Hillary Aides: The Treatment Of Sarah Palin Has Been Sexist
If Barack Obama wins this election Hillary may as well become a Republican (not that we want her) because she isn’t going to have any friends left on the left.
ST. PAUL, Minn. — Sarah Palin found some unlikely allies Wednesday as leading academics and even former top aides to Hillary Rodham Clinton endorsed the Republican charge that John McCain’s running mate has been subject to a sexist double standard by the news media and Democrats.
Georgetown University professor Deborah Tannen, who has written best-selling books on gender differences, said she agrees with complaints that Palin skeptics — including prominent voices in the news media — have crossed a line by speculating about whether the Alaska governor is neglecting her family in pursuit of national office.
“What we’re dealing with now, there’s nothing subtle about it,” said Tannen. “We’re dealing with the assumption that child-rearing is the job of women and not men. Is it sexist? Yes.”
“There’s no way those questions would be asked of a male candidate,” said Howard Wolfson a former top strategist for Clinton’s presidential campaign.
The sexism charge was hurled with new intensity Wednesday afternoon by McCain surrogates, all women, at a news conference just hours before made her acceptance speech here - a speech in which she said this about the media and Washington elite: “I’m not going to Washington to seek their good opinion - I’m going to Washington to serve the people of this country.”
I think the coverage of Palin, and the reaction to her by many on the left, has absolutely been sexist. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a female politician have her record as a mother questioned as part of her vetting for public office before. Nor have I ever seen so many people suggest that she maybe can’t do the job because she’s just a hockey mom.
But I do think Republicans need to be careful not to get into the sort of identity politics game liberals play. Just as Palin isn’t a bad candidate because she’s a woman, she isn’t necessarily a good one because she’s a woman.
There are plenty of reasons to believe that Sarah Palin would make an excellent Vice President, and we’ve been talking about those reasons a great deal over the last couple of days. But as the left turns to attacking Palin (obliquely, granted, but still) let’s not turn to defending her because she’s a woman.
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