Posted by Damozel | Meanwhile, the tragic decline of progressive values continues apace.
Of Mark Penn's release from his campaign strategy obligations, Josh Marshall asks: "FULL FIRING? OR JUST GELDED?" Yes, because that's how ruthless bitches do it when they go to town on male minions who get above themselves: firing or gelding. There's no arrogance a good either one of those won't cure. Care for a round of 'which would you rather,' guys?
Melissa McEwan at Shakesville has included this reference #76 in her ongoing feature "Hillary Sexism Watch: Castrating Bitch Edition."
Are you fucking kidding me, Josh Marshall? Because I quite honestly can't believe that a person who identifies as a progressive and has two brain cells still knocking together doesn't understand why it's problematic, to put it charitably, to frame Hillary Clinton pushing her male chief strategist from power as "gelding" him. (Shakesville)
Yep.
I disagree with her, though, about the true significance of the Hillary nutcracker (which she mentions as one example of castration-based mockery of Hillary). Like the Hillary-opposing Citizens United Not Timid, the nutcracker novelty item is one of those anti-Hillary gags that just reverses itself like a boomerang to cut off the perpetrators at the, um, knees. After all, if you belong to Citizens United Not Timid (a maladroit name which was apparently the best its creator could do) what does its acronym say about you and your issues and preoccupations?
Whatever the nutcracker's makers intended---nothing kind to Hillary, I am sure---I consider thisa back-handed and unintentional tribute to her superpowers. Every woman over 50 ought to be able to inspire such (literally) visceral and atavistic fear in a certain species of man. The nutcracker is one of those intended attacks that says something very different about Hill than the attackers intended. Or at any rate that is how I choose to construe it.
Marshall's little quip troubles me too, but in a different way: he's a man and meant to be a progressive. Men don't get to make these jokes; it makes them seem pathetic and pathetically lacking in self-awareness. And progressive men in particular are supposed to have enough self-confidence to be comfortable with the ascendancy of a truly powerful woman.
What bothers me---speaking as an older feminist---is Marshall's no doubt intentional implication that this is how Hillary will proceed if permitted to become president: by 'gelding' hapless males. And while I know it's what certain members of the right have thought and feared, I've always assumed that this was because the angry men of the right are actually a rather insecure, jumpy lot, with various 'issues' about control and dominance that play out in war-mongering and misogyny.
And while I don't believe that Marshall is in the same category with those guys, I do accuse him of deliberately pushing all the fear-of-castration buttons as another strike against Hillary.
But that was just the title of the post. His real concern---if I understand him correctly--- is that the Clintons, having had Penn publicly de-bollocked, might intend to keep him around. He's pretty sure they shouldn't.
When you figure how much grief this swaggering oaf has caused the Clinton campaign, if you're going to can him you'd think you would want to present it as something of a clean break, even if in the background some ties might actually remain. Yet the statement seems to have been massaged in such a way as to leave the murkiest of impressions. (TPM)
I guess the Clintons just aren't picking up what TPM is laying down since it seems that Penn, while no longer chief strategist, actually is going to be hanging around.
Corrente (via Lambert) gets the last word:
Seriously, why would anybody take whoever kidnapped Josh Marshall seriously when he gives advice to Hillary?
Kidz, I’m so old I remember when I thought Talking Points Memo was misnomer, and they were really into news gathering. I thought they wanted to be the next Times, when it turns out they want to be the next Weekly Standard. A shame, really. (Corrente)
Clinton Strategist Mark Penn's Stumbles Finally Lead to a Fall
Condi Rice Wants to be Vice President?
Bush to Deploy More Troops to Afghanistan: is a Draft Ultimately Coming?
Hugh Hewitt on Hillary's Bookbag---Wry Witticism or Sad Lack of Life Experience?
Shortage of Primary Care Providers Proves an Obstacle to Universal Coverage
State Dept. to Renew Blackwater's Contract?
Comments