September 12, 2017

"No question at all she lost because she was a woman."/"She didn't lose because she is a woman. She lost because of the woman she is."

Those are the first- and second-highest-rated comments on the Washington Post piece by David Weigel "Clinton’s account of how she was ‘shivved’ in the 2016 presidential election."

78 comments:

Matt Sablan said...

I think this book is shaping up to be a classic example of hubris. How does the statement she lost because she was a woman mesh with Palin's popularity on the right/far right?

David Begley said...

Hillary was outworked and outsmarted. WI, MI, NC and PA never should have been lost by a Dem.

wildswan said...

Bitter Blamer

Matt Sablan said...

Wait. Her staff begins meetings with ominous proclamations like "James Comey?"

This section must have been written before the revelation Comey already agreed to let them all off. Which makes strange decisions in the investigation, like not recording or transcribing her interview, make sense.

rcocean said...

Yeah, that's why Palin lost. American wasn't ready for women as VP.

JPS said...

I like that second-highest-rated comment. I'd be delighted to vote for a woman for president. Not that woman.

(Martinez 2020!)

Ralph L said...

Can we send her somewhere to learn more about shivving?

Rick said...

Locked out of the White House, she offers solidarity with Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and other women who are called shrill, or unlikeable, because they want to climb the same ladder as men.

I wonder why people ruin their credibility by saying such things. She's unlikeable because because she has shown everyone she looks down on them, thinks it's her right to interfere with their lives, and feels laws don't apply to her. Men who let the public see this side of them aren't elected either.

It ought to be embarrassing people continue to make these unsupported accusations that everything people say is due to some ism.


1. I'm not some stay at home mom baking cookies.
2. I can't be responsible for every under-capitalized business in America.
3. I can't be bothered to pay attention to national security requirements.

Matt Sablan said...

She really thinks the press was biased against her? That's A rank delusional. They propped Trump up at her direction. It is no one's fault but hers she picked a fight she couldn't win.

wildswan said...

If you think WI "never should have been lost by a Democrat" just look at the Democratic antics over Foxconn going on right now in Wisconsin. Foxconn is the promise of 22,000 good manufacturing jobs in Wisconsin at the cutting edge of global technology. The Democrats of Wisconsin are all voting against it because it makes Republican Governor Walker look good. Unemployed workers - they still don't matter AT ALL to the Democrats. NOT AT ALL. The Democrats of Wisconsin even deposed one of their own from a leadership position simply because he was one of three Democrats to vote for Foxconn (which was bringing jobs to his district). No attention is being paid to this by MSM. But this is why Trump won; this is really why Hillary lost. And the importance of the Dem job-killing habit hasn't sunk in yet. As I say there is no attention from MSM and if there was any attention the MSM would be looking for ways to help the Dems to drive away good jobs, not ways to win them back.

Earnest Prole said...

Is it sexist to call a shrill harpy an evil shrew-bitch? Asking for a friend.

Bob Loblaw said...

Hahahaha. I like the way Ace put it. something like "she's still lighting up the town with her blamethrower".

rehajm said...

Martha Stewart knows more abour shiving than Hillary. It shouldn’t be this way...

Matt Sablan said...

If someone were to parody the 2016 election becomes a movie, it is easy to cast Clinton as the Standard Movie Villain. The Villain is very much the Technician. On paper, very good at what they do. In the movie, they'd be the Big School Football Team vs the Ragtag Bunch of Misfits; the classically trained violinist and composer vs. the kid off the street with talent and a dream, etc.

The things the Villain does turn around to bite them in the ass. To wit: Screwing Bernie over denies her the Bernie Bros and middle class whites that hurt her most. She's so sure of herself she can ask things like, "How am I not X% ahead?" She works with high powered media players to spin against the upstart, which only ends up forcing her into a confrontation she ultimately loses.

If only Trump had been likable, it would have been a perfectly cast TV Political Movie.

Matt Sablan said...

Hell, her staff is a group of elites. All technically proficient, but who lack the common touch. They're a finely tuned machine.

They're up against a bunch of people who have shown talent, but can't work together very well, sometimes get in each other's way, but manage to pull out a win at the end.

YoungHegelian said...

If there was ever any doubt that HRC is every bit as looney-tunes as Trump is claimed to be, she seems to be determined to erase those doubts. What do you do with someone who doesn't understand why voters don't like her when she is told over & over again the reasons why? Having the power to surround oneself with yes-men seems to be a sure-fire method of self-destruction.

