Politico and Daily Kos Double Standard on Gillibrand
January 29, 2010
by Amy Siskind
|This is just unbelievable. How do these guys even have jobs?
Glenn Thrush wrote yesterday on his blog at Politco about Senator Kirsten Gillibrand. The piece is mostly about Harold Ford referring to Sen Gillibrand as a “parakeet”. But Thrush also reports the following (my emphasis added):
Gillibrand also shrugged off a Research 2000/Daily Kos poll showing Ford leading among women…
Huh? That’s not remotely what the poll actually shows. Did you even read it Glenn?
Here’s the Research 2000/Daily Kos poll results (my emphasis added again):
Democratic Senate Primary
Kirsten Gillibrand (D) 41
Harold Ford (D) 27
Jonathan Tasini (D) 3….Interestingly, her favorables are better among men (49-23) than among women (44-28). They are 46-26 overall, quite unremarkable.
So, to be clear, Ford does NOT lead Sen Gillibrand with women as reported by Thrush. Rather Ford’s favorables with women are 35-14 – but with 51% saying I dunno!
And, can I ask Daily Kos what would constitute “remarkable?” Apparently, if a woman’s favorables are 46-26 that is not high enough?
The level of bias and misinformation here is simply and insult. Thrush owes Sen Gillibrand an apology and should issue a correction to his blog!
Oh, and if any of you had doubts about whether sexism is alive and well in our country, here’s a comment posted to Thrush’s blog story:
Gilly, go make dinner, change a diaper and get Chuck Schumer his coffee and dry cleaning. We cant wait to vote this dim bulb out.
And, to make matters worse, the NY State Democratic Party Chair today called for a “truce” between Gillibrand and Ford, saying “We’re not choosing a Prom Queen here!” I beg your pardon? How much more sexist can this get? Harold Ford blows into town, goes to work on Wall Street, doesn’t both to register to vote, doesn’t bother to VOTE in two consecutive elections, still carries a Tennessee drivers license – and announces he’d like to represent New York in the US Senate? And launches his effort by a three-week relentless and vicious attack on Gillibrand. This guy has done enormous damage to the New York democratic party in a matter of weeks, a great way to jump start a new political career. He’s Wall Street’s candidate, pure and simple. There are a bunch of them being recruited by Steve Rattner and Maureen White, including one hedge-fund lawyer running against Congresswoman Carolyn Maloney. Gillibrand, meanwhile, fights the fight to repeal DADT, led the fight to defeat the Stupak Amendment, while leading a campaign for food safety. She and Maloney have joined forces to create a bill that will encourage small businesses to hire new employees. She is hardworking, incredibly smart, and a worthy successor to Hillary Clinton. Helicopter Harold, go home!
Amy,
I would urge you to please to directly to DailyKos and Politico. These guys need to be taken on and women need to push back in a very public and assertive way. Women seeing other women defending a woman by simply setting the record straight and calling these men out is the best and IMO, the only way that we will make significant strides in stopping this behavior.
In other words, what would Jesse and Al in a situation like this?!
You would think that after the primaries and everything that’s happened over the past year, that the D’s could not piss me off anymore. Then along comes my favorite guy in the whole world, Harold Ford. Bloody hell! And the purpose D’s of trying to run Gillibrand out is what? Too many women in congress?
Daily Kos has always been a hotbed of sexism.
If you read the whole story by Kos, you’ll see there’s nothing remotely sexist about it. Kos strongly supports Gillibrand and despises Ford:
“Either way, Gillibrand will crush him in the primary, which would be fantastic indeed.”
http://www.dailykos.com/storyo.....14957/7777
For the record, this is sexism. This is sexist. This is misogyny. This sucks.
Women in New York should band together immediately with a “just say no until this shit stops” platform. No kissing, no cleaning, no cooking, and no nothing until apologies made, Ford is trumped by Gillibrand, and even after women should consider a ‘cold shoulder’ approach to their menfolk.
I also think that women currently serving in politics in America should seriously consider re-branding. Get rid of the deadweight Democrat misnomer and become, for example, the New Party. Or the Woman’s Party. Or Any Party but the Democrat Party, because that title is definitely a drag and it is only going to get worse.
I said it two years ago, and I will keep saying it–The Democratic Party is dead. And they just keep digging the grave deeper. As an ex-Democrat I can say this with glee–them chickens done come home to roost. Cluck, cluck, cluck.
