Media Matters for America: Maureen Dowd repeatedly uses gender to mock Democrats

[DeepModem Mom]

Report: Maureen Dowd repeatedly uses gender to mock Democrats

A Media Matters for America review of Maureen Dowd's New York Times columns between January 1, 2007, and June 8, 2008, reveals that Dowd has frequently characterized this election cycle's leading Democratic candidates -- Sens. Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton and former Sen. John Edwards (NC) -- using gendered language, specifically characterizing Clinton as masculine, and Obama and Edwards as feminine....

OBAMA

Dowd has described Obama as "the diffident debutante" and "America's pretty boy." She has characterized him and his campaign as seemingly "effete," writing on March 9: "Obama's multiculturalism is a selling point with many Democrats. But his impassioned egghead advisers have made his campaign seem not only out of his control, but effete and vaguely foreign -- the same unflattering light that doomed Michael Dukakis and John Kerry." Similarly, in an April 2 column, Dowd claimed that "his strenuous and inadvertently hilarious efforts to woo working-class folk in Pennsylvania have only made him seem more effete." Later in the column, she wrote: "At the Wilbur chocolate shop in Lititz Monday, he spent most of his time skittering away from chocolate goodies, as though he were a starlet obsessing on a svelte waistline."...

Dowd has also frequently characterized Obama as a child....

CLINTON

Dowd called Clinton "The Man," following Clinton's win in the May 6 Indiana primary....

***

Dowd has also frequently compared Clinton to aggressive, ruthless, or violent characters, describing her efforts to obtain the Democratic nomination as "Attack of the 50 Foot Woman," and writing that she "seized the chance to play Godzilla." On June 20, 2007, Dowd claimed that, "like Tony (Soprano), Hillary is so power-hungry that she can justify any thuggish means to get the prize." Similarly, on March 23, Dowd wrote: "It's impossible to imagine The Terminator, as a former aide calls her, giving up. Unless every circuit is out, she'll regenerate enough to claw her way out of the grave, crawl through the Rezko Memorial Lawn and up Obama's wall, hurl her torso into the house and brutally haunt his dreams."...

***

EDWARDS

Dowd has described Edwards as a "Breck Girl," a "Material Boy," and a "glamour boy," and has called him the "Secretary of Hairdressing." In a September 16, 2007, column, Dowd wrote that Edwards and Obama seemed to be "hiding behind their wives' skirts," after asserting that they had "tiptoed around her (Clinton), letting their wives take shots at the front-runner."

REPUBLICAN CANDIDATES

By contrast, Dowd rarely feminized the all-male Republican field, and Media Matters found no instances of her doing so with McCain this election cycle since January 2007....

***

Dowd has also used gendered language in contrasting Democrats with Republicans -- at times suggesting that Giuliani is tougher and more masculine than Obama and Edwards. In her September 16, 2007, column, for example, Dowd juxtaposed Giuliani with the "comely" Obama and Edwards, who -- she wrote -- seemed to be "hiding behind their wives' skirts" in their campaigns against Clinton. Dowd then added: "Enter Rudy. He may wear skirts, but he's not afraid to take down a skirt."...

***

Later in the column, Dowd wrote that while Giuliani can't campaign on policy issues, "he can be the only man in the field tough enough to slap around a woman....

http://mediamatters.org/items/200806100002?f=h_top

[monmouth]

1. Egads Maureen, menopause much???

[Captain Hilts]

10. Now, THAT's sexist. nt

[KittyWampus]

12. how about if I call her a sophomoric, snide, petty Heather?

[Captain Hilts]

17. Works for me! nt

[BlooInBloo]

2. Poor, pathetic, bitter old MoDo....

Nothing in her life but snark-for-snark's-sake.

[Mabus]

3. I never could see her "charm"

She doesn't strike me as very bright and she's always willing to jump on the most recent band wagon. I can't begin to list the number of ways that she makes my skin crawl. The last time I saw her on Maher's show she just seemed so pathetic. She was still trying to be a flirty ingénue although that boat sailed several cases of hair dye ago.

