Dee Dee Myers Is Wrong: It's Not About Gender

Dee Dee Myers suggested on the Today Show that some of the animous about Hillary has to do with gender. She even blamed Hillary's Iraq vote on the perception that a women has to over compensate about national security. I respectfully disagree.

Gender has nothing to do with the ant-Hillary vote. The DLC and her husband's campaign strategy regarding blacks has caused her demise. I suggest that Hillary has benefitted from the fact that the majority of voting Democrats are women. That has not been enough to offset the negative impact of the her husband and the strategy of the DLC. Had she really been her own women, she probably would have been the nominee.

Comments

[amberglow]

Can anyone name an anti-war president? Or an occasion where the one that wasn't hawkish actually won?

America votes for hawks always--even when they don't like the war we're in at the time.

[SamThornton]

A couple Presidential peaceniks spring to mind:

George Washington - http://tinyurl.com/2kdtsb

John Adams - http://tinyurl.com/37jaxw

Franklin Roosevelt - http://tinyurl.com/yutl4t

I'd include Richard Nixon's first campaign with his "secret plan to end the war," but he was an obvious liar.

[MH51]

I can only hope that in Ohio and Texas she loses and then she can bow out gracefully. Yes, gracefully. I don't think she can do it but by God I can hope.

Being a 51 yr old successful feminist I am so tired of woman crying about how strong they have to be. Damn it - be strong and shut the hell up about it. As Nike says, Just do it.
Yes it sucks but it is what it is. Stop making excuses and do what you have to do, what you want to do, and don't make any apologies or excuses. I am so tired of hearing about how tough it is for her. She knew that when she got in it. It's like celebrities whining about fame. It's really boring and old.
Being president won't be easy either.

[zasu]

I think Obama will more than likely wind up with the nomination, and that is just fine with me. But I think we really should give Hillary a lot of credit, rather than simply predicting her demise or criticizing the way she ran her campaign.

Win or lose, Hillary has made a major impact on our political system and history. Never again will a woman, with a desire to run for president, ever have to feel hesitant because she will not be taken seriously. She has opened the door for competent women who enter politics to strive for the top job with the same expectations and gusto as any man. A female candidate for president will not be considered a novelty any longer, and her primary campaign will be considered a formidable force to be dealt with by any man running against her. No longer will we ever be able to say "if" a woman ever becomes president, but it is now "when" a woman becomes president.

The nation owes a great debt to Hillary Clinton. Should she win the nomination, it will be well earned. But if she does not succeed, her mark will be felt forever.

[GLBorchert]

I also saw Dee Dee with basically the same arguments on Countdown (MSNBC) tonight. I think she's wrong about the gender thing. I look at myself, my wife, my children, my siblings, etc., as a point of reference. We live in Texas, Illinois, Minnesota and North Dakota. We are white collar and blue collar. We are Christian and agnostic. We are Democrat and Republican. We are not atypical of average Americans, and any of us would definitely vote for a woman for president. In my view, most of the people who wouldn't vote for a woman for president wouldn't vote for a liberal Democrat anyway.
There's another thing Dee Dee said that I disagree with. She said that Hillary's gentleness and humanness in the recent debates was nice, but didn't get her any votes. I think she's wrong about that. I think when Hillary has "gone human" during this campaign, she has made real gains. When she has gone negative, she has lost ground.
Everyone in the world knows Hillary is tough enough. That question no longer needs to be answered. What we don't know, and what she refuses to show the world, is that she can be anything but tough.
The campaign is over anyway. There's nothing she can do to pull it out now. Hillary's irratic behavior this weekend sealed her fate. But, the truth is that she could have run a winning campaign, and the basis for such a campaign needed to be to out-nice Obama.

[PoliticalEnnui]

The problem with Hillary is not that she's a woman. The problem is not that she's white. The problem is that she's a Clinton.

[PioneerKing]

It is Hillary's arrogance that has diminished her ability to win votes. It is Hillary's inability to say that she is wrong or to utter the words, I am sorry, or to say I apologize and Hillary running away form the word liberal on a CNN debate that have crippled her campaign.

It's as though Hillary believes that she can play on Americans' intelligence by saying anything contrary to realty.

When Hillary denounces No Child Left Behind one simply has to laugh and wonder at what type reality is Hillary trying to create.

Hillary voted for No Child Left Behind and then proceeded to make comments about how "wonderful the program would be for all of the money that it would send to New York State." Yet, Hillary now calls No Child Left Behind a failure - the program has been implemented just as it was written.

Hillary said on a debate a few months ago that "there was nothing wrong with NAFTA accept the way that it was implemented." In the 1990's NAFTA was denounced by labor and environmental groups as well as Pat Buchanan for exactly have proven true. NAFTA does not work because it is a poorly drafted trade agreement that did not put Americans first, but put corporate interests first.

It greatly amuses me to see the Clinton spin machine in action. Parsing may have worked for the Clinton's in the 1990's but double talk and outright lies won't work this time; this election America is aware of the Clintons.

America is saying to the Clintons , both, Bill and Hillary have "shame(d) me once " so shame on you, shame me twice - shame on me." America does not desire to further be shamed by the Clintons this year.

[Lon]

Myers may be right that Clinton's hawkishness is a result of her thinking she has to be tougher than any man. But then that just shows that Clinton made a cynical miscalculation which is not paying off for her.

One of the interesting things about Clinton's losing is that it is the result of a series of cynical choices she made which could have worked, but on which it is a good thing that it didn't. Her playing the race care before South Carolina, her 51% solution whereby only some votes need to be sought, her pandering to the middle with hawkishness and flag burning laws all seem like good examples.

[BrooklynLager]

I totally agree - I have nothing against Senator Clinton, but I cannot think of any reasons I'd rather see someone lose an election than the reasons she's losing this one.

Unfortunately, I don't think the lesson is going to be learned.

[Countess]

Using gender to explain the poor performance of Hillary Clinton is taking the easy way out and frankly is for simpletons. She is a poor candidate running a terrible negative campaign and is losing support everyday.

[BillZBubb]

I think Ms. Myers is more correct than not. A woman running for national office has to be seen as "strong". For the presidency that means "strong on defense"--and stronger than any man.

The problem for Clinton is that she incorrectly surmised that voting for the IWR would help her in that regard. She also incorrectly surmised that admitting error on that foolish vote would be a lethal sign of weakness.

Had she voted against the IWR, she would have been the Democratic nominee without a doubt.

As for her "strategy regarding blacks", there was nothing wrong with it. Obama's campaign did a great job of taking a few comments out of context and twisting them to paint her and Bill as racists--which is as disgusting as it is absurd. That was a classic Rovian move by Obama's camp and like the swiftboats it worked.

[ayc]

I agree with your first two paragraphs, but disagree with you vehemently on the last one. Senator Clinton, and her surrogate ex-President Bill Clinton did indeed race bait. That is different than being racist, I will give you that. But there is still no place for that in a Democratic primary. And it was only the swift response by those in the Democratic party that stopped the Clinton campaign from marginalizing Senator Obama as the black candidate. That is race baiting, and it is bigoted, but, IMHO, stops short of being a racist.