I really respect the honesty in Rebecca Traister’s Elle piece on Hillary. I admire how she was willing to just “put it all out there” and take whatever criticism comes as a result. It’s a generous thing to do, really, to sacrifice yourself that way to make an important point. I mean, she’s not pretending that we can’t come along and poke holes in her arguments and point out where she’s being very emotional and a bit irrational. She’s okay with that as long as we have to listen to how she feels and maybe learn a little bit what it’s like to be really invested in the idea of a woman president for its own sake.
It’s a feeling and a sentiment that ought to be respected. And part of me just wants to say, “Okay, I hear you, I respect that” and be silent.
But, look, the thing is that part what’s going on is that white liberals like myself are being put on the defensive in a way that really isn’t fair. And we have feelings, too, which deserve the same kind of respect. So, when I read something like the following, I do feel like I need to respond:
There will be sexism, veiled and direct, from the right and the left. Democratic women will feel screwed by their friends all over again, as I did in August when I saw a poll showing Clinton ahead of her Democratic challenger Bernie Sanders by a mere 6 points with the party’s men and 44 points with its women: a 38-percentage-point gender gap that seemed to speak volumes about how much men on the left care about women’s leadership.
And oh, those guys—my friends, my colleagues, my professional sparring partners—make me mad. Not just because they’d never in a million years admit that their preference for a white guy has anything to do with gender, or because they suggest that I’m the regressive one for caring that Hillary’s a woman. I mean, obviously those things make me mad too. But the real bitch is when I hear her attacked by men who claim to be feminists but actually despise her with inexplicable intensity, when I hear her supporters belittled for their cute investment in a non-male presidential power. It makes me spittingly angry. It transforms me into a knee-jerk defender of a candidate about whom I actually feel very torn. I’m allowed to criticize Hillary all I want, but damn if another round of sniping from liberal white boys isn’t going to radicalize me in her defense all over again.
Again, when someone comes right out and tells you that they’re being “a knee-jerk defender” of someone or something, they aren’t actually trying to convince you of the intellectual merits of their argument. They’re telling you how they feel and asking you to respect the legitimacy of their feelings.
And I’m willing to do that, so long as we’re clear that knee-jerk reactions are not ideal. That’s the way you react instinctively before you’ve had a moment to process what you’ve just seen or heard. I’m in favor of processing stuff.
As for how I feel, all things being equal, I’d prefer a woman president to a male president and I’d prefer a Senate with 80 women instead of 80 men. But I also know that there’s something about Hillary Clinton that I can’t warm up to, and I’m not just talking about her politics. I examine those feelings all the time because I’m suspicious about those feelings. They are, in some sense, inexplicable, even if I would never describe them as terribly intense or anything like “despising” her. So, no, I’m not a “hot mess” about Hillary, but I am conflicted and I do wonder how my feelings about gender enter into the intellectual, conscious part of my political analysis.
What I don’t like is having these feelings, which I freely admit that I don’t fully understand myself, reduced to me being a “liberal white boy” who doesn’t give a damn about “women’s leadership” and is willing to “screw over” my fellow liberal female friends.
To Traister’s credit, she acknowledges that she’s loading Hillary’s candidacy up with a bunch of values that have little to nothing to do with anything specific to Hillary, but people are reacting to a real human being, not a gender. How I feel about Hillary is completely different from how I feel about Amy Klobuchar or Claire McCaskill or Barbara Mikulski. Maybe Klobuchar presents herself more like how I subconsciously want a woman to present herself, and maybe I like Mikulski’s form of combativeness better than I like McCaskill’s or Hillary’s. How I feel about their positions on issues also colors how I feel about them as people. I like Barbara Boxer’s politics but don’t have much respect for her as a politician, while I dislike Diane Feinstein’s politics but think she’s very effective and influential. You know, I can trust Elizabeth Warren and revere Paul Wellstone while not trusting Alan Grayson and not revering Dennis Kucinich. I make judgments about politicians based on everything I can bring to the table, and some politicians I just don’t quite feel comfortable with even if I can’t precisely describe my reasons.
