Dover Bitch

Saturday, January 05, 2008

Past ready

Via Kevin Drum, I find this at the Corner from former Dan Quayle speechwriter Lisa Schiffren:

Admit it [Lisa Schiffren]

Let's say last night really did indicate that Hillary's negatives will keep her off the ticket. (Or keep her from winning if she's on it.) You know what? Deep in my psyche, in the place that kind of misses the toothache I've been prodding at with my tongue, I am having a tiny little pang of missing Hillary. Not her, but hating her. Hating Hillary has been such a central political impulse for so long now — 15 years — and I have had to work so hard to keep it up as she became more appealling looking, less shrill, more human — I don't really know what I will do with that newly freed strand of energy.

The sad thing is, America is past ready for woman president. Just not a woman who got to office on her husband's coattails. Time for the new crop of professional political women — the ones who are tough enough to run for office — to stick your heads up and start putting your opinions on the table.


Say what you will about Quayle, at least he didn't want people to know he wasn't that smart.

It's one thing to want to hate a political opponent enough that you struggle to do so for a decade and a half... Even worse to want people to know that hating somebody is central to your politics.

But what tips her scales from pathetic to imbecilic is the fact that Schiffren, while calling for "a new crop of professional political women," reveals without irony that her hatred for Hillary grew harder to maintain "as she became more appealing looking, less shrill."

What could possibly be keeping "professional political women" from jumping at the chance to run for president with writers like Schiffren ready to analyze their opinions?

But let's be real here. The fact is, Hillary was wearing a fairly low cut summer top. She was not displaying cleavage, as the shot on Drudge indicates. Someone else wearing the same outfit might have done. But Hillary Clinton does not have cleavage to display. Period. Indeed, Hillary never forgave her mother-in-law, Virginia Kelly for pointing this out decades ago to the young Bill Clinton, a cleavage man if ever there was one.


Perhaps Schiffren can go back to crusading against women in the realm of fiction if no ugly or flat-chested ones answer her call in real life.

Otherwise, I'm sure she can burn off that strand of energy fantasizing about the codpiece.

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