Who played the first gender card? Not Senator Clinton.

President Bush in his fancy flight suit played a gender card.

Ghouli, the Testosterone mayor, constantly plays the gender card, as do Freddie and all the other macho males in the Rethug party.

Anyone who spouts off about HRC's shrill voice or her "cackle" is playing the gender card.

Anyone who says a politician needs to grow a set of balls is playing the gender card.

Anyone who says the country isn't ready for a woman President is playing the gender card.


So Hillary made a speech at her alma mater, Wellesley, about how grateful she was for her education at a woman's college. About how, as an eighth grader, she had written a letter to NASA asking how she could prepare for the astronaut program -- and had been informed that women weren't eligible. About how, after she was accepted at Harvard Law School, a prominent professor informed her that they didn't need any more women there. About how Wellesley had supported her in her dreams and helped to make them possible.

And people run around squealing that she's playing the gender card.

Good for her. It's about time.

are piling on OFFENSIVE.

Who gives a crap what others have done?

I remember her saying John's campaign was stalled because he was not black, hispanic, or a WOMAN.

I am an Edwards leaner and caucused for him in 2004, but the Hillary attacks are getting to be a bit much.

You could say that HRC was responding to the pile-on. The fact is, one need not play a gender card simply because one is responding to someone who has played the gender card.

That's always an option.

there's only two ways to respond to a gender card (ie do the same, or do nothing)

was playing the gender card? Why? HRC didn't mention her gender, she said it was because of her status as front-runner.

Or do you think giving an inspiring talk at her own alma mater, a woman's college, is playing the gender card?

I don't think that either of those actions was "playing the gender card," but if other people do, then so be it.

I don't think HRC has played any gender card. I merely pointed out that there are more than two ways to react

I think we both had our lines crossed for a minute there

asking her more than half the questions, while tossing softballs to the other candidates (except to Kucinich with the UFO question).

HRC has NEVER claimed that was about sexism, but about her being in the lead. Even so, it was the most skewed "debate" I've ever seen.

attacked by a commentator with such a disproportionate number of questions?

And then where a network (CNN) would deliberately alter the transcript to put her answers out of order to make it appear she was lying about what she had said?

Never in the history of the US have the candidates been invited to attack another by a moderator during a debate. Never

But the HH's will insist it was SOP

was put on a single candidate.

The media spun it that way. Hillary's notation for the pilon was simply, "It's because I'm Winning"..

Other people brought up the issue of gender, not her.

swift boating coming from Obama and his camp is basically a misunderstanding of the question.

Thanks..

"I'm comfortable in the kitchen" in reference to the Harry Truman quote about taking the heat. I wish her team had thought of that one first.

playing the MACHO GENDER card.

As far as Hillary's speech at Welslsy, my response was "For God sake! She was speaking to an ALL WOMAN'S college, and it was her alma mater too! What the hell would YOU DO?" I went to an all girlse HS, and yes there were always little comments being made about how "we" were better than the co-de public schools, etc.

the background noise. Like "white noise" it's just there -- we don't hear it unless we listen for it, but it's affecting everything that we do hear.

One of the things she has to do that drives DUers crazy is act "tough." But she has to do that to counter the image people have of anyone who is female. No guy has to do that because people automatically credit any man with more toughness than a woman.

called a bit*h! Believe me, I worked 48 years hearing that kind of stuff. I actually got to the point where I said "Yep! I'm a bitch, and proud of it!" I even framed a picture of a buzzard that said "5% Friendly, 95% Bitch", and hung it on my office wall. I really got along with everybody very well, but I had to act the part of bitch or I would have NEVER been accepted as competent in a MAN'S business world!

suddenly realizing they have more in common with her than they thought . . . and being excited about that.

voting for the plumbing is not good politics.

Why am I reminded of a scene from "Holy Grail"?

We are in the majority but you wouldn't know it. The national bullshit dialog is lead by men - arrogant self-satisfied men. The media tells us "how to think" about candidate Clinton without having a clue that they are insulting us. I am sick of it. I have been sick of it for 50 years.

Clinton's race is bringing up all my anger that I stored away (to some degree) for the past 25 years. I have talked to many women who feel the same.

We watch the crap that is going down right before our eyes and say to ourself - put it back in your pants you asshole.

In fact, I said it last night in the space of about 45 seconds while watching Dan Abrams - had to turn him off. He doesn't know what he doesn't know - just another ignorant self-satisfied white guy with a mic.

it brought back so much.

People forget about what the world was like -- what HRC went through to get where she is today -- what every middle aged and older woman has gone through. For me, that story touched a cord.

The bias dialog about her by the male media (and to some extent the all male cast of her opposition) is pounding on a lot of nerves. Nerves that have been dormant for years.

A new feminist wave has started. It is not visible. It is in the kitchens, over lunch and on the telephone with friends.

