Icy Hillary and her Inner Jock

Patrick Healy of The New York Times gives a rather bizarre analysis of Hillary Clinton's challenges in "Hillary Clinton Searches for Her Inner Jock."

He writes:

Hillary Rodham Clinton needs a sport.

Her favorite fitness activity, according to her MySpace page, is speed walking. Her hobbies include crossword puzzles, Scrabble and gardening. Organizing her closets is stress relief. Sleeping in until 7 a.m. is her idea of being naughty.

Her chief rival for the Democratic presidential nomination, Barack Obama, meanwhile, has already shown a touch for channeling the varsity glamour of John F. Kennedy, who radiated vigor and charisma by playing touch football and skippering boats. Mr. Obama loves to play pickup basketball, a game that is the definition of cool for a lot of men.

The problem, as one of her donors put it: “How does 59-year-old Mama run against sexy Obama?” (The donor asked not to be named speaking critically of his candidate.)

This is a weird, sexist column.

It's not that I want to defend Hillary. That's the last thing I feel the need to do. But implicit in Healy's piece is that women make for awkward presidential candidates.

He seems to be picking on mature women in general, rather than the stiff, distant Hillary Clinton.

How does she show personality through leisure, particularly of the sporting kind? Voters expect their presidents to throw out the first pitch; they are used to George W. Bush clearing brush, Bill Clinton playing golf, George H.W. Bush racing speedboats, and Ronald Reagan riding horseback.But there is no playbook for a woman running for president. If Condoleezza Rice ran for president, some adviser would surely play up her love of the National Football League.

I don't expect my president to play sports. I expect them to carry out the duties assigned to them under the Constitution.

Pickup basketball isn't one of them. (By the way, when did pickup basketball become sexy?)

I could not care less what a president does for leisure, unless of course it involves oral sex in the Oval Office and then lying about under oath.

I didn't vote for Bush 43 because he clears brush. (When did that become a sport?)

I certainly wouldn't support Condi just because she's an NFL fan.

...The Clinton camp believes that if the presidential nomination comes down to experience, competence and gutsiness (rather than personality), Mrs. Clinton will win.

...But Mrs. Clinton also knows that she needs to win points for likeability. So she often pokes fun at herself.

...Her inner jock, however, can feel forced.

...The problem for her, unlike Mr. Obama, is that if she played any sport today, she could invite ridicule. There is a delicate balance between a candidate’s true self and, if voters don’t buy it, a phony image. John Kerry bought a hunting license in Ohio three weeks before Election Day in 2004; his campaign also arranged for the media to photograph him with gun in hand, wearing fatigues and gesturing thumbs up after a kill. While Mr. Kerry often talked about hunting as a young man, many people found the sportsman imagery — and him — inauthentic.

Hillary definitely has a likeability problem.

It would be a terrible mistake to think that she can her fake her way into the hearts of Americans.

We know Hillary. Since she showed up on 60 Minutes with Bill to talk about Jennifer Flowers, we've known her. For fifteen years she's been on the national stage.

The verdict has been in for years. She's not very warm. That image is as immobile and stony as Hillary's face.

She should just be herself.

She doesn't have to pretend to be interested in things that she's not. As it is, her fake Southern drawl shows more pretense on her part than I can handle.

Then, Healy gets into the candidates' physical looks.

For a female candidate, double standards can also complicate their image-buffing. Last week. the Boston Herald published a column alleging that Mrs. Clinton had Botox treatments. The claim was more or less debunked, but it was a provocative moment. If the media ever confirmed that Mrs. Clinton did have a Botox treatment, she would almost certainly face an authenticity question. And the double standard would probably kick in: She would seem consumed with her looks — as if men aren’t.

Anyone looking at Hillary can see that she's not consumed with her looks.

Botox isn't nearly as inauthentic as that lame Southern accent she trots out when she thinks it will help her score points with her audience.

Anyway, I don't think people would be troubled to learn that Hillary had Botox, as long as she admitted having the treatment.

That was John Kerry's mistake.

From early 2004:

A Boston radio station posed the question to Kerry on the day of the New Hampshire primary. The Massachusetts senator "absolutely" denied receiving Botox treatments.

"I've never even heard it," Kerry said. "Where did this come from? ... I've never even heard of it. Never heard of it."

The Daily News noted the candidate's wife, Theresa Heinz Kerry, has publicly acknowledged using Botox.

And people call Bush stupid!

If Hillary, too, feels the need to use Botox to help her sagging campaign, I hope she has the strength of character to be honest about it.

It appears, like Kerry, that she doesn't have the cojones to do that.

Hugging and crying also trigger the double standard. In 1992 Bill Clinton was saying “I feel your pain,” and putting his arms around grown men, sometimes tearing up over a sad story.

But if Mrs. Clinton cries on the campaign trail, it will be big news — and not in a good way, her advisers say. “It’d be very difficult for her to cry now,” said John Catsimatidis, another Clinton fund-raiser. “The best she can do is listen.”

Mrs. Clinton could have had a perfect feel-your-pain moment last month on a walking tour of flood-ravaged New Orleans. At his half-rebuilt home, Gerard Washington told her of being cheated by contractors. As he became more emotional, Mrs. Clinton listened with a furrowed brow and looked at him with concern. But she did not touch him. Maybe it’s her nature; despite all her “listening tours,” she can seem rather formal. Or maybe it’s the nature of her candidacy. Can a female politician go around hugging male voters?

Why can't a female politician hug male voters?

What sort of sexist drivel is that?

It's not always the best thing to have male politicians going around hugging female voters.


Bill Clinton's legendary hugs weren't always a sign that he was feeling someone's pain.

Bottom line:

Hillary isn't struggling with double standards related to the fact that she's a woman in a field of men.

She has challenges to overcome but they are about personality. character, qualifications, and her positions on issues, not X chromosomes. Healy and New York Times libs are closet sexists. And they're too dumb to realize that the closet door is wide open.