June 10, 2007
· Filed under Bill Clinton, Chelsea Clinton, biohraphies, motherhood, poltical husband
So how does Hillary combat the two new biographies which portray her as a single-minded, intensely driven careerwoman?
Like any candidate wishing to become more of a ‘real person’ in the public eye, she goes back to her roots.
For a politician, this means emphasizing her childhood, family life, and ’salt of the earth’ experience. While Hillary has not completely brought out the big guns yet, she has started mentioning her childhood, her daughter, and her mother a bit more in speeches as of late (see this Washington Post article). Read the rest of this entry »
June 10, 2007
· Filed under biohraphies, limelight
Time magazine has done a direct side-by-side comparison of the latest two biographies about Hillary in simple chart format– click here to see it
June 4, 2007
· Filed under Bill Clinton, insider, iraq, limelight
Hillary has recently found two new thorns in her side: two books written about her that both happened to come out at roughly the same time. One is “Her Way: The Hopes and Ambitions of Hillary Rodham Clinton,” by Jeff Gerth and Don Van Natta J, and the other is “Woman in Charge: The Life of Hillary Rodham Clinton,” by Carl Bernstein. Both books are critical of Hillary, and although her campaign managers are writing them off as ‘old news’, such an assesment isn’t entirely true.
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May 16, 2007
· Filed under Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton, Mother Theresa, campaign strategy, democrats, limelight, poltical husband
More and more, Bill Clinton’s name is being mentioned in connection with his wife’s candidacy for president. Hillary faces a major dilemma when deciding whether or not she should allow her husband to enter the spotlight with her. She must consider the following: will Bill’s legendarily charismatic presence overshadow hers, thereby preventing potential supporters from really getting to know her? On the other hand, Hillary and other democrats remember all too well what happened to Al Gore, who tried to distance himself from President Clinton during his campaign.
Clearly Team Hillary is not too afraid of using Bill, since he recently released a 5-minute video endorsing her candidacy and telling the story of her career in public service. This same video has already received strong criticism from Christian groups, because Hillary includes footage of herself with Mother Theresa in it. (see rest of post for video)
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May 10, 2007
· Filed under Angela Merkel, Bill Clinton, Denis Thatcher, Hillary Clinton, Joachin Schauer, Margaret Thatcher, democrats, female politicians worldwide, female vs. male politicians, limelight, poltical husband, world opinion
Bill has started thinking about what his role will be when he returns to the White House– not as the ou
r political leader in charge, but as her devoted husband. As this NYT article points out, the main change will be that he will not continue working; instead, he will pay his expenses out of the Clinton savings account and focus on representing the United States of America by Hillary’s side. He seems to be handling his journey from democratic frontman to the weaker half of a political dyad quite well; who knows, maybe having the charismatic lady-killer focus on PR while his less scandal-prone wife runs the country would turn out to be a stupendous idea?
This unique Clinton dilemma– a former President’s return to the White House as an unelected sidekick– made me wonder how ‘first husbands’ in other parts of the globe choose to adopt to and treat their newfound roles.
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May 8, 2007
· Filed under Hillary Clinton, Hillary vs Obama, Obama
Is Barack Obama’s wife Michelle challenging Hillary?
In a recent Washington Post article, she was quoted as saying:
“I know that experience is important, right? But experience without the sort of moral compass is not enough. And it’s not just enough to check off a bunch of boxes and say, ‘I’ve spent so many years in Washington,’ because Barack has those experiences. He doesn’t have the checked-box experiences, but he has experience that makes a difference.”
Could this possibly become a war of words between the two females?
May 6, 2007
· Filed under Hillary Clinton, campaign money, campaign strategy, donors, female voters, philanthropy
As Hillary continues to compete with Barack Obama in the campaign cash race, she has decided to focus more intensely on appealing to female voters. This Washington Post article by Matthew Mosk , sent to me by the lovely Ben, states that women usually contribute 27% of the money eventually raised in overall presidential elections.
In general, I think that women have been less numerous and less generous donors than men– I know that my coed prep school had a far larger endowment than my sister’s nearly identical single-sex prep school, and I have a feeling that this is true for many traditionally male vs. traditionally female colleges as well (although colleges currently do not allow statistics to be kept of donations given only by women).
So why do women give less money than men? And How will Hillary address this challenge?
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April 29, 2007
· Filed under Hillary Clinton, Hillary vs Obama, Obama, clothing and makeup, female vs. male politicians, reporting, sexism
A classmate of mine recently found this Media Matters article which discusses the sexist nature of MSNBC’s coverage of the first presidential debate.
Click on the link above– the story and transcript of the coverage speak for themselves.
April 27, 2007
· Filed under Hillary Clinton, John Edwards, female vs. male politicians, reporting, sexism
While I was listening to NPR show which was discussing the presidential hopefuls this morning, one caller mentioned that reporters and pundits often used the word ’strident’ when describing Hillary. He was angry because he thought that this word was extremely sexist; he viewed ’strident’ or ’shrill’ as demeaning words that society used to describe women who it deemed too pushy or insistent in their views.
I decided to do a bit of research and see if this caller was right– did the media, in fact, use these two words more often when describing Hillary than other candidates?
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April 26, 2007
· Filed under gay rights, iraq, the army, the issues
I found out in a recent Des Moines Register article by Tony Leys, that Hillary Clinton has come out to criticize the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy that the US army currently holds towards its gay members. While answering a question in Iowa, Clinton stated that gays should be allowed to serve in the army while being open and honest about their sexuality. To drive home her point, Hillary quoted the late Senator Barry Goldwater, saying, “think the question should be not whether you are straight, but whether you shoot straight.”
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