Hell, I had the conversation with my sister last weekend. She is a Repub and never considered herself a feminist. Now she is a grandmother and has looked back on her life. She was the primary bread winner of her family for 40 years and has been discriminated against in her field/job for her entire working life.

Now she is awake and pissed and has apologized for not getting it back in the 60s and 70s. She plans to vote for Hillary. It will be her first vote ever for a Democrat. We also decided that our mother (she has Alzheimer's) will vote for Hillary. It will also be her first vote ever for a Democrat.

Keep it up guys - you have no idea what you are pokin' with a stick.

I made a comment about the fire situation in California, and the government's lack of preparation. Suddenly he was jabbing his newspaper and saying "And it's all because of THIS MORON!"

He was jabbing at the Shrub.

So he asked me what I thought of HRC and I told him. He's thrilled with how she's doing, though he likes Richardson a lot, too. And he told me that his gay brother will be helping their 92 year old mother with her absentee ballot.

He said he travels all the time and never runs into anyone who will admit voting for Bush.



:shrug:

and he is playing blind, deaf and dumb to the complicity of the NBC "debate moderators" as well as motormouth Matthews in the Hillary-bash. They are in a losing war for ratings with Fox Noise. Look for Wolfie/CNN to emulate the M$NBC "moderators" in the next debate. I'm sorry to say that except for Olbermann, all of the yammering idiots at NBC are acting like circling sharks much like they did Gore.

but Matthews is the one who's really getting on my nerves. The little 'kingmaker' believes his own hype, and his over the top anti-women in general, anti-Clinton in particular rants are too much to watch.

They don't have a gender - they're just people!

:crazy:

If Hillary Clinton is President (she won't be), will she say that world leaders are picking on her because she's a "chick"? Did Thatcher do that? Indira Gandhi?

How about Shirley Chisholm? Does Nancy Pelosi need her hubby to tell people to stop picking on her? Barbara Boxer needs a man to prove her worth?

Hillary Clinton needs her husband (who had no problem cheating on her) and her campaign merchants to play the gender card when times get a little rough. By "rough", I mean having some scrutiny and challenge put on her record and opinions, which in many cases contradict the other.

Read the email from the Clinton campaign the day after the last debate:



Is that playing the Gender Card? It is, if you're being honest.

When Bill Clinton tried to say that the debate scrutiny was like what the Swiftboaters did to Kerry, that was the most pathetic reach I've ever seen from him. Kerry's record as a military officer is in question by some opportunists and liars and that compares to Hillary Clinton's own words being used against her in a debate? Wow. That's sick.

What does Hillary Clinton's campaign say about empowering women? Not much, in my view. Then again, I'm a "bad boy".

Tim Russert stepped out took a role that no debate moderator has ever done before. I think a former President has a right to comment on such crap.

You are the one who is pathetic - still trying to tell us women how to think. I have a bulletin for you - we don't care what you think.

Give me a __________ break... As for her cheating husband trying to compare Russert's uncomfortable questions to the Goldwater Girl to John Kerry's attackers on his military record, I guess with draft dodgers like Bill, it all seems the same to him.

As for women not falling for the Gender Card Act, there are plenty here and elsewhere that thought that ruse was pathetic.

She sustained more scratches than usual, but she remained on her feet and never lost her cool. She was NEVER "Poor Little Hillary."

Nothing in that email says gender card to me. Nothing at all implies that the others were attacking her BECAUSE she was a woman.

They were taking the opportunity to respond to all the idiots who are afraid that she couldn't hold her own among world leaders -- that is, all the people who try to play the male gender card -- by pointing out that she is a strong woman, as was clear in the debate. She never lost her cool, despite Russert's orchestrated attacks in a display unlike any Presidential "debate" any of us have ever seen.

When have we ever seen more than half the commentators' questions directed to only 1 candidate out of 7? Never. I can't believe more people aren't complaining about that, because it meant that much less air time for the other candidates. But maybe they thought it served them better just to watch Russert try to take her down a peg.

Everytime I hear the expression :

"They Don't Have Balls" or "My Candidate Has the 'Nads" or any other such crap.

Hillary hasn't played the "Gender Card" once --what HAS happened is she is being perceived as playing the "Gender Card" simply for being female.

Apparently, some people don't like that she has "the balls" to be a woman.

No. It would be a statement of fact.

It's a statement of fact, not playing the gender card, to say that HRC is a strong woman.

and spot on. Everyone's always looking for the least little excuse to bash the Goddess of Peace, so it's not surprising that the naysayers here on this forum will nitpick about her the same as what the rightwing nitpickers do.

WHAT THE FUCK???????

The most hawkish of ALL the dem candidates - including "I will go into Pakistan" Obama - and you call her the Goddess of Peace?

What are you smoking?

"I am a woman, and that is reason enough to vote for me". While I think that to be simpleminded, that may work for the 'older, with less than a college education woman' who is her base, making it a valid campaign tactic.

