To: Courtney E. Martin; Wendy Shanker

I love Wendy's imaginary “bitch” speech for Clinton. (Of course, I would.) And like Courtney, I was appalled—no, make that, seriously pissed off—at Charlotte Allen's simpering blow job to the patriarchy.

Speaking of simpering, Chris Matthews continues to smirk and leer about Clinton at every opportunity. Hirshman, who I too like, tries to talk about the class issues in this primary, but concludes with a cutesy swipe at “the fickleness of the female voter.” Allen's and Hirshman's editor tries to defend his decision to publish blatant misogyny by playing the humorless feminist card.

So yes, I too am getting really, really tired of these primaries. Up until recently, I've enjoyed this political season and been excited about the possibility of a brokered convention. But the unremitting media sexism is really wearing me down, and now racism's starting to show up, too, with the increasing claims that Obama is somehow “unqualified.” You know, the same way that black applicants to competitive colleges and professional programs are “unqualified” to take the places that ought to be somehow guaranteed to white students.

Sadly, the Clinton campaign has helped push this message. First with the “plagiarism” charges, and now with the (incredible) statement that McCain “will bring a lifetime of experience to the White House”–unlike Obama. Then there's Bill's statements in South Carolina, and Clinton's own insistence that Obama “denounce and reject” Farrakhan during the Ohio debate.

Part of me wants to point out that this is politics as usual, and that expecting Clinton to be “above” infighting or negative campaigning is just a version of the canard that women have to be twice as good as men to be considered equal. After all, what male politician in recent memory has refrained from negative ads? Even Obama's had a couple of sexist moments—his saying that “the claws come out” when Clinton was behind pretty bad, and though I'm inclined to give him the benefit of the doubt on the “periodically, when she's feeling down” remarks, some feminists aren't. Am I the only one who hears a tone of sexist disdain in arguments that Clinton, the woman candidate, should be more virtuous than that?

Still, part of what's attractive about Obama, obviously, is that he has (mostly) been more virtuous than we're used to. “The claws come out” is mild compared to implicitly endorsing McCain over Obama, or holding Obama responsible for Farrakhan despite not having responded to Andrew Cuomo's “shuck and jive” comments. I'm still hoping that if Obama wins the nomination, his change message and inspirational qualities will help Democrats appeal to America's better nature—and though I'm less sanguine about Clinton's ability to do this, I certainly hope that if she's nominated, she'll do the same.

But in the meantime, all these dog whistles are giving me a headache.

The post Electoral Dog Whistles Are Giving Me A Headache appeared first on Jewcy.

To: Courtney E. Martin; Wendy Shanker

I can't get on board with getting rid of “women's issues.” I know what the problem with that term is—much like “women's studies” or “minority studies” in academia, it effectively ghettoizes the subject matter—but if we get rid of it, then we're back to “universal” issues that exclude us altogether. It's like the argument that “feminism” is a divisive term, and we should all just be humanists. This is why I continue to think that Steinem's remark about “escaping the gender caste system” was so apropos: given that sexism still exists, there's no way for us to escape it, bracket it, transcend it, or put it aside.

That said. I just finished reading a really fascinating book: Erika Falk's Women for President: Media Bias in Eight Campaigns. Briefly, Falk's argument is that since 1872, every time a woman has run for office, the discussion of her candidacy—discussion like we're having here—has focused on her exceptionalism, her femininity, her appeal to women voters, etc. But. Studies show that when women run for office, they raise as much money as men do; they do as well or better than equally qualified men; and they win as often as men do relative to how often they run. According to Falk, the problem isn't the voters. The problem is us, the media—and women themselves, who do not enter races nearly as often as men do. Falk hypothesizes that this may be because media coverage of women is so gendered, and so biased, that it discourages women from running.

This is one reason why, in my initial comments, I tried to focus on Clinton's record. I'm excited that we're about to nominate either the first major-party black candidate or the first major-party woman, but I'm also increasingly frustrated by the way that discussion of the race has focused so heavily on symbolism, style, and rhetoric rather than on concrete differences between the candidates themselves.

Even when the candidates themselves have been given a chance to emphasize actual policy differences, as in the Texas debate, they seem to have generalized rather than been specific. Since reading Falk's book, I've especially noticed the way the Clinton campaign has itself been emphasizing gender. It seems to me that they've been doing more of this since Obama gained the lead (or maybe I've just become more aware of it); even the recent “red phone” ad, which overtly emphasizes Clinton's experience, covertly emphasizes her femininity by employing the “security mom” meme, focusing on putting the kids to bed and wanting to know that the world is safe while they sleep. Then there was her explicit invocation of Ann Richards, both in an ad and in the Texas debate, when she also mentioned that it was Barbara Jordan's birthday.

Obviously part of this is an attempt to rally what seems to have become Clinton's “base”: older, second-wave generation feminists. I think her emphasis on Obama's purported inexperience is part of this as well. Without the gender emphasis, it would be a pretty conventional “experience” vs. “inexperience” campaign. But with the gender emphasis, it's hard not to perceive it, at least in part, as an older woman correcting the younger generation—which is a major part of both the rhetoric and resentment of the “feminists ought to support Clinton” arguments. And whether because we tend to resent mothers, because America is a youth culture, or because it feeds directly into the Obama “change” message, it definitely seems to be a losing strategy. But the change message itself isn't unproblematic. Clinton's attempts to spin “change” as mere “speechmaking” didn't seem successful. Still, I do think that underlying the “inexperience” argument—which I think we'll see more of if Obama runs against McCain in the general election—is the implication that “change” is unspecific and vague, more rhetoric than substance. Of course, all presidential elections rely heavily on rhetoric, and McCain's reputation also relies on a certain popular vagueness about his being a “maverick.” (For example, there's a popular perception that he's not an anti-abortion extremist, despite his clear and appalling record on reproductive rights issues.)

