I'm sick of your insane demands.

I must admit to calling Hillary ruthless, but in a kind of complimentary way. As in she'll ruthlessly crush her opponents, some of whom dearly deserve to be crushed. I must admit that Barack's "vision" is appealing, but history is littered with failed visions. I was rather hoping to see Hillary unleashed on the "vast right wing conspiracy". The woman has scores to settle, and I'd love to see her have the opportunity to settle them.

If this campaign as proven anything, it's that sexism is more socially acceptable than racism. Not that racism is dead. You just can't speak of it in polite society. Society is far more tolerant of sexism, and if you complain, then, you know, feminists just lack a sense of humor. It remains to be seen how many "color blind" Americans end up voting for McCain this fall. Of course the folks who vote against Barack because he's black will probably also vote against Hillary because she's a woman. But at least we know who's voting against Hillary. My guess is the polls will show Barack in the lead all through October, but the margin will close come November.

Wow - powerfull post.

Its true that sexist democrats have gravitated to Obamas campaign because he's a man. But we aren't all like that.
And you have to admit that its equally true that racists in the Democratic party have gravitated to Hillary because she is white (take a look at the racial voting split in any of the Southern states in the primary for proof of this). But that doesn't mean that Hillary, you or any of the intelligent people who post on your blog are racists, quite the reverse.
I don't think its fair to categorize a politician by the worst of there supporters, because while its true that if you do this the Obama campaign is sexist, applying the same logic to Hillary's campaign would make her a racist.

I clicked through some of those examples. Some aren't sexist. Anti-Hillary, certainly, but not anti-woman.

Many are sourced from DailyKos diaries, which any idiot can post, and by the look of it did. A couple were popular, most were just ignored garbage.

So... how about I scan through the pro-Hillary blogosphere and pull ever racist attack on Obama out? Would that help? It would prove that, just like Hillary, Obama too has morons counted among his supporters

I won't bother though, because at the end of the day, it's a waste of time and it doesn't demonstrate anything useful.

How I love the implications that disliking either candidate carries. If we don't like Clinton, we're sexist. If we don't like Obama, we're racist. Either way, we lose.

It's so easy to frame one's objection to Senator Clinton or Senator Obama as being about policy issues. When bloggers chose to frame them as "OMG, that bitch" or with other sexist language, that is the problem.

Object to Senator Clinton all you want. Just do it *without* calling her shrill, a bitch, frigid, a psycho ex-girlfriend, or wahtever else.

If she's as bad as these people insist, it shouldn't be that difficult.

I think what makes the criticism of Hillary highlighted here both exceptional and sexist is (1) the double standard by which she is judged, and (2) the fact that our punditry is clogged with sexists, while racist views are for the most part relegated to the fringe of public discourse.

We can plainly see in the reaction to Clinton's "negativity" that different rules apply to the candidates - she can't say anything even mildly disparaging of Barack without everyone condemning her behavior, while Barack has consistently portrayed her as unethical without anyone saying a word. Only Clinton has been booed during a debate for bringing up a scandal (Rezko); other candidates say things like this with impunity.

Also - everyone (sane) knows that racism is evil. But there isn't the same agreement about sexism or misogyny. Jackasses like Chris Matthews plug away day after day with his sexist views, and there are no repercussions. His views are considered somewhat normative.

Racist discourse is (rightly) relegated to fringes. Even racists know that their views are not socially acceptable. But disparaging women, mocking their abilities, reducing them to objects? That's considered mainstream, even desirable if you are trying to target a certain audience.

I've been having this discussion with a female friend of mine. What criticism of Senator Clinton is criticism on policy and the merits and what criticism is sexism? I don't think it should be hard to tell those apart.
But you are being disingenuous here. I checked all of your links and some of them I just can't understand. For example, the link to Eschaton where he links to Daily Kos.
It seems to me Zuniga's objection to Clinton is a policy issue. He claims the Clinton's and other DLC Democrats have been contemptuous of the grassroots. Now, you might disagree with that. But I don't see how his claim is sexist or misongynistic. His dislike of Senator Clinton as a politician is based on policy, not sex.
I just don't get why smart people interpret mistrust of a politician, for political reasons, as mistrust based on sexism.

Racist discourse is (rightly) relegated to fringes.

Really? http://www.reclusiveleftist.com/?p=926#comments.

Well, I posted to lbo-talk a while back:

"...Is Obama really a weaker candidate than Clinton? That depends on whether American voters, en masse, are more fervent racists than misogynists. Who knows? It's hard to tell."

I still can't say about the general public, but so far as the chattering class go I think that question has been answered once and for all.

Sexism is the norm and it makes it incredibly hard to fight it especially when it comes from people occupying the same political space on the spectrum. I grew tired of defending Ann Coulter and Michelle Malkin from the worst kinds of misogyny on "liberal" boards so I stopped reading a lot of threads. However that Eschaton link explicitly states that misogynist attacks against Clinton are unfair. It does not imply that women just vote with their vaginas it says if they were undecided they came out in the end to defend Hillary becuase the voters knew it was unfair. (As you no doubt remember they also came out and protested her treatment in the media wrangling a painful apology from Chris Matthews which obviously did no good in the long run)

I completly agree that there has been rampant sexism in this campaign but the majority of it has come from the Republicans first, the media a close second, liberal "progressives" third and the Obama campaign a distant fourth.

The Obama campaign has an obligation to not be sexist (something it has dropped the ball on a couple of times) it does not have an obligation to defend Hillary Clinton from other people's sexism. The Clinton campaign has an obligation to not be racist (something it has dropped the ball on a couple of times) it does not have an obligation to defend Obama from other people's racism.

I do not support the Clinton campaign because I think every Democrat who voted for the War in Iraq should be denied higher office from this point forward. I am tired of our politicians dancing around and never holding to a just position every time somebody says "national security".