"Playing the gender card" is her saying "It's not fair for all the guys to pick on me because I am a woman".

IF she said that.

But she didn't.

Including Bill. I get the campaign newsletters online, and I also read that one reference above. Not to mention all the supporters here saying she is being picked on because she's a woman.

True, she didn't say that. And she's not stopping her people from saying it, either - as with so many other issues, she wants it both ways.

Bill didn't say it was wrong for the males to pick on HRC because she's a women. Neither has any of her other supporters

Would ANYONE say that statement is "playing the gender card"?

The email said Hillary is a strong woman, which is the truth. Why is that "playing the gender card"?

Since when haven't we been able to call a candidate "strong"?

She didn't play the gender card, she just pointed out that she had withstood a challenging situation.

And her campaign called her "a strong woman."

And if you think that's wrong, because it's playing the gender card, would you also think so if Kucinich's campaign said that he's a strong man? I'm sure everyone would applaud that, because being strong's supposed to be part and parcel of being a man.

Right?

Who played the gender card first? Who the fuck cares? Over the last week this has been the big debate over Clinton around the media, around here, and around the rest of the blogs. I thought people around here were smarter than that. This is a bullshit issue meant to distract from the important issues, and you are all falling for it.

Oil is about to hit $100 a barrel for no apparent reason. There is still a war in Iraq. Global warming is still very real. People are losing their homes because certain people wanted to make a quick buck. Pakistan, a country with nukes (nukes we helped them get) is fucked right now. And we are sitting here bitching and moaning about who played the gender card first. Wonderful.

HRC with. And it will continue into the general-- if she gets that far -- if we don't turn it back on the clubbers now.

and with all of you talking about this she doesn't have to explain her position on any of the things I mentioned.

to describe courage. I thank them for that.

And thanks for the OP. I especially like your idea that Bush was playing the gender card in his flight suit. So obvious...and yet so much a part of our culture that I hadn't really thought of it that way.

We don't always hear it but it's always there.

I've noticed the "spine" comments too, with gratitude. Maybe more people are thinking twice.

claiming Al Gore was practically lactating because he cared about the environment, she's also referred to John Edwards as the Breck Girl.

She's a female misognyist, disparaging men by comparing them to women.

I can't stand her.

Which is as ridiculous an analogy as Bill's swiftboating analogy that Edwards, Dodd, and Obama took such exception to.
Between that surrogate remark and Geraldine Ferraro insisting that every single man ganged up on Clinton because she
was a woman, period -- I have to think Hillary overplayed the gender card. And I suspect she's suffered in the polls partly
because of it. Nobody wants the next leader of the free world to act like a victim.

She can't control everything all her supporters say about her.

All she can do is control her own response, just as that was the only option open to Kucinich when one of his supporters -- Shirley MacClaine -- said some unfortunate things about him.

There are no coincidences in politics, especially in a campaign run by Mark "Blackwater/Union Buster" Penn.

Then he has awfully poor judgment.

What's next? I'm sure we'll find out on Drudge soon.

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the other leading candidates.

Nobody with a long Senate career ever seems to get elected to the Presidency. Too much baggage, apparently.

they don't get the credit they deserve or their successes are hidden in deal-making and compromise with the 49 other Senators. Its difficult to stand out and be your own man. There's also a complacency about the 6 year terms, voters tend to forget about you until re-election time. Its a great paying job for incumbents but not very good for barn-stormers.

With NYS, Hillary is forced to either support or denounce Spitzer's plan. If she was so capable, then she should have the influence to tell Spitzer to go with it or not. If she were president today, what would she tell Spitzer to do?

Thats the serious question. Her hedging is making her look indecisive and incapable of action.

I think she gave a good, thoughtful answer. What some people call "parsing" I call not giving a black-and-white, simplistic, sound-bite answer in a situation that is complicated.

Then CNN distorted it, as Media Matters demonstrated, by rearranging the order of her answers in the transcript. Nasty.

to understand such a complicated issue?

If Hillary wants to act Presidential and Be seen as a Go-Getter that gets things done, then why doesn't she step up to Spitzer and tell him he's right or he's wrong.

She's acting like she's powerless and has no influence on Spitzer.

If she can't control Spitzer, how can we expect her to control national security issues and other governors as President?

"If Hillary wants to act Presidential and Be seen as a Go-Getter that gets things done, then why doesn't she step up to Spitzer and tell him he's right or he's wrong."

She did.

"If she can't control Spitzer, how can we expect her to control national security issues and other governors as President?"

I'm surprised that an american citizen thinks that one person can "control" another

And neither do Senators or Presidential candidates.

Some matters are controlled by Federal LAWS, some by State LAWS -- it's all set out in the Constitution.

I want the person to have a license and insurance, whether they're here legally or not.

When I'm on the roads, I want the other people around me to have had their driving skills tested.

I agree with you - it's about time.