Althouse: "I think women should never be in politics. We're just not suited to it."

September 12, 2011

"I think women should never be in politics. We're just not suited to it."

Said Jackie Kennedy.

35 comments:

sakredkow said...: My how times have changed.; 9/12/11, 10:22 AM
SGT Ted said...: I, for one, am completely loving the release of these statements from Jackie O that would be used to paint a conservative as a neanderthal bigot, were he to speak so.

I have a schadenboner.; 9/12/11, 10:25 AM
edutcher said...: Depends on the woman.

A lot of Lefty women in politics are airheads who owe their seat to Daddy or Hubby or both.

And their plumbing.

OTOH, there are some very smart Conservative women just starting to get involved. Nikki Haley, as an example.; 9/12/11, 10:27 AM
traditionalguy said...: Jackie was raised in the world of powerful men. She was one of the last of the traditionalists. A powerful man needed a loyal woman to make a team.

After 1966, the women could seldom find a powerful man that wanted to settle for one woman, since women became so easily available sexually. One at a time maybe the best they can hope for.

So today it is every woman for herself.; 9/12/11, 10:34 AM
Fred4Pres said...: Jackie was not suited to politics.; 9/12/11, 10:37 AM
Nonapod said...: I'm not sure men are much suited for it either.; 9/12/11, 10:50 AM
rhhardin said...: Women certainly aren't suited to voting, but women holding office is fine.; 9/12/11, 10:50 AM
pm317 said...: Thank God for Hillary Clinton!; 9/12/11, 10:52 AM
edutcher said...: She's one who vindicates Jackie more than all the rest.; 9/12/11, 10:56 AM
kjbe said...: Thanks for sharing, Jackie.; 9/12/11, 11:16 AM
Saint Croix said...: I think Sarah Palin might be the first U.S. national politician who's overtly feminine, who uses sex appeal to help get her way.

Which is ironic, because JFK might have been the first male politician who used sex appeal to help get his way.

I am sure lots of women voted for Kennedy on the grounds of sex appeal. And Clinton, too, apparently, but by God I never got that at all. Bill Clinton is like ordering an extra bucket of sleeze at the KFC.

But what's interesting is that Palin's sex appeal makes the other side completely flip out. So she's attacked ("Caribou Barbie") in a way JFK never was. The media absolutely romanticized the Kennedys ("Camelot") to a degree that's pretty damn absurd.

So is our society more threatened by female sex appeal than male sex appeal? After all, men do not use sex to get our way. Men are the second class citizens of the sexual universe.

Women, on the other hand, use their sex appeal all the time. They learn how to manipulate men when they are frickin' girls. So to combine this old-fashioned feminine power with political power is new. And for some people, clearly, scary.

Michelle Bachmann, by the way, does not have this sort of sex appeal. So, even though she's obviously to the right of Palin, the media has not gone off the rails with her. It's just normal, make-the-righty-look-crazy stuff. It's not absolutely unhinged and obsessive behavior, like the media showed with Sarah.

Bachmann is 55. She's attractive, I guess, but she's not hot. Nobody is sexually obsessed with Michelle Bachmann. If you are, see a doctor.

Sarah Palin is 47. She just had a baby. This so unhinged a certain gay commentator that he made an ass out of himself insisting it was impossible. Sarah Palin is 47, still hot--although not as hot as she was 3 years ago--and the most common refrain I hear about her is that she should "wait until she has more seasoning."

In other words, America is ready for the old, wrinkly woman-as-leader model. The wise old grandmother can lead us. But are we ready for the GMILF?

I don't know. Stay tuned!; 9/12/11, 11:18 AM
Saint Croix said...: Women politicians on the left, of course, desexualize themselves as much as possible. "Sex is irrelevant!" they say. And their wardrobe screams it.; 9/12/11, 11:28 AM
edutcher said...: Saint Croix said...

I think Sarah Palin might be the first U.S. national politician who's overtly feminine, who uses sex appeal to help get her way.

Which is ironic, because JFK might have been the first male politician who used sex appeal to help get his way.

Papa Joe wanted him packaged like soap flakes and that's how it was done.