In any case, it matters much less to me how I feel about Hillary as a person than it does how I feel about her position on Syria, and I’m not ready for the quagmire candidate. I feel like I should be able to make that point without getting lumped in with a bunch of jerks who are genuinely uncomfortable with female leadership. I should be able to say that having a woman president is important to me, but not as important as the distinctions between Hillary and Bernie, and probably Joe, on what to do (or not do) about the Middle East.
And I think I ought to be able to say that maybe gender does enter into it for me, a bit, even if I’m not really aware of quite how it does, but that this isn’t what’s driving my skepticism about and reluctance to see a Clinton restoration. You know, there’s also this guy Bill who is part of the package here, and perhaps how I feel about him is nearly as important as how I feel about her.
To be honest, I’ve been reconciled to a Clinton restoration for several years now, as readers here can attest. What I always say, though, is that the foreign policy piece is the hump I can’t quite surmount. I can’t just say, “well, look, if she doesn’t win the nomination all these people I care about are going to feel really disappointed and betrayed” and let that be the end of my decision making.
In closing, let me make a point about Jackie Robinson. When he came up to the Brooklyn Dodgers, some of the players threatened to sit out rather than suit up with a black guy. Here’s what their manager Leo Durocher had to say about that, “I do not care if the guy is yellow or black, or if he has stripes like a fuckin’ zebra. I’m the manager of this team, and I say he plays. What’s more, I say he can make us all rich. And if any of you cannot use the money, I will see that you are all traded.”
The Dodgers’ general manager Branch Rickey carefully chose Jackie Robinson to break the color barrier because he had the right temperament, in his estimation, to put up with all the hatred and hostility that he knew would accompany the move. Maybe that’s the best argument for Clinton being the first female president.
On the other hand, maybe it’s wrong to treat her like Jackie Robinson. After all, who’s Leo Durocher in this scenario? Who’s the one with the clear moral authority to tell us that we have to get on board or we’re going on the trading block?
The presidency isn’t a baseball game, and it’s not whether or not Hillary can hit a curveball or has zebra stripes that we’re worried about. I know some good people will feel terribly if she isn’t our nominee, but we can’t let that be decisive. There’s a bigger picture to consider.
And that’s just how I feel.
Sounds like the BLM discussion.
There’s a very easy test of Traister’s claim: have a poll which puts Bernie against Elizabeth Warren. If the numbers are similar to Bernie/Hillary, then she’ll have a point.
My guess is that both women and men would support Warren over Bernie, although he has much more political experience than she does. (I would certainly support Warren.) Sex is certainly a factor in all this, but I think Hillary’s centrist politics are much more important.
Disclaimer: I’m a straight white guy.
As a straight white woman, I wouldn’t support Warren for POTUS over Sanders. Not that I don’t think Warren isn’t great. The issue is experience and expertise. Warren has depth on an very important issue and now new Senator has ever hit the ground running as fast as Warren has. She’s also a fast learner and has added PP with some depth to her areas of interest. However, outside of that, she lacks breadth and has but a single election under her belt (2012 Massachusetts: Obama 60.65%; Warren 53.6%), and less than four years in office.
I’d support Warren because she’s more electable. Neither she nor Sanders would encounter anything but the stiffest conceivable resistance from all quarters.
