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Sunday, Nov 8, 2009
baldheadeddork
Published Letters: 28 Editor's Choice: 3
Three pages, Gary - did I miss even one word about how Obama or his supporters are responsible for the reprehensible way Hillary Clinton has been treated by the beltway pundits and the tabloid press?
I've heard for almost a solid week how "both sides" want to or need to ratchet down the rhetoric. But I pay pretty close attention and I haven't heard one word from Obama or one of his spokespeople about race or gender, while HRC continues to run out a parade of proxies saying the most embarrassing things I think I've ever heard from a Democratic campaign.
And when she's called on this bullshit, what happens? That's playing the gender card.
I expect this kind of lazy stuff pass for reporting in the major papers. (Do you have one demonstrable fact on the third page?) I don't expect to see it on Salon.
Damn.
I won't spoil it, but...damn. As compelling as the Stringer Bell and Omar characters have been, Marlo raises it to a whole other level in this episode. Amazing.
I've got three words to jog your memory:
Orenthal James Simpson.
Still think Clay Davis couldn't really use a circus defense like that and win an acquittal?
Credit to Simon and the writers for setting it up, too, with Pearlman cramming at night and telling Daniels that Bond hasn't tried a case in years and he'll need all the help he can get. As Davis goes on his monologue in the trial there's a cut scene where you can see Pearlman practically jumping out of her skin while Bond looks like a deer in the headlights. It's not her case, and she will let Davis walk before risking her career by embarrassing Bond.
I had a bunch of other stuff I wanted to say, but I made the huge mistake of watching next week's episode via On Demand. Damn...if you haven't seen it you won't believe it.
The "iron my shirt" attack in New Hampshire was a stunt by a couple of morning radio idiots. The repulsive C.U.N.T. "group" was created by a right-wing idiot who has made most of his career from attacking the Clinton's.
Sexism is alive and well, but is this it? These are morons using sexist attacks against Hillary Clinton to promote themselves. Sexism is just the tool they use to that end because it will deliver the attention they want.
Look, I'm a guy so my thoughts on feminism, and perhaps on sexism, are as relevant as a dolphin's thoughts about tap dancing. But I listen to my female family members and what they say about sexism in 2008 is a hell of a lot more nuanced than some line straight out of I Love Lucy or the C-word. Nobody says "iron my shirt" in a science or math classroom, no one calls a female engineer the c-word when she is meeting a client with male colleagues.
Stop me if you've heard this before, but Hillary Clinton is trying to frame the debate like the 60's and 70's never ended - just like men and women of her generation try to frame every issue.
Is that relevant to your life? Is sexual discrimination in your life expressed today with "IRON MY SHIRT!"? If that is relevant for you, then yeah - Hillary is right. If not, then perhaps there should be more discussion about where we need to demand from the candidates in 2008.
Spare me the drama, and your high-horse, too. You want to talk about civility and ad-hominem attacks? Why hasn't your publication said one word about what appears on Taylor Marsh's website or NoQuarter blog (just to name two) every goddamned day of the week?
You're proud of tripling your readership, but you publish crap like the Wilentz piece without even checking the math behind his central claim (Hell of a correction you got there) or disclosing in the footnote that the author is a historian and longstanding Clinton supporter?
You personally cite the "iron my shirt" incident as evidence of a sexist campaign against Hillary Clinton - without including the context that the guy saying it was a morning radio idiot/host who did it only as a stunt for his show. As an editor, do you think that detail does not matter?
Joan, I think you've turned Salon into the cyberspace version of the WaPo Op-Ed page. You don't enforce even the most casual editorial scrutiny on contributors whose positions you support, you ignore conflicting incidents, you magnify and distort isolated events to bolster your position, and you then broadly paint those who disagree as vulgar and unworthy of being taken seriously.
(The cherry on top of this analogy is that both you and the WaPo somehow employ the two most relentless and intelligent media critics in the business. If you think that makes you immune to that kind of scrutiny - read through the 109 pages of comments on the Wilentz piece and think again. Greenwald focuses on the mainstream press but the lessons are not being lost on your readers.)
Nice work, davidsugarman! "Postmenopausals!" I love the way so many of you make my points for me. I really appreciate it, it's a busy day here at Salon.
Joan -
Care to respond to any of the substantive criticism in these posts? Or would you like to continue concentrating on the tee-balls?
For a near perfect example of the difference between reporting and pulling something out of your ass.
Much of the initial coverage about Fort Hood turned out to be wrong. Is there anything wrong with that?
The accountability imposed by another country for the CIA's kidnapping and torture reveals much about our own.
Fox News' morning show plays to type, talking about whether Muslims in the Army should face "special debriefings"
The survivor and author is upset about comparisons some on the right are making to genocide
Once seen as a lunatic fringe, reactionary anti-women groups are courting respectability
Salon headlines in your mailbox
