Dowd, "When Hillary Clinton Killed Feminism": Murder, She Wrote?

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"There’s a special place in hell for women who don’t help each other!"

- Madeleine Albright, speaking on behalf of Hillary Clinton's candidacy

Can you imagine a male candidate for president, Democrat or Republican, applauding and laughing raucously when endorsed by another man, who declares to the crowd, "There’s a special place in hell for men who don’t help each other!" I can't. Such a mistake would be fatal. But then I also couldn't imagine two PBS "NewsHour" journalists, Gwen Ifill and Judy Woodruff, moderators of the Democratic debate on  Thursday, failing to ask Hillary a single question about the State Department subpoena served upon the Clinton Foundation. Was this "feminism" or "sexism" at work, or just journalistic ineptitude?

In a guest New York Times op-ed entitled "My Undiplomatic Moment," Madeleine Albright yesterday attempted to explain away her controversial "special place in hell" comment supporting Hillary's candidacy. Albright wrote:

"However, I do want to explain why I so firmly believe that, even today, women have an obligation to help one another. In a society where women often feel pressured to tear one another down, our saving grace lies in our willingness to lift one another up. And while young women may not want to hear anything more from this aging feminist, I feel it is important to speak to women coming of age at a time when a viable female presidential candidate, once inconceivable, is a reality."

Maureen Dowd, however, will have none of this. In her latest New York Times op-ed entitled "When Hillary Clinton Killed Feminism," Dowd writes:

"The interesting thing about the spectacle of older women trying to shame younger ones on behalf of Hillary is that Hillary and Bill killed the integrity of institutional feminism back in the ’90s — with the help of Albright and Steinem.

Instead of just admitting that he had had an affair with Monica Lewinsky and taking his lumps, Bill lied and hid behind the skirts of his wife and female cabinet members, who had to go out before the cameras and vouch for his veracity, even when it was apparent he was lying.

Seeing Albright, the first female secretary of state, give cover to President Clinton was a low point in women’s rights."

Ouch!

Any discussion of Hillary and feminism, however, would not be complete without mentioning the millions of dollars donated to the Clinton Foundation by Saudi Arabia, a country which whips and imprisons gang rape victims.

And then there is also that small matter involving Hillary's tweet on November 22, 2015:

"Every survivor of sexual assault deserves to be heard, believed, and supported."

Which was followed by Juanita Broaddrick's tweet on January 6, 2016:

"I was 35 years old when Bill Clinton, Ark. Attorney General raped me and Hillary tried to silence me. I am now 73....it never goes away."

With a little luck, all of this talk about Hillary's candidacy will be rendered moot when the FBI weighs in with a recommendation concerning the use of her home server for sending and receiving top secret government communications (including emails exchanged with President Obama, who claims he never knew that his secretary of state was using a private server). Further afield, my guess is that if Hillary is forced to withdraw from the race: a) no one will ever again pay her anything approaching $500,000 for a speech (although maybe she could make a paid guest appearance on "The Biggest Loser"), and b) her marriage to Bill (of convenience or inconvenience) will end within a year.

By the way, it is fast becoming apparent that Elizabeth Warren was wise not to endorse Hillary. Two days ago, in a Boston Globe article entitled "Why Elizabeth Warren can’t endorse Hillary Clinton," Eric Fehrnstrom wrote:

"Stumping for Hillary Clinton before the Tuesday vote, Madeline Albright delivered her now-famous 'special place in hell' warning to women who don’t help other women. If the Clinton campaign was sending a not-too-subtle message to Senator Warren, they’re going to have to wait a long time, maybe until hell freezes over."

Hell, however, could freeze over if Hillary - a narcissist, not a feminist - runs against Donald Trump, also blindly enamored of himself, in November, which is not so far off.

Stay tuned . . .

Gail Collins, "Republicans, Widows and Porn": Sisters in Arms

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"There’s a special place in hell for women who don’t help each other!"

- Madeleine Albright, speaking on behalf of Hillary Clinton's candidacy

Yesterday I observed that The Washington Post, MSNBC, CNN, Yahoo News, Bloomberg and UPI had all published articles concerning the State Department subpoena served on the Clinton Foundation, but The New York Times decided to ignore the matter entirely. I asked whether the Times is still a newspaper or if it has become a highly politicized, self-serving propaganda machine. Well, maybe I was too harsh on the Times. After all, during the PBS "NewsHour" Democratic debate on Thursday, Gwen Ifill and Judy Woodruff remarkably failed to ask Hillary a single question about the subpoena.

I supposed that it should come as no surprise that in a New York Times op-ed entitled "Republicans, Widows and Porn," Gail Collins also fails today to mention the subpoena. Instead she reserves most of her criticism for Ted Cruz ("The run-up to this weekend’s Republican debate was greatly enlivened by the news that Amy Lindsay, an alum of 'Animal Lust' and 'Whose Thong Is It Anyway?,' was starring in a Cruz campaign ad") and Donald Trump ("it might provide the opportunity for someone to recall that the widow in question once referred to the man who is now the leading Republican presidential candidate as 'a maggot, a cockroach and a crumb'").

So what is more important? The pulling of a Cruz advertisement or service of a subpoena upon the Clinton Foundation? We obviously know what's more important for Gail.

But don't worry, Gail! You've got good company! In a guest Times op-ed entitled "My Undiplomatic Moment," Madeleine Albright attempts to explain away her "special place in hell" comment supporting Hillary's candidacy. Albright writes:

"However, I do want to explain why I so firmly believe that, even today, women have an obligation to help one another. In a society where women often feel pressured to tear one another down, our saving grace lies in our willingness to lift one another up. And while young women may not want to hear anything more from this aging feminist, I feel it is important to speak to women coming of age at a time when a viable female presidential candidate, once inconceivable, is a reality."

Hillary is a "viable" candidate? Sorry, Madeleine, but the State Department subpoena (you remember the State Department, don't you, Maddy?) served on the Clinton Foundation did away with that viability. As Chris Cillizza wrote in a Washington Post article entitled "Hillary Clinton’s week just went from bad to worse":

"There is, without question, a desire on the part of many Republicans to cast Clinton in the worst possible light using almost any means necessary. But it strains credulity to believe that Republicans somehow concocted a way to get the State Department and the FBI to look into Clinton's tenure at State."

Hillary's candidacy will unravel when the FBI makes its recommendations. She would be doing the United States, the Democratic Party and women a favor by ending her presidential bid now and not later, unless it is her intention to demonstrate conclusively that female politicians are just as despicable as male politicians.