I’d support Warren because she’s more electable. That’s an opinion; not a fact. The 2008 DEM primary dragged on for far too long because many DEM primary voters concluded that Hillary was more electable than an AA man. Maybe she was or maybe she wasn’t (that shall forever remain unknown), but it missed the point that in that year, practically any Democrat was more electable than a Republican. A third WH term for one party is very difficult to achieve, particularly when the sitting occupant has been a disaster. Shouldn’t have happened in 1988, but the Democratic Party is responsible… Read more »
A few points: A) I think Hillary is substantially more liberal than Bill. I think she has felt the need to hide that, because of her experience in the ’90s, but I think she’s over that. B) I agree that she’s more hawkish than Sanders, but is she significantly more hawkish than Obama? I have never heard her advocate for ground troops. C) Hillary’s abrasiveness stems in some part from her scripted behavior to the tenor of her voice which is kind of twangy and doesn’t always play well – though it turns out she can sing. … Read more »
Re: B) I don’t know if “hawkish” is the right term but she is more aggressive and maybe reckless. She comes across to me as more leap-before-you look. She wanted to arm the rebels before we knew anything about them despite proliferation risks and whether the data actually shows it works. Doing so could’ve possibly derailed nuke talks with Iran as well. She’s advocating for a NFZ which entails its own legal issues, logistical costs and increased risks. She also is more quick to act on options dealing with Ukraine. Some of this is presidential election politics but pushing to… Read more »
Don’t forget the real issue with Libya, which wasn’t Benghazi.
The real issue in Libya was that Qaddafi was going to unleash ethnic cleansing that threatened to destabilize the Arab Spring in Tunisia and Egypt.
Was that a quagmire? No. A disaster, sure, but not for the US. It’s a disaster made in Libya and fueled by the dynamic in Libya.
I admit to being more hawkish than most around here, but I don’t see the problem with using force from time to time. And I don’t see a problem with a NFZ over ISIL held territory or using airstrikes to attack them, they’re fucking nuts.
I don’t see the problem with using force from time to time, either, except that our use of force a) rarely improves the situation and b) is deployed very much on the basis of ‘they’re fucking nuts.’
Which isn’t, I suspect, an entirely productive military doctrine.
You can’t divorce the repercussions of our blowing up Libya’s governmental structure from the military operation in your evaluation . Regional effects along with effects on the Syrian war bring into question whether on the whole the intervention saved more lives than it cost.
http://oversight.house.gov/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/Gartenstein-Ross-Statement-5-1-Benghazi-Libya.
pdf
Here’s some information on NFZs. It’s not the simple, low risk, cost effective solution many make it out to be.
http://blogs.cfr.org/davidson/2015/05/05/how-no-fly-zones-work/
HRC is certainly more hawkish than Obama … she proved her point in Tuzla (Bosnia) as traveling First Lady and used the foreign policy vis-à-vis Russia as dictated by Brzezinski / Albright during her four years at State. John Kerry was a breath of fresh air in 2013 when she resigned. HRC still voted for the Iraq War, used awful advisors like Lanny Davis in Honduras; same with her choice of Dennis Ross as advisor Iran policy and later for the Middle-East; and as Tahrir Square protests started Frank Wisner was sent and recalled as special envoy to Egypt’s Mubarak.… Read more »
None of this responds to the point about gender: a female candidate for President will have to demonstrate “toughness” in a way that a male candidate won’t.
I don’t relate to either side of this. I don’t have any particularly bad feelings about Hilary personally. I think she’s quite likable. Something about her persona seems to hit a lot of people wrong, but I, myself, don’t feel this and never did. I sympathize with how unfairly she has been treated, including by Bill in his affairs. I don’t like some of the associates the Clintons have picked up, but that’s as much on Bill as her, maybe more, and, in any case, lots of my friends have friends I don’t care for. It’s life. I have no… Read more »
Well, I disagree with part of your argument. Having spent 2004 working with inner city youth to get out the vote, I got to know them well enough to understand how meaningful it would be to have a black president. It really mattered because it provided hope and legitimacy and self-esteem in areas that were sorely lacking those things. I understand what it will mean for young girls to see a women in charge of our country and how important that would be for them, and how positive and affirming. And I also know, conversely, that Hillary has… Read more »
Any sufficiently-left woman candidate would make it, standing on her head. None is ever offered, though.