I am sure lots of women voted for Kennedy on the grounds of sex appeal. And Clinton, too, apparently, but by God I never got that at all. Bill Clinton is like ordering an extra bucket of sleeze at the KFC.

And you didn't even get a paper napkin.; 9/12/11, 11:39 AM
Carol_Herman said...: Well, Jackie Kennedy represents WHY so many women who can be successful with men, prefer their company to that of other women!

The other good thing Jackie Kennedy did was GET RID OF HATS!

Unfortunately, if you wanted the kind of money she wanted to spend, she had to marry Aristole Onassis. And, then tolerate it until the divorce.

Next, she found a very orthodox Jewish guy. (Whose wife wouldn't give him a "GET" ... so, in essence, he was "religiously married." And, he invested what she got from Aristotle. And, that portfolio grew ten fold.)

Jackie didn't ask a woman to help her invest, either.

And, if truth be known ... most women enjoy the company of men ... far more than they do the company of their girl friends.

(This only changes with queers. While those rules don't even amount to 10%. Let alone the devastation that came from AIDS. And, hampered cultural growth. Because, as the very interesting Fran Lebowitz said: Those were the guys who were frequently having sex. Which caused their early demise.)

Oh. And, Truman Capote did end up in Jackie Kennedy's circle of friends. But then she wanted a job, so she got one in publishing. I don't think she published a single female name. And, her daughter, now, doesn't count.; 9/12/11, 11:44 AM
SukieTawdry said...: I have to say that in the years since women first became active in politics, they (we) haven't shown me much. There are far too many women who proclaim their independence and then proceed to attempt to make government a substitute for daddy, husband and nanny. Some independence.

rhhardin said...Women certainly aren't suited to voting, but women holding office is fine.

Very funny. Also, too close to the truth for comfort.; 9/12/11, 11:46 AM
Hagar said...: I do not think any of this should be taken at face value.

Jackie made a deal with old Joe that she would stay married to Jack and not make any sort of trouble, and he would make sure that she and her children would never be poor, and she kept her side of the bargain.

And I have read that Schlesinger was not one of her favorite people, so it is unlikely she would "open her heart" to him. Or for that matter to anyone else. I can't remember Jackie O. ever saying or intentionally doing anything that was not packaged for publication.; 9/12/11, 12:09 PM
William said...: I have read the back stories of women like Katherine Hepburn, Simone de Beauvoir, Jane Fonda, Hillary Clinton, and Jackie Kennedy. I cannot understand why they get to be feminist icons and women like Sarah Palin and Michele Bachmann are ridiculed.; 9/12/11, 1:21 PM
Christy said...: Reading some of these quotes is bizarre. The kids and I will never leave your side [because, as Hagar pointed out, Joe Kennedy paid her to stay with Jack.]

I did wish, at the time, I had her clothing budget. I remember pulling an article about how much she spent on everything from Parade Magazine and lobbying Mom, to no avail.; 9/12/11, 1:43 PM
Alex said...: I always felt a tinge of pity for Jackie Kennedy.; 9/12/11, 2:05 PM
Anonymous said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 9/12/11, 2:35 PM
YoungHegelian said...: @William,

"I have read the back stories of women like Katherine Hepburn, Simone de Beauvoir, Jane Fonda, Hillary Clinton, and Jackie Kennedy. I cannot understand why they get to be feminist icons...."

They are not feminist icons in spite of the men in their lives treating them like shit, they are icons BECAUSE of it.

You just don't understand what a burden it is to be a intelligent, sensitive, female person and have to live with these, these BEASTS called men, do you!?

The fact that all the women above sold their souls when they hitched their stars to exploitative & manipulative jerks on their way up is neither here nor there.; 9/12/11, 3:14 PM
Jose_K said...: Nobody is sexually obsessed with Michelle Bachmann. If you are, see a doctor
why?
She is married ,so her husband must be.
Usually, people is obsessed with less than perfect women.
Nobody kills for Alessandra Ambrossio or Megan Fox but someone tried for Jodie Foster.; 9/12/11, 3:23 PM
pm317 said...: William said...
-------------

True feminists like me have applauded women like Palin. In fact I was cheering her loudly when she went around using the phrase 'old boys club'. I was giddy thinking about her win, a mother of five and what she could have done with that office shattering the image notwithstanding that her politics was different from mine. I have watched her husband in many interviews and quite impressed with how he comes across. He is a role model in his own right. We need more women of all persuasions and walks of life and we don't have the luxury of saying 'not that woman'. Not yet.; 9/12/11, 3:36 PM
Kensington said...: Michele Bachmann is hot...enough.

