The media is at it again – both the old and the new. A cursory glance across the online MSM and the blogosphere is all it takes for anyone who followed the primary and the general election to get the picture. From
David Corn at Mother Jones to an
editorial at the Chicago Tribune, the possibility of HRC at State has unleashed the good old boys’ pathological Hillary-hatred full force.
Marie Cocco’s sober assessment of women’s progress in 2008 cuts through the latest outbreak of Clinton Derangement Syndrome that has dominated news coverage the past several days. Cocco begins:
“WASHINGTON -- It is time to stop kidding ourselves. This wasn't a breakthrough year for American women in politics. It was a brutal one.”
Cocco concludes by suggesting that in its treatment of women, the American culture is not that different from the cultures found in developing nations.
I’m with Cocco: I’ve noted in previous posts that as the supposed leader of the western world, America has set a horrid example to other nations in the widespread trashing of Hillary Clinton and Sarah Palin.
Cocco reminds us:
“The glass ceiling remains firmly in place -- not cracked, as Hillary Clinton insisted as she tried to claim rhetorical victory after her defeat in the Democratic nominating contest. It wasn't even scratched with the candidacy of Sarah Palin as the Republican vice presidential nominee -- unless you consider becoming an object of national ridicule to be a symbol of advancement. As divergent as these two women are ideologically and temperamentally, as different as are their resumes, they both banged their heads -- hard -- against the ceiling. Both were bruised. So was the goal of advancing women in political leadership.”
Cocco continues:
“Even if President-elect Barack Obama chooses Clinton as secretary of state, no ground will be broken. Clinton would be the third woman to hold the post. And there is no longer anything extraordinary in a president naming women to his Cabinet. Franklin D. Roosevelt did it first, when he appointed Frances Perkins as labor secretary in 1933. Since then, every president but Harry Truman and John F. Kennedy has named women to the Cabinet or to Cabinet-level posts, according to the Center for American Women and Politics at Rutgers University. Bill Clinton holds the record: He appointed 16 women overall, and at one point about half of those serving in Clinton's Cabinet were female.”
Cocco cites some international statistics on women in politics:
“Including incumbents and newcomers, a record number of women will be serving in Congress, but still only 17 percent of its members will be female. This is where that record places us: on a par with the legislative representation women have achieved in sub-Saharan Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean. The United Nations, which tracks women's global political advancement, says that at this rate, it will take women in the developing world 40 years to reach parity with men.
“How long will it take us? We already are well into the fourth decade since the contemporary women's movement of the 1970s spawned a generation that sought to claim an equal place in the halls of power.”
Here’s the deal: as Gloria Steinem pointed out, now that we’ve elected the first male African-American president, the first woman president will have to wait in line until after we’ve elected the first male Hispanic, the first male Asian-American, the first Jewish male, etc., etc.
Cocco continues:
‘“Those who watched the media's sexist hazing of both Clinton and Palin often rationalize this treatment as the result of these two candidates' particular personalities and the legitimacy -- or presumed illegitimacy -- of their campaigns. But Barbara Lee, whose Boston-based family foundation has conducted extensive research of gubernatorial races involving women, routinely identifies the same undercurrents in state campaigns. Voters demand more experience of a woman candidate, and judge her competence separately from whether she is sufficiently ‘likable.’ Male candidates typically must clear only the competence bar to be judged -- as Obama indelicately put it during a primary debate – ‘likable enough.’
‘“We heard that over and over again -- that no woman is ever right,’ Lee says of her focus groups. ‘They like the concept of it but when it comes to a real, live, breathing candidate, they don't.”’
Cocco notes;
“Yet American women are a majority of the population and a majority of the electorate. They earn more than half the bachelor's and master's degrees, a level of educational achievement far exceeding that of women in developing countries. There must be some reason we don't do any better than women in impoverished, rural regions of the world where cultural norms oppress women.
“Maybe it is because our culture isn't so different after all.”
One might well argue the treatment of Hillary Clinton and Sarah Palin on the national political scene this year gave tacit permission to the people of Somalia to commit an unspeakable crime against an innocent 13-year-old girl who was brutally raped by three men. The child sought help from the authorities and was charged with adultery. As punishment, she was then publicly stoned to death.
I wonder how America’s Hillary-haters would feel about taking credit for that?
