FRANK RICH: Angry Clinton Women ♥ McCain?

[kevinmc]

Good article Frank Rich ties it all together and dispells the McCain is making any strides BS ........ Long Article ....

TEN years ago John McCain had to apologize for regaling a Republican audience with a crude sexual joke about Hillary and Chelsea Clinton and Janet Reno. Last year he had to explain why he didn’t so much as flinch when a supporter asked him on camera, “How do we beat the bitch?” But these days Mr. McCain just loves the women.

In his televised address on Barack Obama’s victory night of June 3, he dismissed Mr. Obama in a single patronizing line but devoted four fulsome sentences to praising Mrs. Clinton for “inspiring millions of women.” The McCain Web site is showcasing a new blogger who crooned of the “genuine affection” for Mrs. Clinton “here at McCain HQ” after she lost. One of the few visible women in the McCain campaign hierarchy, Carly Fiorina, has declared herself “enormously proud” of Mrs. Clinton and is barnstorming to win over Democratic women to her guy’s cause.

How heartwarming. You’d never guess that Mr. McCain is a fierce foe of abortion rights or that he voted to terminate the federal family-planning program that provides breast-cancer screenings. You’d never know that his new campaign blogger, recruited from The Weekly Standard, had shown his genuine affection for Mrs. Clinton earlier this year by portraying her as a liar and whiner and by piling on with a locker-room jeer after she’d been called a monster. “Tell us something we don’t know,” he wrote.

But while the McCain campaign apparently believes that women are easy marks for its latent feminist cross-dressing, a reality check suggests that most women can instantly identify any man who’s hitting on them for selfish ends. New polls show Mr. Obama opening up a huge lead among female voters — beating Mr. McCain by 13 percentage points in the Gallup and Rasmussen polls and by 19 points in the latest Wall Street Journal-NBC News survey.

How huge is a 13- to 19-percentage-point lead? John Kerry won women by only 3 points, Al Gore by 11...........


......


The ludicrous idea that votes from Clinton supporters would somehow make up for McCain defectors is merely the latest fairy tale brought to you by those same Washington soothsayers who said Fred Thompson was the man to beat and that young people don’t turn up to vote.


http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/15/opinion/15rich.html?ref=opinion&pagewanted=print

[Tarheel_Dem]

1. Frank Rich is quickly becoming my favorite columnist. The media would

so like to gin up a disinformation campaign to make McCain look as if he's doing better than he truly is, but the facts just don't bear them out. And we even have (or had) women on this board pushing McCain talking points. Obama will win this demographic handily, and given that he has 4 months to smooth things over, I'd say he'll win women by 30 pts.

[roguevalley]

19. OK! How did you put that heart into the title of this thread?

Sorry. I am ridiculously amazed by totally small and cool things. :)

[Political Heretic]

2. Really excellent article. Recommended.

[Connie_Corleone]

3. He is absolutely right.

The way the media keeps trying to sow division among Democrats and make it look like Obama's poll numbers are somehow so different from previous elections is ridiculous.

I have seriously cut down on the number of political shows (only one now)I watch because of this "horse race" nonsense.

[kevinmc]

5. I quit listening to those shows and Washington Journal about 2 months ago ....

they are just trying to make it look close and making people angry. :)

[charlie]

4. That 13-point lead

is up from 5 points when Hillary conceded. 7 points in 2 weeks. The harder McCain tries, the more he creeps women out. Heeeeeeeere's Johnny!

[PretzelWarrior]

6. articles like this show the broadcast news is still unrepentantly

trying to change reality rather than just report on reality. It's sickening that they will pound the rock and state lies or very dubious claims over and over again as though it is in their interest to shape perception.

I really really really want to see some of these news companies held accountable for their horrendous showings.

[FrenchieCat]

7. They will be as long as we elect Barack as President!

[janx]

16. Hey Frenchie--

From the article:

But the notion that all female Clinton supporters became “angry white women” once their candidate lost — to the hysterical extreme where even lifelong Democrats would desert their own party en masse — is itself a sexist stereotype.

:thumbsup:

We weren't the only ones who noticed this.

[grasswire]

8. the way to hold them accountable is to develop new paths...

...through which people get news. That's happening. We must always remember that the audience for cable news is really very small.

[PretzelWarrior]

9. I know. I'm excited about how internet channels/pathways for news are getting

more and more sophisticated. It's like just as big media tries to control the agenda, the internet is maturing into an information medium they don't know how to deal with effectively.

Grass roots at its best.

[gateley]

10. What a great article! Really enjoyed it -- thanks!! Recommend. nt

[kevinmc]

11. K&R n/t

[Life Long Dem]

12. Just a little more sweet talk and I think he might win over Clinton's woman voters!

:7 Go get-em Johnny! :bounce:

[roseBudd]

13. spent some time reading the PUMA's blog, their strategy is to write letters, wear Tshirts...

that most people won't get, and argue with people to change their minds.

Oh and they also seek to prove Obama is not a Natural Born Citizen

And he is obviously just like Hitler.

Edited to add.

Hating the person who ran a better smarter campaign and does not have something your candidate is saddled with (Bill Clinton baggage) but also owes some of his success to something Bill Clinton did have (charisma) is short sighted immature and silly.

It was not a tie.

He had an insurmountable lead in pledged delegates.

The Super Delegates did not select Obama to prevent massive urban riots.

[Liberal_Stalwart71]

14. One of my journalist heroes!! FANTASTIC!! n/t

[jazzjunkysue]

15. K&R. Real conservatives like Barack's understanding of economics.

"The conservative legal scholar Douglas Kmiec has endorsed Mr. Obama, as have both the economic adviser to Newt Gingrich’s “Contract With America,” Lawrence Hunter, and the neocon historian Francis Fukuyama."

Gramps is so unsavory that the angry jolted HRC supporters will likely stay home, just like the angry old GOP supporters.

So, the polls are only partly informative. They don't tell you who's staying home.

This is why I supported Barack as soon as Edwards conceeded. Hillary would have brought out the anti hillary vote, but Barack won't. Merits aside, the numbers were always for Barack.

[janx]

17. kick

[dailykoff]

18. I've been wondering if this isn't a cover for future vote-stealing.

"Disgruntled Hillary voters hand victory to McCain in a squeaker," that type of thing. Remember the huge crowds that stood in line half a day to vote for Kerry? And then we were supposed to believe "values voters" handed it to Bush? Well they're laying the groundwork for another attempted theft IMHO. As Rich puts it, this is "just one subplot of the master narrative."