But that's not why I support her.

Sarah Palin is smoking hot.

But that also is not why I support her.; 9/12/11, 3:43 PM
Pettifogger said...: Jackie was projecting. I suppose she saw herself as unsuited to politics, but I don't see any basis to say that about all women.

I don'think I am temperamentally suited for politics, but surely that's not a reflection on males in general.; 9/12/11, 5:10 PM
Saint Croix said...: Nobody kills for Alessandra Ambrossio or Megan Fox but someone tried for Jodie Foster.

Not when she was 55!

Look, there's a biological reason men are more interested in young women than old women. Young women have babies. Old women do not. The urge to reproduce is a basic human urge, an animal impulse if you will.

I think the animus against Sarah Palin would be a lot weaker if she was 55 or 60. As her sexual power declines, other women feel less threatened by her. And of course many women are not threatened by Sarah Palin at all. It's an idiosyncratic response, to be sure. But so much of the rage against Palin seems emotional to me. It's primal and (I think) sexual.; 9/12/11, 5:16 PM
Kensington said...: I'm not at all convinced that Sarah Palin's sexual powers will ever decline. We could be looking at a Sophia Loren situation, here.; 9/12/11, 5:31 PM
Saint Croix said...: Or Raquel Welch! That woman had scary good genes.; 9/12/11, 5:47 PM
Carol_Herman said...: Feminists are lesbians. Most women are not lesbians!

You know, I can remember back to the early 1960's, when I saw Jackie Kennedy, just having her hair done, coming down the steps of Kenneth's. And, going into her waiting limousine. She was more beautiful than any of her photos!

No. She wasn't bright! And, she spoke in barely a whisper. Didn't keep her husband faithful. And, it didn't keep him with being involved with Marilyn Monroe.

So, now there are tapes.

But ya know what? The Camelot fiction has given up its ghost. And, John-John had a terrible end of his own devising.

Caroline, on the other hand, is without the magic.

Also, because JFK died before his dad, Joe, there was no inheritance for Jackie! And, once Joe stroked Rose made sure she was going to make Jackie's life miserable!

The "truth" is still hiding behind the scenes.; 9/12/11, 6:41 PM
A. Shmendrik said...: Nobody kills for Alessandra Ambrossio or Megan Fox but someone tried for Jodie Foster.

But Jodie Foster is a lesbian, no?; 9/12/11, 7:18 PM
Cindy Martin said...: I wonder what the Iron Lady had to say about that comment.; 9/12/11, 8:17 PM
Saint Croix said...: But Jodie Foster is a lesbian, no?

Well, not in the movie.; 9/12/11, 9:49 PM
HKatz said...: After 1966, the women could seldom find a powerful man that wanted to settle for one woman

And before 1966, powerful men didn't often go for more than one woman? Given who Jackie Kennedy was married to, that's an especially odd comment.; 9/12/11, 11:46 PM
Almost Ali said...: The greater good demands we repeal the 19th Amendment. Which I believe was suggested by Ann Coulter.

Wanna catch a deer in the headlights? Ask an educated woman about Obama's background prior to the White House. Ask [her] about his articles in the Harvard Law Review.

Then ask [the woman in the headlights] about Michelle's Princeton thesis.

Then for the sake of your own sanity, change the subject to Bill Cunningham's latest fashion video. Otherwise you'll run over that deer-in-the-headlights like a drunk careening down the highway.; 9/13/11, 12:34 AM
Curious George said...: "A. Shmendrik said...

But Jodie Foster is a lesbian, no?"

Yes. But at the time of the Reagan assassination she was a closeted lesbian. Either that or Hinkley wanted a three way. Can't blame a guy for tryin'; 9/13/11, 7:25 AM