Whining about discrimination

Badtux whines about Clinton's whining about sexist discrimination in the campaign.

There can be no doubt, however, this discrimination does exist.



[h/t to Reclusive Leftist]

Badtux makes some logical solecisms in his criticism:

Bad press? It's not because she's a prickly personality who rarely gives reporters the time of day. It's because she's a woman.

First, the idea that Clinton "rarely gives reporters the time of day" is bullshit hyperbole. It's inconceivable that a presidential candidate is going to ignore the press. More importantly, the idea that Clinton is justifiably objecting to blatant media sexism does not entail that she or her supporters believe or assert that sexism is the only reason for her bad press. But it is still a big reason.

If Clinton were getting bad press because she "rarely gives reporters time of day" or because she "shunned the online progressive community in favor of sucking up to big wigs," then one would expect the bad press to be about, hmm... maybe not giving reporters the time of day or sucking up to the big wigs, instead of about "her voice, its her pantsuit, or it's her cackle, it's her hair, or it's her putting up with her husband".

Secondly, note the disingenuous comparison of apples to oranges:

[Hillary Clinton's] campaign workers and supporters keep whining...

BTW, you'll note that Obama *never* plays the victim card. Ever. When things go down hard on him, he *never* says "you're just biased against me because I'm black." [boldface emphasis added]

Badtux is comparing Obama himself to Clinton's campaign workers and supporters. But of course Obama's supporters do complain about racism.

It's also the case that racism is much less acceptable than sexism in the United States; Obama doesn't complain as much about racism as Clinton complains about sexism because there's less open racism. A pundit can put the words, "Take out the garbage!" in Clinton's mouth but if anyone were to put "Give me a watermelon" in Obama's mouth, they'd be fired in heartbeat... and rightly so, without Badtax telling us to STFU and suck it up.

And how much does Clinton herself actually play the "victim" card anyway? Yes, I've heard a little snark, and we know how much Badtux the Snarky Penguin hates snark.

I don't think Clinton would be a very good President. I think she would continue the occupation of Iraq. I think she would attack Iran. I think she would perpetuate the fundamental economic issues that are turning the US into a third-world country. (These are not just Republican issues, e.g. Bill Clinton's NAFTA, welfare "reform", media consolidation.) I don't think she would take the savage reprisals against the Republican party that are the primary justification for having a partisan political system in the first place.

I don't think Obama would be a very good President either, for exactly the same reasons. Of course, either of them would be a thousand times better than McCain, but that's just saying a poke in the eye with a sharp stick is a thousand times better than being drawn, quartered and burned at the stake.

The problem is, though, we're being suckered into choosing the Democratic nominee for all the wrong reasons. Not on the basis of substance, but on the basis of image. Image is created, by and large, by the media, not the candidate; a candidate can destroy his image on his own (cough Guiliani), but he cannot create it on his own. And when we make our political decisions on the basis of image, we are ceding effective control of the political process to the owners of media, who are, to a man (and I use "man" advisedly), batshit crazy neocons, defense contractors, outsourcers, pension stealers and Rupert Murdoch.