What removed all doubt about HRC's sanity for me was that fainting episode. Caught on tape, the campaign did what it did best -- lied through its teeth. But the reasons given were bizarre. She had pneumonia. Well, stay home & get better. You've got a campaign to run! She was dehydrated. Just how fucking stupid does an adult have to be that in venues where water is available to get so thirsty that you collapse? These are excuses that her campaign thinks makes her look better?

Bob Loblaw said...

She really thinks the press was biased against her? That's A rank delusional. They propped Trump up at her direction. It is no one's fault but hers she picked a fight she couldn't win.

What's funny about that is they did the same thing with Reagan.

"There are more tears shed over answered prayers than over unanswered prayers." - Teresa of Avila.

Earnest Prole said...

A funny takedown of Hillary's latest whining in Reason:

"What's the difference between Game of Thrones character Cersei Lannister and failed presidential candidate Hillary Clinton? One is an entitled narcissist who quietly supported her lecherous husband (whom she clearly loathed) when it was politically convenient, then insisted it was her turn to rule (even though it wasn't), chose boot-lickers, ass-kissers, and elitist bankers as her advisors while alienating more competent and better-liked people who might have helped her, exacted petty vengeance on imagined enemies, escaped justice and the judgment of the people by destroying her main rival—the charismatic, income-inequality obsessed populist—with an explosive cheat, and was left confused why so many people in her country would rather be ruled by a complete political unknown who tells it like it is.

"The other fucks her twin brother."

Bob Loblaw said...

I like that second-highest-rated comment. I'd be delighted to vote for a woman for president. Not that woman.

Nikki Haley. And if the Democrats don't vote for her, by their very own logic they're all a bunch of misogynists.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

Hillary won't go away.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

If the GOP were smart, they'd keep talking about her illegal money grubbing using a private server while head of the State Dept.
If she refuses to go away, make her useful.

YoungHegelian said...

@Dickin'

If the GOP were smart....

Is that a cool breeze I feel blowing out of Hell?

Bay Area Guy said...

Nobody cares WHY she lost, or more precisely, the cause of her electoral defeat.

The people only care THAT she lost. Some (like me) are ecstatic that she lost; some are pretty bummed out.

Sorry, you don't get a do-over when you LOSE. Ask Bill Buckner of the 1986 Boston Red Sox, or the Atlanta Falcons of last year's Super Bowl.

And, the fact that these left wing idiots have conjured up this phony, Trump-Putin-Russia conspiracy, and ginned up the goofy special prosecutor to try to undo the election tells you how the Left deals with LOSING.

In 2008, Sarah Palin LOST as a VP candidate. Nobody shed a tear for that particular female politician. So, get over it, Hillary.


Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

She and Pelosi are fantastic!

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

I know- big IF... If only.

Michael K said...

f someone were to parody the 2016 election becomes a movie, it is easy to cast Clinton as the Standard Movie Villain.

Apparently there is a movie coming out about Chappaquidick that savages Ted Kennedy.

Of course, he's dead and of no use to Democrats, plus his children are bratty.

I could see a pretty good biopic for her if they didn't care what she thought. Although they would probably wait until she is dead.

The Bergall said...

"The failed expectations of feminism......."

Not my words, but my local farmer's wife.

"Anyway we have fresh lima beans" she said!

Anonymous said...

There is a liberal woman commenter in the WSJ who generally excoriates us Trumpers, but the other day she admitted that she couldn't stand Hillary any longer. It was a bright, shining moment and I congratulated her on honesty.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

Jeebus - progressives lib-left are strange. Begging for forgiveness from the dark lord.

Larry J said...

I've had a security clearance for most of the past 42 years. Holding a clearance means following strict rules to safeguard classified information. Had I done even a tiny fraction of what she did, I would've lost my clearance, my job, and likely my freedom. There is no way that I'll hold her or anyone else to a lower standard han I'm held to myself. Fuck that.

As for opposing Hillary because she's a woman, that's stupid. I would've voted for Maggie Thatcher if it was possible. There are women that I could gladly vote for, but not for Hillary even if she offered me a million dollars from one hand while threatening me with a gun in the other. She is a vile, evil human being. I quietly give thanks every single day that Hillary is not and never will be president. We didn't just dodge a ullet on election night. We dodged a thermonuclear bomb.

Paco Wové said...

"If someone were to parody the 2016 election"

With just a small bit of re-writing, the story of Election 2016 could be a brilliant satire. Maybe a sequel to Election, with Tracy Flick finally meeting her match.

Fernandinande said...

Billary accused Trump of wanting go be white: "He seems to want to be like Putin, a white authoritarian leader"

FullMoon said...

