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

Tweet

"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

Tweet

"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.

Gail Collins, "Hillary, Bernie and History": Women Can Be Just As Rotten as Men?

Tweet

Yesterday, in the aftermath of comments from Madeleine Albright ("There’s a special place in hell for women who don’t help each other!") and Gloria Steinem ("When you’re young, you’re thinking: 'Where are the boys? The boys are with Bernie,'"), Ruth Marcus declared in a Washington Post opinion piece entitled "Hillary Clinton needs to figure out how to talk to women — and fast":

"Feminism doesn’t mean imposing a moral obligation on women to vote a certain way. It means trusting them, not demeaning them, when they choose the candidate they like best, male or female. Even if their mothers disagree."

Marcus's opinion piece followed on the heels of Frank Bruni's New York Times op-ed entitled "Feminism, Hell and Hillary Clinton":

"Clinton’s gender indeed matters. Just as you couldn’t properly evaluate Obama’s arc without factoring in race, you can’t see her accurately without recognizing that she’s a woman of her time, with all the attendant obstacles, hurts, compromises and tenacity.

That informs — and, ideally, illuminates — her perspective. And her presidency would carry a powerful, constructive symbolism that can’t and shouldn’t be ignored.

But those are considerations among many, many others in taking her measure and in casting a vote. To focus only or primarily on them is more reductive than respectful, and to tell women in particular what kind of politics they should practice is the antithesis of feminism, which advocates independence and choices."

Well said, Frank.

Gail Collins's "contribution" to the debate over Albright's and Steinem's remarks? In her latest New York Times op-ed entitled "Hillary, Bernie and History," Collins concludes (my emphasis in red):

"It took almost 40 more years before a woman won a major presidential primary. That was, of course, Clinton in 2008 in New Hampshire. She didn’t win the election, but she was so credible, and finished so strong, that the nation came away believing a woman in the White House was a completely normal idea.

If the younger voters who are flocking to Bernie Sanders don’t share their elders’ intense feelings about needing to elect a woman president right now, it’s partly because Hillary Clinton helped create a different world. So no matter what comes next, everybody’s a winner."

Hillary "helped create a different world"? Yeah, right. No mention by Collins of the acceptance by the Clinton Foundation of millions of dollars in donations from Saudi Arabia, a country which whips and imprisons gang rape victims.

And no mention by Collins of 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."

In addition, there's the small matter of Hillary's honesty as perceived by the American electorate. As reported by Chris Cillizza in Washington Post article entitled "Hillary Clinton has a major honesty problem after New Hampshire":

"Hillary Clinton has an honesty problem.

That point is driven home hard in the exit poll following Clinton's 22-point drubbing at the hands of Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders. More than one in three (34 percent) of all New Hampshire Democratic primary voters said that honesty was the most important trait in their decision on which candidate to support. Of that bloc, Sanders won 92 percent of their votes as compared to just 6 percent for Clinton."

Bottom line, Hillary Clinton has proven that female politicians can be just as despicable as male politicians. Collins writes:

"Strong as the emotions are in the Clinton and Sanders camps, both sides have to feel sort of chipper when they look over at the Republicans, who are engaged in something between professional wrestling and Godzilla Versus Rodan."

In fact, the real battle between Godzilla and Rodan will arrive if Hillary is nominated by the Democrats and runs against Trump in November. And in this case, no matter what comes next, everybody’s a ... loser.

Dana Milbank, "Leon Panetta, other former Obama subordinates show stunning disloyalty": Or Refreshing Honesty?

In a Washington Post opinion piece entitled "Leon Panetta, other former Obama subordinates show stunning disloyalty," Dana Milbank rebukes Leon Panetta, a Democrat who served as Obama's CIA director and secretary of defense, for disparaging the president in his recently published book "Worthy Fights." Milbank writes:

"Panetta criticized his former boss for having 'lost his way' — allowing the power vacuum in Iraq that created the Islamic State, rejecting Panetta’s and Hillary Clinton’s advice to arm the Syrian rebels and failing to enforce his own 'red line' barring Syria’s use of chemical weapons."

I don't understand what Milbank wants of Panetta. Speaking on CBS’s "Face the Nation" in July, Madeleine Albright admitted, "To put it mildly, the world is a mess." Obama had nothing to do with this? Should Panetta wait another two years and four months before explaining how American foreign policy went astray?

In fact, I think that Panetta owes America an explanation. You cannot correct mistakes without first acknowledging them.

A pity that Panetta would never consider running against Hillary for the Democratic nomination for president. America is in need of a breath of fresh air.

David Ignatius, "In ‘Hard Choices,’ Hillary Clinton is seen as hesitant to take big risks": Kissing the Considerable Ass of America's Next President?

How much more credibility can David Ignatius lose? In a previous Washington Post opinion piece, Ignatius claimed that Israel would be building 700 new settlements, when in fact 700 new housing units had been approved in a long existing offshoot of Jerusalem (see: http://jgcaesarea.blogspot.co.il/2014/05/david-ignatius-why-mideast-peace.html). Today in a WaPo opinion piece entitled "In ‘Hard Choices,’ Hillary Clinton is seen as hesitant to take big risks" (http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/in-hard-choices-hillary-clinton-opens-up-about-world-leaders-and-what-she-got-right/2014/06/09/b4ecc0d2-efeb-11e3-bf76-447a5df6411f_story.html?hpid=z3), Ignatius by and large gushes over Hillary Clinton's new autobiography. Ignatius begins:

"'Hard Choices' begins and ends in the empty voice of a campaign speech. But in between, it contains a clear and at times riveting account of Hillary Rodham Clinton’s four years as secretary of state.

This is a careful book, written tactically to burnish friendships and avoid making enemies. Perhaps that’s inevitable for an autobiographer who is considering running for president, but there are times when the reader feels he is being 'spun' rather than enlightened."

Hmm, why would Hillary possibly want to "spin" us?

Ignatius concludes that "the book should reinforce the case of those who believe Clinton is well prepared to be president."

A simple query for Ignatius? Does he truly believe that this "autobiography" was written by Hillary? If so, he's more of a naif than I ever imagined.

More to the point, where in the book do we learn of Hillary's crowning achievement - or any achievement for that matter - as secretary of state?

Although I read Madeleine Albright's "Madam Secretary" and "Memo to the President Elect," I don't have time for Hillary's self-serving campaign narrative.