The issue here is not whether Clinton was betrayed or not or which candidate has a better record on women's rights.

The issues is that an endorsement from NARAL was totally unnecessary. NARAL is supposedly a grass-roots movement and one that a lot of people work with and provide money for. NARAL should be doing its job, keeping on watch for encroachment of women's rights, rather than deciding it needs to say which candidate it thinks is better (when in reality both candidates have equally good records). Those of us who have supported NARAL are put off by this endorsement because NARAL is no longer speaking for us, its supporters. It as a corporate entity has made a decision and is now pretending to speak for all of its supporters. It does not. I certainly do not agree with NARAL's endorsement, and don't think it was NARAL's business to support a candidate until the general election. All they have done is alienate a lot of people who simultaneously support both Clinton and NARAL. By picking sides between Clinton and Obama, they are essentially forcing us to pick sides between NARAL and Clinton.

The complete unwillingness of people, such as many posters here at Salon, to even entertain the idea that misogyny still exists and has been aggravated by Clinton's run in the campaign proves the fact that not only does it exist, but it will continue to do so because those most guilty of it choose not to believe they are sexist.

To people on these forums who go on and on about their perfectly reasonable reasons for apparently hating Clinton:

NO ONE CARES.

The issue here is the amount of vitriol directed at Clinton, its nature, the fact that it has gone unaddressed by the media and by leading Democrats... the fact that it so obviously exists, and yet no one says anything about it or condemns it. Show a picture of Obama in traditional Muslim dress, and you are accused of being a racist. Ok, that's all well and good. Show pictures of Clinton around the words "whore," or "cunt," or show her (on an allegedly serious news program) with photoshopped devil's horns, and it's simply because of your perfectly legitimate and non-sexist reasons for disliking her. And no one says a damned thing.

THAT is what is disgusting. No one gives a crap if you're voting for her or not. What we care about is not that you don't like her, but that your dislike of her apparently has clouded your ability to recognize and condemn these unwarranted, tasteless, sexist attacks against her. Attack her for her policies all you want. But if you're not standing up against the sexist attacks, then you are just as bad as the people dealing them out. As a Clinton supporter, I would (and have) gone out of my way to express my outrage at attacks associating Obama with militant Islam and so on. I don't have to like Obama to see how disgusting those tactics are. You don't have to like Clinton to see how disgusting the attacks against her are.

SO WHY THE HELL DO YOU SEEM NOT TO CARE?

Someone please make the argument that they would vote for any woman other than Clinton. Please.

The absurdity of that statement is its own best criticism. All the millions of reasonable, non-sexist people who would vote for any woman other than Clinton are surely the people we have to thank for all the serious female presidential contenders we've had up until this point, right? Right.

Reading these letters makes it painfully clear that not only have most people not actually read this article, they have certainly not read the WaPo article it references.

Come on, people. No one wants to hear you spew your opinion when it completely misses the point of what is being said.

Thanks, Rebecca, for your thoughtful coverage of this story. Like you, I don't think Obama was using the word intentionally or maliciously, but the fact that it's still ok for a presidential contender to address a female reporter by a dimunitive like this is just a sign of how deeply-rooted sexism is in our culture. Unfortunately there are a lot of people who choose to pretend it doesn't exist, and they only exacerbate the problem.

Speaking as someone who has lived around guns all his life, I can tell you that no one in the audience would be taking this joke as seriously as an anti-gun person might. To people who use guns, guns are not that scary. To people who have been taught to think that guns are the very cause of violence, guns are scary as hell.

So, even though Huckabee's joke was tasteless and inexcusable, I don't think he or anyone in the audience was taking it seriously as alluding to an Obama assassination or anything.

The NRA is still a Republican bastion. Rove is still a douchebag. Obama is still going to have to beat them, given that he gets past Clinton cleanly at the convention.

As far as I can tell there is nothing new to see here. Move along.

In this case he is joking about a nonexistent gun pointed at Obama who isn't anywhere around, and not pointing a gun at Obama as a joke.

I guess they didn't teach you common sense.