OMG: The Media Is Sexist

The post-mortem of Hillary Clinton's failed bid for president had started way before she had actually conceded the race. Mainly cooing tributes about how Hillary Clinton had buried the idea that women couldn't seriously be considered viable presidential candidates or commanders-in-chief. The New York Times reported that NOW and EMILY's list are going after the media for sexist coverage of their candidate. NOW has gone so far as to create a media hall of shame.

Back before the campaign had started in early 2007, when Clinton's name was mentioned, when she was a celeb member of the Senate, helping the Democratic Party resuscitate its image and fundraising for candidates like Obama, Ellen Goodman spoke at the Women, Action and Media conference. She remarked that Clinton had effectively "de-gendered" herself. Clinton wasn't promoting herself as a potential woman candidate for president, but as the leading candidate for president. For women trying to pioneer any kind of new role, this is often the most effective strategy: being better than everyone else, making sex a second thought. So she put sex aside. But the media was having none of that.

Still, sexism was only one of Clinton's problems.

Obama's way was using narrative as his strength. His speeches often drew from his memoir. Clinton didn't want it to be about her, but about, as she would say, all of us. She tended toward telling the story of the people set met while on the campaign, preferring policy to the personal. In the end, the cable commentator cracks said more about them than her.