As long as you don’t “actually despise her with inexplicable intensity,” I think you’re in the clear.
I’m a straight white guy who’s ambivalent about Hillary Clinton myself, but I see nothing of myself in Traister’s description there. If she would apply that judgment to me, knowing nothing else about me, then she’s some combination of a fool and an asshole.
On the other hand, the kind of guys she’s talking about do exist–men who really aren’t as feminist as they claim to be. I don’t blame her for being annoyed.
Still, there’s something incomplete about saying you’re going to rally to the support of this politician that you have all these disagreements with and all these qualms about just because some guys were mean to her.
Sure, that’s a legitimate feeling to have. But it’s just a feeling.
It’d be different if you didn’t have differences or qualms or a candidate out there that might better reflect your views.
it’s not any different than a lot of us did for the President. He was and is unfairly attacked by both the left and the right and often times I end up sounding like I support everything he does which isn’t the case but when you have to constantly defend against stupidity it leaves little room for nuance.
I do think a lot of women are going to feel bitter and betrayed if she loses. Rightly or wrongly, they think it is their turn and they are supporting the person who is easily the most qualified candidate. She understands the job better than anyone else, she is the most experienced, and she is the most accomplished. The media coverage of her has been outrageous and the criticisms of her from Sanders supporters – never mind Republicans – has been unfair. She is not responsible for the decisions her husband made. She is not an oligarch. She is not… Read more »
I do think about party unity. I think about everything. I’m always thinking.
It’s my curse.
And if you could convince me right now that we need Hillary or we’ll lose or be at substantial risk of losing, I’d sign right up enthusiastically.
But I’m not convinced that a candidate that is getting thumped by a socialist in New Hampshire at the moment is the juggernaut that you might imagine. And I see no juggernauts on the other side.
So, I’m keeping my options open.
And if you could convince me right now that we need Hillary or we’ll lose or be at substantial risk of losing, I’d sign right up enthusiastically. I think the general election campaign will be vastly different if it is Hillary or Joe vs anybody, or Sanders against anyone. I do not think Hillary is a juggernaut but I do think she is the Democrat most likely to win. If Bernie is the candidate, money is going to be a big problem and not just for him. How does the DNC raise money? How do other Democratic candidates raise money… Read more »
You may have noticed that I haven’t been pumping Sanders up.
I don’t think our options are going to be limited to Sanders vs. Clinton.
But, if they are, then this is gonna be a doozy of an election with all the marbles on the table. I’ll be ready.
Biden. Should be interesting to see if Hillary goes after him on women’s reproductive rights, esp as relate to Supreme Court nominees. Be very telling if she doesn’t, no? And the TTP positions will decide a lot of folks, imo.
I’m not sure I understand this comment. Biden? I like Joe – even think he might make a better president than Hillary – but his only rationale to get in is to be anti-Hillary. He won’t change how women feel about the party turning their back on Hillary. He’ll exacerbate it. An election with all the marbles on the table? Following a president who finally ended the Reagan era and turned the country to the left? The objective should be to take the Obama coalition and keep pushing left inch by inch for 35 years just like the Reagan coalition… Read more »
Well, I want to make a statement, and be seen making it.
Because at the end of the day, politics isn’t about policies. It’s about self-expression. It’s about my telling the world how I feel by my choices in consumer products, in this case, Presidential candidates.
I want to have seen the band twice, in person, before you even heard them on the radio.
That’s what’s important to me.
Biden will get in as a way to continue Obama’s policies vs. Hillary who will not, both in FP and domestically [look at her terminology “shared prosperity” vs. rebuilding the middle class; look at her FP statements]; recently I took another look at the White House Correspondents dinner video from 2015, that Barack has himself introduced by Joe in a fairly long segment with Julia Louis-Dreyfus. But in fact the segment reintroduces Biden as a cool guy. I’ve argued before that 2 items that emerged in past months – not disclosing all foreign donors to the Clinton Foundation contra signed… Read more »
Oh, about what Bush and Co expected when they nominated him. Some breathtaking cynicism exhibited. And they weren’t wrong.
