Hillary Clinton Stays Undefeated Against the Alpha Males

[DonViejo]

She’s taken the hits, stayed on her feet, and hit back harder, again and again and again.

MICHAEL TOMASKY

10.22.16 12:03 AM ET

Hillary Clinton, FiveThirtyEight tells us, is the most dominant debate winner in recent presidential history. They did all that ciphering they do over there and decided she won her three debates by +71, the highest score going back to 2000. She did it by being well prepared, yes. But she also did it, and bigly, by just standing there and taking his crap.

God bless the split screen; as he spoke, I kept my eyes fixed on her face, to see if she flinched when he said she belonged in jail and the rest. Not once. And she proved unflappable again, and even more so, Thursday night at the Al Smith Dinner. He was so obnoxious. He didn’t just cross the line; he crawled into a cannon and catapulted himself over it. She hates Catholics? Really? At a Catholic event? There was hardly a joke to it at all (the embedded joke, such as it was, had to do with emails among Catholic aides, but nothing Clinton had ever said or done). It was awful.

And there she sat, smiling, laughing, cool as you please. People ask why she’s winning, and the usual answer is that Trump is such a catastrophe. And he is, obviously. But I say she’s winning mainly because she’s one tough dame. She’s made of steel. And not Trumpian Chinese steel. And even though she’s going to face a wall of total resistance from Congress if she’s president, I say history tells us not to sell this woman short.

I’ve seen it for years. I’ve covered her on and off for 17 years, when she first went up to New York to run for Senate. All these alpha males were supposed to bury her. First, the tabloid New York media (a metaphorical alpha male) was supposed to eat her alive. And it took some bites out of her, no doubt about that. Especially Murdoch’s Post, and especially in those early months of the race, in 1999, when she kissed Suha Arafat. But in time, she neutralized them. The Post never warmed to her during that campaign, God knows, but the Daily News did (it endorsed her), and she learned how to anticipate the tabs’ rhythms and return their best serves.

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http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2016/10/22/hillary-clinton-stays-undefeated-against-the-alpha-males.html

[madaboutharry]

1. Tomasky has always been a great writer.

Wonderful article.

[AgadorSparticus]

2. She is strong as steel is right. They made her strong with all the harassment.

But hopefully, she won't have to go up against a congressional wall. I am hopeful that we will turn the Senate blue.

[PoliticAverse]

3. Did the writer miss the whole 2008 election? n/t