Hillary mimics Monica

rhhardin said...

Woman: How do you write women so well?

Jack Nicholson: I think of a man. And I take away reason and accountability.

- As Good as it Gets (1997)

The Cracker Emcee Refulgent said...

Halfway through this comment thread I had an actual deja vu episode and wondered for a moment if Althouse wasn't trolling us by inserting an old post. Regardless, my delight in Hillary's defeat is evergreen. I do find it interesting that, just as before the election, none of our Leftist friends feel inclined to defend Hillary. Sure, they'll attack Trump all day long, but I can't remember having read a single heart-felt defense of Hillary in the last couple of years. Maybe that's what happened, Hillary.

Francisco D said...

Hillary has become a transparently pathetic public figure.

I say "transparently" because I have long thought her pathetic, in a dangerous sort of way.

I should revel in Schadenfreude, but I like to think of myself as someone with compassion for the pitiful wretches of the world.

Of course, she is a wealthy, corrupt pitiful wretch, so it's hard to muster much compassion.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

Hillary- you're pretty white... and corrupt.

Robert Cook said...

Hillary has to tell herself she lost because she was a woman, or because Trump colluded with the Russions, or because paralyzing emanations from Uranus felled wide swaths of her electorate, preventing them from voting, or whatever other fanciful tale she might devise, because she is unable or unwilling to admit she lost because the voters did not like her, that she ran a terrible campaign that alienated voters she had to try to win over. SHE blew it, no one and nothing else. (Well, and that too many voters saw that the Dems didn't really care about their concerns and would continue to serve the interests of the ruling elites, as they have done for some time now. While the more affluent Democrats remained fooled by Obama, the less affluent Democrats saw him as just another huckster, telling them he would work for them while actually serving the wealthy and powerful.)

rcocean said...

Can you imagine anyone but Hillary acting like this after losing a POTUS election?

McCain, Romney, Kerry, Gore, Dole, Bush, Mondale all acted with more or less a degree of dignity.

But Hillary....

Even worse, her former voters seem to approve of her whining, and refusal to act with any degree of class.

Henry said...

Banquo was shivved. Lady Macbeth dies by her own hand.

Henry said...

The other analogy lurking in my mind is Gandalf's final ruling on the folly of Saruman. This, I imagine, is what the Democratic leadership thinks of their erstwhile candidate:

You have become a fool, Hillary, and yet pitiable. You might still have turned away from folly and evil, and have been of service. But you choose to stay and gnaw the ends of your old plots. Stay then! But I warn you, you will not easily come out again. Not unless the dark hands of the east stretch out to take you!

Humperdink said...

Why in the world would Hillary be doing this? Really. This is extremely odd behavior. Parading around the country pointing fingers and being all weepy. Why, oh why?

I'll tell you why. She is running again.

Henry said...

To think she needed just one more pelt for the full dalmatian.

rhhardin said...

Chelsea at least has Web Hubbell's charm.

rhhardin said...

Hillary should run for chancellor of Germany against Merkel.

Birches said...

God bless the woman live tweeting her reading of What Happened. Katereadsbks is the Twitter handle. It's hilarious.

traditionalguy said...

She wants some recognition for losing what she believes she was entitled to have under the 1990's Clinton Rules. Those rules anointed Bill and Hill the Boomer Elites that always had 100% Media protection. But the Internet and social media out flanked the old Media and the truth won. November 8, 2016 was the night they drove old Hillary down.

Bad Lieutenant said...

This, I imagine, is what the Democratic leadership thinks of their erstwhile candidate:


Your problem is that Tolkien didn't give Sauron any lines, so there's nothing you can quote that would be really reflective of that conversation in actuality.

Bad Lieutenant said...



I'll tell you why. She is running again.

In your wet dreams.

...That is to say, I'll be in my bunk.

...Eeew, now I feel dirty. Where is that cheesecake daguerreotype of Harriet Tubman again?

Gahrie said...

To think she needed just one more pelt for the full dalmatian.

I've been calling her Cruella De Ville for decades.

Big Mike said...

I think that Hillary Clinton really did lose this election because she was a woman. If she'd been a man she would have understood that you have to fight for every vote and not take any state for granted.

Steven said...

Actually, yeah, her sex had a lot to do with her defeat.

Because if it weren't for her sex, she'd have never been married to Bill Clinton, and thus never have been First Lady, Senator, or registered for a Presidential primary ballot.

Moondawggie said...

Gee, was there any woman I could have voted for over Trump?