I’m going pretty far with the comparison, more comparable would be the number of women who were disappointed that Sarah Palin didn’t win, but anyway, that’s sort of where I’m going.
Agree with all of this except ‘The only thing I care about in this election is a Democratic win. I don’t care about policy differences.’
As a fan of the primary process, I’m not quite sure what to make of that.
And it’s a given that we’ll go into the general election campaign bitter and divided. But by the time the general heats up, we’ll all be supporting the Democratic candidate to our fullest, I’m sure, given the alternative.
The only thing I care about in this election is a Democratic win. I don’t care about policy differences. The assumption is that – absent a wave election – Republicans will still control the House. Neither Hillary or Sanders will get much of their agenda passed. All we can reasonably expect domestically is Supreme Court nominations, holding the Obama gains and pushing the country a little further to the left. And no, I don’t expect a guy like Cory Booker to support Sanders to his fullest given that Bernie is running against his donor base. Lots of Democrats running for… Read more »
Ah. Well, I halfway agree. However, I think there are policy difference insofar as one candidate might agree to ‘compromises’ with the Republicans (compromise is good!) which another might not, and I even expect that we might see not-identical Supreme Court nominees. But my big issue–and I realize I’m opening myself up to accusations of Green Lantern and Rainbow Pony-ism–is the ‘pushing the country a little further to the left’ part. I think that the bully pulpit is a thing. Not a superpower, but still a thing. I think that a President with a recalcitrant Congress can still, using policy… Read more »
But my big issue–and I realize I’m opening myself up to accusations of Green Lantern and Rainbow Pony-ism–is the ‘pushing the country a little further to the left’ part. I think that the bully pulpit is a thing. One of the things that really annoys me about Sanders is the pretense that Obama did not use the bully pulpit, and had he done so, things would have been different. Every time Obama did use the pulpit – for every single initiative that congress balked at – he built very large majorities among Americans for his positions. The Republicans brazenly ignored… Read more »
Too late to change that now.
Repeat after me: He. Didn’t. Even. Try.
Blessed be the Narrative, the righteous Judge.
He singlehandedly made gay marriage the law of the land upon his full evolution, hallowed be his name!
Repeat after me: All of the Credit, None of the Blame.
More of a Serious Progressive than you. Always. No matter how Serious you are.
I don’t give Obama all of the credit for anything. I do give him credit for being by far and away the best President of my lifetime and I remember Eisenhower. Blame? I suppose he can be blamed for taking half a loaf sometimes instead of fighting harder for 60% of a loaf. I have not always agreed with him but I admit that I have reached the point that when I do disagree with him, I think “He has much better information than I do and he is much smarter than I am. He is probably right and I… Read more »
Sorry, Tom, that was in a reply to DXM, who posts the same comment several times a day because he’s Extremely Knowing. I agree that Obama is the best president of my–or your!–lifetime.
However, this–while true–strikes me as a bit scary: “He has much better information than I do and he is much smarter than I am. He is probably right and I am probably wrong.”
However, this–while true–strikes me as a bit scary: “He has much better information than I do and he is much smarter than I am. He is probably right and I am probably wrong.”
It is a bit scary. All I can say is that is the level of respect he has earned from me after nearly seven years. I know he’s trying to do the right thing and because of that I find it very easy to forgive him – even defend – his mistakes.
