You know, I have never been a big fan of Hillary Clinton, but the unleashed hatred against this woman is so virulent and irrational I'm beginning to think there is no "frontlash" for this backlash to be against. Don't believe me? Do a google image search for Hillary.
If you have safesearch turned off like I do, you'll see every unflattering angle and photo ever of Hilary, photoshopped naked pictures, nasty cartoons, faked images of her and Bill having sex.
Only 6 of the 21 images could be considered neutral or positive.
Now search George W. Bush. Only 8 of them are humorous or negative. Even liberal sites post flattering pictures but with negative captions. This picture isn't even on the front page.
Barack Obama? A satirical "rapper" caricature, a traditional caricature and the rest are smile smile smile smile smile. Heck, there's even pictures of him on the beach.
Let's try Rudy Giuliani, another politician who people really really hate. 11 negative/satirical pictures, including the drag pictures, which some may think positive but probably weren't in context.
John McCain? 6 cartoonish or unflattering. (There are also pictures of him after his rescue from the Viet Cong and one of his wife who I'd never seen. She's pretty hot!)
Admittedly, Hillary is not very photogenic, which adds to the number of very very bad photos of her. One look at that Wellesley graduation photo above (from a site called nohillary.com) and you know she has always struggled to look good.
Like I said, I'm not a huge fan -- Hillary has a sense of entitlement and expediency that I dislike and distrust. But guess what...so does everyone else! She's not much worse than any of the other candidates on that score. Heck if I was going to go with character, John McCain is the only one who really rates -- and he's a wackadoo just like the rest of them.
What about Barack? I like him. He's got 19+ charisma. And he's obviously highly intelligent and principled.
Do I think those principles would last a moment in the Oval Office?
No.
For a control, I tried an image search on Condoleezza Rice. 6 photoshopped naked pictures, 2 cartoons, one unflattering angle. 12 neutral or flattering images. Only Rudy (and Hill) has fewer.
Is there a gender issue here? You bet. As this weeks New Yorker points out, a few weeks ago Chris Matthews was complaining Hillary laughed too much. Now she's crying too much. She's too mannish; she's pandering to women. She's not feminine enough to get elected; America would never accept an emotional woman any way. Nothing she does can win.
By now, Hillary is a symbol. She's the whipping girl for whatever you don't like about the Demoratic party. And maybe for everything you don't like about a strong female authority figure. Hillary is in uncharted territory here. America doesn't like powerful women (Hell, I'm not sure anywhere does.) Oprah Winfrey, Nancy Pelosi, Janet Reno, Condi. Not only are they picked on for their positions and views, but every single aspect of their appearance, wardrobe and interaction is criticized. Ad nauseum.
There's no society in which women are not judged on their appearance. (Well, maybe places where rigid sharia is practiced, and look how those turned out.) That's human nature -- and women buy into it. It's accepted. Can we move beyond that just a bit to accept substance in a female authority figure? I have no answer for that.
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