Most voters don't dig deep into specific policy platforms, but the implication that Obama's a lightweight may have legs. Certainly Obama's been making a point in recent speeches to mention specific policy goals, which I interpret as a conscious attempt to demonstrate that he's inspirational and solid on the issues. I think, though, that the contention that voting for him because he's inspirational—or voting for Clinton because she is—is somehow different than voting on the “issues” is mistaken. Inspiring young people to active political participation is an issue. Representing an end to the old boy's club (whether as a woman or as a young black man) is an issue.

And after eight years of the Bush Administration, I think giving the people the sense that government is and should be responsive to their concerns is a vital issue. That, I think, is why the “change” message is so inspiring. It's not just “I'll change what Bush is doing” (which Clinton, too, is saying); it's “I'll change the appropriation of executive power, of presidential unaccountability, of crumbling civil liberties.” Clinton's “experience” argument relies in part on a claim of authority, and I think that voters are very nervous about that kind of presidential claim right now.

The post Hillary Clinton Should Run on Her Own Merits appeared first on Jewcy.

To: Courtney E. Martin; Wendy Shanker

Do women have any special obligation to support Clinton's candidacy? The obvious answer is no — only the most reactionary kind of identity politics would assert that women must support women, men must support men, etc. (And what are black women to do? Vote twice?)

It isn't that simple though. Clinton does have a shot at breaking the glass ceiling of the American presidency, and I for one think that if she wins it will be not only a symbolic victory — and symbols are important, mind you — but also a material one for American women.

Clinton really has made an explicit point of putting women's issues front and center in her political career. She spent the early years of her career working for the Children's Defense Fund. She started a parent education program in Arkansas. There's a page on her Senate website devoted to women's issues (no corresponding page on Obama's). She made a point, as first lady, of going to Beijing to speak at the UN's Fourth World Conference on Women, where she emphasized that "women's rights are human rights" — a fact that gets too little attention from the executive office of the so-called last remaining superpower.

She was the first person in national public life to try to achieve universal health care,* one of the things that would make the greatest difference in the lives of poor mothers; now that issue is at the center of the Democratic Party's agenda. When she failed, she pushed for the State Children's Health Insurance Program. In the Senate, she worked with Harry Reid (who is anti-abortion) to introduce the Prevention First Act in Congress. She and Patty Murray held the nomination of a new FDA chair hostage until Congress voted to make Plan B available over the counter. There's also the fact that according to the Huffington Post's research, Clinton's campaign staff is "balanced, but favors women," while Obama's campaign has "few women at the top." If you are a feminist who thinks that having more women in powerful positions is good for women's rights, then you do, in fact, have something of an obligation to support Clinton's candidacy.

Inasmuch as feminists like Robin Morgan, Gloria Steinem, and Erica Jong have endorsed Clinton as feminists, they are right to do so. Steinem is right, too, when she says that "some women, perhaps especially younger ones, hope to deny or escape the sexual caste system" — when young feminists argue that it's sexist to expect them to support Clinton "just" because she's a woman, or that feminism is "all about choices" (as if all choices were equally valid), they are, in fact, denying the fact of the sexual caste system. She's also right that "women…[grow] more radical with age," precisely because, the older one gets, the more experience one has with the fact of the sexual caste system, and the harder it becomes to ignore it.

As feminists, we should support Clinton. Not "just" because she's a woman; because she is a woman who, as a woman, has spent her life and career working for women's interests. Because we recognize that although not all women are good on women's issues, the more women there are in power, the more likely it is that everyone, men and women, will see women's rights as human rights.

That said, this feminist voted for Obama. Even though I felt bad about doing it. I made my choice primarily in response to another feminist's pro-Obama arguments: As Senator he introduced a nuclear non-proliferation initiative and co-sponsored a bill to secure conventional weapon stockpiles; he was central in new Congressional ethics legislation and open government initiatives; in Illinois, he spearheaded a bill requiring all police interrogations to be videotaped — and he got it passed, unanimously.

Those issues matter to me too, and given the current state of U.S. war policy and civil liberties, I found them decisive. But they're not feminist issues, and my decision wasn't, in the end, a feminist decision. Not because civil liberties and anti-weapons proliferation are incompatible with feminism (they aren't) but because in this election the candidate who's best on civil liberties is a man.

Feminists who support Obama aren't doing so because he's the best feminist candidate
(he isn't). They're supporting him because they like his position on the war or on civil liberties, or because they're more impressed with his political style or youth appeal than they are with Clinton's. These are completely valid and good reasons to vote for him, and there's nothing wrong with doing so — unless you insist that your feminist sisters are somehow oppressing you by pointing out that Clinton is the feminist choice. They're not. They're pointing out that Clinton is the feminist choice and asking you to vote accordingly.

As a feminist who voted for Obama, I'm pointing out that those like me can at least be honest about it. We all have multifaceted political and social identities. I'm a feminist, and I'm a mother, a Catholic, an American, a wife. Sometimes these various identities conflict: Heterosexual marriage, for example, is not a feminist institution. As a straight married woman, I'm making a compromise between my feminist beliefs and the world in which I actually live. As a no-bullshit feminist, I'm woman enough to admit it. As a voter, I faced a choice.

One candidate (possibly because he is black, possibly because he has lived abroad, possibly because his father is Kenyan) seems better on international issues. The other (partly because she is a woman, possibly because she has herself made compromises between her feminism and her other goals, possibly because she is in her sixties) is more experienced and a better feminist. I chose the first. It wasn't a feminist decision. I'm woman enough to admit that, too.

*Correction: the first high profile effort at achieving universal health care was during deliberations on the Social Security Act in 1935–ed.

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