Some people see Clinton as a big risk. Some people see Sanders as a big risk. Just like Dean/Kerry. It’s not the kind of thing we can convince each other of … until it’s too late. We’re talking about different uses of ‘the bully pulpit.’ I’m not saying it can magically force Republicans to vote differently. That’s ridiculous. It’s not mind control I’m saying it can be used to explain to the American people wtf liberals actually stand for–and against. I know this is very silly, and only the worst sort of purists believe it, but some dumbass named Rick… Read more »
I think it is nonsense. Furthermore it has nothing to do with getting things done right now. Republicans would not have voted differently? Obama should have used the pulpit so a President 20 years from now can get something done? Bernie is implying that had Obama fought harder and used the pulpit like he is going to use the pulpit, results right now would be different. When he is asked how he expects to get single payer health care through congress he launches into a spiel about how Obama is a nice young man but he tried to deal with… Read more »
There is one thing about Ms. Clinton that is unarguable–she has endured far more than her share of undeserved crap. From the “not staying home baking cookies” flap in 1992, right up to Benghazipalooza, she has been targeted for being too emotional and too cold, too secretive and too ready to say anything to get her way, for micromanaging or being aloof. No matter what she does or says, somebody, somewhere–often in the press–will mark it down as a weakness in character. I can’t think of another politician of her experience and skill who has had to endure as many… Read more »
You are indisputably correct about every word of that.
I agree it is true, but at this point it seems irrelevant. She and Bill have serious faults that have little or nothing to do with the GOP echo-chamber crap.
But she’s going to bomb Iran!
” showing Clinton ahead of her Democratic challenger Bernie Sanders by a mere 6 points with the party’s men and 44 points with its women: a 38-percentage-point gender gap that seemed to speak volumes about how much men on the left care about women’s leadership.” This is either sexism working AGAINST HRC in the men or working FOR HRC in the women. After all, a whole bunch of women seem to support her for the sole reason that she is a woman. The whole “subgroup identity politics” which is a pernicious and destructive component of D Party politics at this… Read more »
This pretty much nails how I feel, too: As for how I feel, all things being equal, I’d prefer a woman president to a male president and I’d prefer a Senate with 80 women instead of 80 men. I also am skeptical about Hillary, but unlike you it is entirely about her politics. So, if I were ever to answer a poll I’d say I prefer Sanders to her, based entirely on the politics. OTOH, if the primary campaign become very close – so close that a few delegates here or there could swing the result – I might find… Read more »
I like Barbara Boxer’s politics but don’t have much respect for her as a politician, … That’s because you don’t fully appreciate how extraordinary it was for her to get elected in 1992 (and reelected three times) as a feminist and environmentalist who also wasn’t backed by developers, the national security state, and the “law and order” industry. She does satisfy a traditional CA voter impulse for a liberal DEM Senator, but she did it on her own merits. Boxer began her political career in a Republican county and later House district. Feinstein was actually conservative compared to SF Democrats… Read more »
Okay, you’re right. I was unfair.
I’m not impressed with Boxer’s record as a senator. I am impressed with Mikulski’s and Feinstein’s and Murray’s and pretty much every Democratic woman in the Senate who has any time, except Boxer.
But she was a good politician just to get the position in the first place and she’s good at getting reelected.
First of all, Boxer took on the most difficult and thankless task of the environment. One of the most important issues of our time that gets little more than passing nods of agreement from most DEM politicians. (Feinstein does “intelligence” — and other than being high profile, has done it badly.)
Second, Boxer’s voting record gets it far more right than wrong and is better than many of her colleagues. IWR — cough, cough. IMHO, none of those 29 Senators that got it completely wrong is a suitable person for POTUS.
So you opposed Kerry’s candidacy in the general election because his Iraq war vote, in and of itself, made him unsuitable to be President? Elections end up being the choice between the two candidates in the general election. The Democratic POTUS candidate in 2016 will need us all pushing along. Turning up our nose, walking away and making it more likely the most dangerous Presidential candidate in our adult lifetimes gains the White House (any of the plausible GOP primary candidates would meet that description) feels to me like a particularly destructive plan of action. I’d add that for a… Read more »
Why yes, that’s gospel on this board.
