Oh, please. Stop!

Yes: Hillary Clinton experienced sexism in the race for the Democratic nomination.

Yes: Sarah Palin experienced sexism (of a particularly vicious type) in the weeks after McCain named her as his running mate.

But: not every attack on Palin is a result of sexism; mostly, right now, it's driven by blind fear. If she were a young, good-looking fresh-faced man of any race (say, JFK), they'd still be looking into every expenditure, every per diem, every banned-book-that-wasn't-banned.

They tried to focus on biology, on the fact that she's either too feminine, or too masculine, or a tomboy, or an airhead, or whatever. Now it's just scattergun time, because the perception is that she's breathed new life into whathisface's—I mean, McCain's—campaign.

Carly: the Saturday Night Live skit was brilliant. The comedy wasn't about Sarah Palin, either. It was about Hillary Clinton, and feminine archetypes (call 'em stereotypes if you like).

Tina Fey's Sarah Palin impression rested on the accent, and on making Palin into a bubblehead. But Amy Poehler as Hillary Clinton got to do the heavy lifting, as she always does. Sure: she got to play the spurned, jealous woman. But she also got to play that person who is being goaded by a series of circumstances right to the edge of losing her temper, and barely keeping it under control. It was a thing of beauty.

Posted by: Attila Girl at 05:45 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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