How about:

Nikki Haley: Check
Condoleeza Rice: Check
Carly Fiorina: Check

Sorry Hill: it wasn't sexism/misogyny that made you lose. It was your lack of sensible policy ideas, your inability to inspire, your corrupt Clinton Foundation pay-to-play scams, your criminal carelessness with classified information, your prevarications regarding the Benghazi debacle, and your duplicitous e-mail cleansing after you were caught breaking the rules.

With Hubris comes Nemesis, and the ancient Greeks had you totally pegged. Learn from it. And for the sake of all the rest of us, please go away.

LilyBart said...

Hillary Clinton is a graceless cow. She lost - she needs to stop blaming everyone else for this.

Earnest Prole said...

I had an actual deja vu episode and wondered for a moment if Althouse wasn't trolling us

The job description of a professor is remarkably similar to that of a parent: troll your little wards mercilessly until they learn to think for themselves. Judging from what I read here, she's got her work cut out for her.

exiledonmainstreet, green-eyed devil said...

For once, I agree with Robert Cook.

She is Exhibit A of what happens to a person who is so cocooned by handlers and sycophants that she has completely lost touch with reality. She imagines she is beloved and admired because she had her ass kissed by the media.

Rosalyn C. said...

I don't understand Hillary telling us all the really nasty things she wishes she had said, for example, to Trump during the debates. And then there's a story she tells in her book about telling off a young woman for not voting, at least she wanted to but she didn't.

Does Hillary want us to know that she really is nasty and vicious and hides it well? Or does she believe she deserves some compensation and/or sympathy for being repressed? Or is she on the verge of a complete mental and emotional breakdown and feels there's no reason to hide her true feelings anymore? This has gone way past the issue of why she lost.

LilyBart said...

I cannot believe anyone would write a book to memorize their extreme bitterness! Graceless!

Bob Loblaw said...

She imagines she is beloved and admired because she had her ass kissed by the media.

It's worse than that. The People Who Matter support her. As for the rest of us, she only acknowledges our existence intellectually, and that only because we existed on a spreadsheet somewhere in her campaign office.

LilyBart said...

I think the fact that Hillary is the kind of person who would write a book bitterly blaming everyone else for her loss is probably one of the big reasons she lost.

YoungHegelian said...

C'mon! Is there anything in that book that tells us anything we didn't already know about HRC? It's just one more confirmation is all. We've been saying this stuff since before she threw her hat into the ring.

There's not much love out there for that poor woman. Her greatest asset was that She Was Not Donald Trump, but I think think most Not Trumpers knew that they were buying damaged goods.

She just lost because The Guy Who Was Not Hillary Clinton worked hard to have his votes spread out in a way that maximized his electoral college advantage.

Bay Area Guy said...

She must be pissed at Bill.

The deal she made: I look away at all your humiliating sexual escapades with other women - even the non-consensual ones; you build and boost me up to become President.

Looks like she got the short end of the stick - so to speak.

YoungHegelian said...

@Bay Guy,

you build and boost me up to become President.

But, when you read "Shattered" you see that her team, no doubt with her concurrence, worked very hard at marginalizing Bill within the campaign. They wanted it to be their win & not Bill's.

The best "natural" politician of our adult lives & they put him out in the back 40. Says something about where their priorities were. As said in a comment above, hubris begets nemesis.

Yancey Ward said...

Humperdink is correct, in my opinion. She is running again, and the book is tailored to the most hard core of her base in the Democratic Party. You have to think it through- she has to win the nomination first, and this time she knows the Democratic establishment isn't going to go belly up at her command a year and half before the first primary- she has to make through the first few primaries and grit out victories. She is counting on that hard core base to carry her through what she expects to be a 3 or 4 way race during January-March of 2020, perhaps winning with only 25-30% of the total vote in Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina.

Sure, she is an unrepentant narcissist that doesn't like to admit that she was her own problem, but a book like this almost surely has a real political purpose behind it- maybe no more than a source of money to keep key advisers and fundraisers on retainer during the next 2 1/2 years.

Bruce Hayden said...

I wouldn't be surprised if Crooked Hillary ran in 2020, health and alcoholism permitting. And, as a Republican, I welcome it. She would make it harder for the Dems to nominate a woman. I think that Fauxhauntis Warren would have done better in 2016. Much better speaker. And Kanela Harris might be decent with good handlers. I think that the Dems best chance in 2020, given the weakness of their bench, is to run a non-Clinton woman at the top of their ticket. I would also welcome her to the nomination, as things stand now. Trump has shown that he can act Presidential, esp when showing compassion, as he did in Houston. Does anyone think that she could have done nearly as well in that role? Exposing the weaknesses and failures of the Obama/Clinton/Kerry foreign policy, etc has to help too. I would expect right now Trump winning in the middle 40s number of states, if the election were held this year or next. But then, the Dems thought that Trump was the easiest candidate to beat...