JasonM,
The following sentence is:
I really do hope he runs.
Instead of trying to start a new party, for now anyways, let’s use the party structure that is already in place, the Independent Party. We need to find, field and support candidates who are truly independent. Kirsten could be one of those candidates if she renounces support of the current HCR bill, but until she disentangles from the current administrations policies, she’s going to be in trouble. This has become a sad, sad state of affairs.
The Democrat party is very sexist. They do not see that as a problem. They intended to sell out womens reproductive rights in the Obama care bill. They treated Hillary and Palin with pure misogyny which encouraged and energized the woman haters. They do not even see that they have a problem or care to examine the situation. You should expect their misogyny at this point and you should not vote for the party that loves to hate women, ever.
Real change your approach is exactly what will get women out of public office back to the nineties with 98% male representation.
if women in the democratic party have no chance in blue states and can be driven out by the likes of ford and brown just because the party is miserable and sexist. where do we go. remember the last house election where the republicans were split between a moderate republican and a conservative independent in a conservative district in New York, the democrat won. whether you like or dislike or hate the dems, we need to support democratic female candidates in blue states if we are serious about getting more representation.
Bes,
Good point Bes–Don’t vote for the party that treats women like shit. At this point in time, the Democrats win that award and will FOREVER be the shittiest party ever thanks to Obama.
For those of you with a short memory, Hillary won, the stole it from her, lied, cheated, bought and then delivered to the American People a big bile o’shit named Obama and 12 months later this country is on the verge of the worst financial break down in history. We’ve got an empty shirt marxist spewing lies right and left, and no one –NOT ONE PERSON–appears brave enough to call the emperor NAKED. But he is …. he certainly is.
Both parties are unacceptable, so I was forced to become independent last year (after being a life long Democrat). I will vote for the best person for me and the country and at this point it is anyone NOT voting with the Democrats. The sooner women understand this the sooner they will start winning elections.
Amy, here’s the full quote, Kos hopes Ford runs because he wants to see Ford lose and lose big:
“That’s not horrible for Ford, actually, though certainly an underdog. His favorability ratings are 40 percent favorable, 13 percent unfavorable, with almost half (47 percent) having no opinion of him. If he decides to run, that’ll be the battle — he’ll try to define himself positively, talking about all the great things he’d do for bankers and hedge fund managers, everyone else will chat about Ford’s helicopters, pedicures, and his decidedly anti-progressive history in Tennessee. Either way, Gillibrand will crush him in the primary, which would be fantastic indeed. I really do hope he runs.”
“I really hope he runs” does not mean “I hope he wins”.
He wants him to run because he wants him to lose and go away forever.
Anyone who reads Daily Kos with any regularity knows that Ford is hated on that site by Kos and a huge majority of diarists & commenters. Ford is a DLC dem, the DLC hates Daily Kos and vice-versa.
This charge of sexism is completely manufactured, Amy you should run a correction here.
JasonM,
This is the exact quote from DK:
“I really do hope he runs.”
I assume you are the author.
You should know that we are watching, and if women candidates are given biased treatment, we will be speaking out!
Amy, please read what I pasted earlier,then read this:
http://www.dailykos.com/story/.....-sacrifice
And this:
http://www.dailykos.com/story/.....-hilarious
After reading those posts by Kos, please show me where he says ANYTHING positive about Ford. Please. Kos supports Gillibrand and can’t stand Ford.
“Quite unremarkable” is not sexist or misogynist. If that’s all you got, there’s no sexism from Kos here.
In case people don’t want to give Kos traffic, here are some highlights:
“I can’t wait for Ford to run. I’m desperate for him to run. We can never have too much hilarity around here.”
“Look at this crock of shit from Harold Ford, April 2009:
“After long thought, consultation and prayer with my wife, Emily, I’ve decided now is not the right time to re-enter elected politics. Therefore, I won’t be a candidate for Governor this year.
I want to personally thank the many across our state and country who urged me to run for Governor. There will be another race and time to ask for your support.”
“Ford hopes to provide much needed-representation for those downtrodden Manhattanites who commute to their Wall Street jobs by helicopter.”
Only in the Bizaro World could Markos be described as a supporter of Harold Ford.
Say it with me once,everybody:
Kos hopes Ford runs because he wants to see Gillibrand trounce him and send him back to the punditocracy.
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