No person who voted yes on the IWR ever gets a ballot again, ever, for anything. Abstain, perhaps, if not actually vote against.
Of course, some of us are serious enough to understand that votes don’t matter as much as our clear-eyed understanding of political realities. These dirty hippies are nuts. Worse than nuts, they’re granola.
Political realities just get in the way.
I’m trying to impress people here….
Once again — we’re in the primary process of this election. And yes, I did oppose those Democrats that voted for the IWR. Once in the general election, given a choice between two “unsuitable” nominees, I’m a less evil Democratic voter. And at that point in every election since 1968, have never made any argument against the Democratic nominee much less for the GOP or any other nominee. Now would you please drop your continuing straw man arguments with me because they are beginning to look a lot trollish.
I am astounded you favor Feinstein’s record to Boxer’s. I lived in California during most of the years these women have been in office and don’t know any progressives who had a high opinion of Feinstein. She and her husband are true 1%ers.
Favor?
That’s a bad misreading of what I wrote,
In 2008, I assume you wrote “It does seem to me in the eagerness to have a person of color elected POTUS, that African-Americans are taking a step backwards in promoting a candidate with a thin political record in his own right.
They really should vote for Hillary in the primaries.”
Your assumption is completely wrong. Didn’t say that much less think it. The 2008 election was a special moment in time when the color and gender barrier for Democrats at the presidential level opened up. Sort of like 1960 when the Catholic barrier was dropped, but JFK wasn’t the first Catholic nominee. But expecting such barriers to remain permanently open in the near term isn’t how it works in this country — lots of slip-sliding and back-slipping for a while. While hailed as a great step forward (and I was one of those that did welcome it), “Roe” was very… Read more »
The ERA was the first casualty of the post-Powell memo conservative movement. At one point it seemed obvious to everyone, and then they began mobilizing the heretofore non-political fundamentalists to oppose it. They effectively tied the ERA to hippies-drugs-sex-rocknroll AND black welfare bums in the minds of middle America. Basically, they successfully made it a proxy for the culture war. Unfortunately, the people promoting the amendment were completely unprepared for this new movement.
I’m going to disagree in this instance. The ERA was really bipartisan and the ratification process began stalling out during the Ford administration and Carter’s first couple of years. That was before the fundies were organized as a GOP sector which came late in Carter’s term. When Powell wrote of “religious institutions” he was likely thinking of those business friendly churches that had tossed that aside along with becoming socially liberal. As a Supreme Court Justice, he voted in favor of “Roe” in ’73. At that time, reproductive freedom was as bipartisan as the ERA. The public backlash to “Roe”… Read more »
In closing, let me make a point about Jackie Robinson. When he came up to the Brooklyn Dodgers, some of the players threatened to sit out rather than suit up with a black guy. Here’s what their manager Leo Durocher had to say about that, “I do not care if the guy is yellow or black, or if he has stripes like a fuckin’ zebra. I’m the manager of this team, and I say he plays. What’s more, I say he can make us all rich. And if any of you cannot use the money, I will see that you… Read more »
as a woman…
I do not trust Hillary Clinton on foreign policy.
I do not trust Hillary Clinton on domestic policy.
I will not vote for her in the primary.
I will not send her money.
I will not volunteer anytime for her campaign.
I will, however, show up on November 8, 2016 to vote for her if she is the Democratic Party’s Nominee.
I want to vote for a woman to be President. I just don’t want to vote for THIS woman.
The people she continues to surround herself with are SUSPECT, and I just have no interest in her being President.
Given the issues facing the nation, from economic opportunity to SCOTUS to foreign and energy policy, there are far more important things than electing a woman president. Besides, as a woman, HRC has already made a huge historical political impact on the late 20th/early 21st centuries. It will not IMO be any sort of failure if she doesn’t also get to be president. She will be credited with making it much more possible for whomever the first female president is. More important is what sort of president will she be. Regardless of the likely policy positions she will have, which… Read more »