[ProfessorGAC]

19. Perfect Description Of Her

Not very bright and a bandwagon jumper supreme. I agree completely.
The Professor

[tom_paine]

20. Good God. I think you just described the entire Amerikan Corporate Cable TV Toady Media!

(with a few notable exceptions...very few)

There can be no doubt that the breakdown of our Free Press has contributed mightily to the Fall of the American Republic...it may be one of the primary causes (a thing like this has many causes).

[ProfessorGAC]

21. Yeah. Likely So

But, that makes sense. Because if she was unique in this regard, she wouldn't have risen to the level of fame to which she has.

So, it must be part of the job description.
The Professor

[Mabus]

24. Fineman calls it the "American Mainstream Media Party"

As this piece of "analysis" by Fineman shows, the AMMP is full of themselves. Fineman is trying to act like he's a member of the crusading press of the days of yore. He seems to forget how much he and his current crop of cronies have bowed to the GOP. He blows it off and acts like he doesn't realize he's part of the problem.

The 'Media Party' is over
CBS' downfall is just the tip of the iceberg

ANALYSIS
By Howard Fineman
MSNBC contributor
updated 12:43 p.m. ET, Thurs., Jan. 13, 2005

A political party is dying before our eyes — and I don't mean the Democrats. I'm talking about the "mainstream media," which is being destroyed by the opposition (or worse, the casual disdain) of George Bush's Republican Party; by competition from other news outlets (led by the internet and Fox's canny Roger Ailes); and by its own fraying journalistic standards. At the height of its power, the AMMP (the American Mainstream Media Party) helped validate the civil rights movement, end a war and oust a power-mad president. But all that is ancient history.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6813945/

Poor, poor media. They were destroyed by the GOP and they couldn't stop it. Boo-hoo. What a crock of doggie doo-doo. I hope Fineman drowns in his crocodile tears. And soon!

[Breeze54]

4. Wow...... she needs to read this and take a break!

:silly:

[madrchsod]

5. i always thought of her as a ramada inn lounge lizard

but it seems she`s working the parking lot now..

[Warren Stupidity]

6. In other news: water found to be 'wet'.

[Lyric]

7. With a name like "Maureen Dowd", is it any surprise that she's bitter?

Her folks might as well have named her Latrina Brown.

[Bucky]

11. Are you even making a point?

Please, think before posting.

[elehhhhna]

8. one can hardly "feminize" McCain -- he looks like the freaking English Patient

[KittyWampus]

13. oh dear...

[Benhurst]

9. She's a third-rate hack working for what has become a second-rate newspaper.

[blm]

14. Name the one politician Dowd would want with her IF she was pinned down by gunfire.

And hook her up to a lie detector when she says so.


I don't give a shit what any of the mouthbreathers will claim - there isn't a political columnist, Dem pundit, or RW Republican who wouldn't choose John Kerry to be watching their back in that foxhole, especially if their life and the lives of their families were at stake.

All the bluster otherwise is PURE BULLSHIT set up to mislead the public.

They all know the truth that he is one of the few in DC with the courage, the skills, and the SELFLESS INTEGRITY to protect their lives.

[Quantess]

15. Her fluff is witty and clever...

...in her own mind.

[JamesA1102]

16. Dowd is a joke and liar.

She lied about Al Gore for 2 years and helped Bush steal the White House. She is a disgrace.

[Captain Hilts]

18. Bob Herbert is STILL peddling the "Clinton vandalism of the White House" story.

No fact checkers on the Times' op-ed page.

[undeterred]

22. I'd like to slap her around myself.

:nuke:

[kenny blankenship]

23. Dowd is an intestinal parasite

If I used the kinds of words that best describe her and her kind of writing, I'd be banned from DU.