Bruce Hayden said...

She is right that a lot of men don't like shrill women. Or whiney ones either. Brings out the worst stereotypes. And there is a physiological aspect to it too - a lot of men are bothered by high pitched voices, and it often gets worse with age, because the higher pitches are the ones you lose first. Her actual voice isn't really that high. The problem is that she doesn't control it. She should have been taking voice and speaking lessons in the 16 years between when she moved out of the WH and lost the election. My partner's sisters were sent to their room if they ever were shrill growing up, and she did the same with her daughters. Having seen it work, I have little sympathy for women who insist on being able to not be penalized for being shrill. Little different in my view from being significantly overweight. If she wanted the Presidency badly enough, she would train herself not to be shrill. She didn't, of course, she couldn't be bothered, because she felt entitled to the position based on her self-perceived greatness.

Rick said...

My partner's sisters were sent to their room if they ever were shrill growing up, and she did the same with her daughters.

I have three sons and we've sent all three to their room for "outbursts". We're constantly coaching them in appropriate reaction and expression. The idea this standard is only enforced against women is absurd. This isn't gender driven other than the words used to describe it, and of course the justification that any criticism is driven by sexism.

Women are subjected to sexist behavior but they do great damage to their cause by trying to protect themselves from expectations everyone has to meet.

exiledonmainstreet, green-eyed devil said...

On Twitter, "kate reads books" has selected prize excerpts of Hillary's book, with her own added commentary. The excerpts make me want to run, not walk, to the library to take out what sounds like the comic masterpiece of our time. Or it would be a masterpiece if a satirist had written it; it's all the fumier for having being written in all seriousness, without a glimmer of self-awareness. It's too bad it didn't come out in June or July because it's the perfect book to take to the beach.

https://twitter.com/katereadsbks/status/907662831822110720

Professional lady said...

I found the whole idea that I was supposed to vote for Hillary because she is a woman offensive. In all of my professional life, I've had to perform. As a lawyer, I've taken abuse from other lawyers, judges, and clients. I've also been fairly and unfairly criticized and called out for my mistakes. No one has ever given me a break because I'm female. No excuses, no whining - you have to do the job to the best of your ability and be able to take what comes with it. Hillary is corrupt, incompetent, and has no ethics. Yet I was supposed to ignore that and vote for her anyway.

Big Mike said...

What’s funny is, Hillary’s probably the only Democrat who would have ignored pointed election advice from Bill.

Glenn Reynolds wrote that one week after the election. Yep, she lost because she was Bill Clinton's wife.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

NEW YORK — Hillary Clinton was so frustrated about the infamous scandal surrounding her use of a private email server that she was “tempted” to construct voodoo dolls in the images of “certain members” of the news media and Congress, and then “stick them full of pins.”

HAHAHHAAAAHAHAAAA

Rusty said...

I find it strange ,in my wifes circle of friends, that almost none of them will admit voting for Hillary.
The shadow falls on the lefts collective memory.

tcrosse said...

I find it strange ,in my wifes circle of friends, that almost none of them will admit voting for Hillary.

Same with the usual gang of anti-Trump commenters here. She is well under the bus.

FullMoon said...

She imagines she is beloved and admired
She is. Not by everybody, for sure. But look at the people crying and hysterical when she lost. Those are the only ones she sees. The rest of us are an invisible minority, in her mind.

JAORE said...

Has she finally realized that Chelsea is a political dead end....?

If not, this book isn't helping.

Chelsea is much like the latest version of the Kennedy kids. A think tank position, spokesperson for some liberal cause, a back water congress critter.... at best.

Bob Loblaw said...

I find it strange ,in my wifes circle of friends, that almost none of them will admit voting for Hillary.
The shadow falls on the lefts collective memory.


Nobody likes to be seen as having backed a loser. You see this in sports all the time - fans from the team losing the championship get rid of their pennants and hats and t-shirts the next day, whereas fans of the winners keep all that stuff for ages.

Seeing Red said...

The response partially explains why men don't want to get married anymore.

Unknown said...

She got us talking about her.

The permanent staff paid for by The Foundation continue working.

Its the Crazy Eddie strategy of promotion

Or maybe the Letterman approach of repeating the lame joke until it becomes funny

"I mistakenly went to the new Don Prudhomme restaurant instead of Paul Prudhomme's. Turned out ok, the funny car veal was excellent"