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"The 20 Most Obnoxious Anti-Palin Quotes So Far."

I'll highlight a few, but read the whole thing.

18) (John McCain has chosen a running mate) "whose primary qualification seems to be that she hasn't had an abortion." -- South Carolina Democratic chairwoman Carol Fowler

17) "With Sarah Palin, America has taken one very large leap toward a completely theocratic politics." -- Andrew Sullivan, The Atlantic

16) "They are true believers in the idea that one can be very sexy but also desexualized, which is why Palin is being treated like this giant sex object, because she's got a practiced ability at being f*ckable without showing that she might be the sort who wants to f*ck." -- Former John Edwards's blogger Amanda Marcotte from Pandagon...

6) "Her greatest hypocrisy is in her pretense that she is a woman." -- Wendy Doniger at the Washington Post...

Pandagon seems to be down this morning. You might have to get back to that one later. The "they" in "they are true believers" includes me, of all people. And the post is the same one I was talking about yesterday, in my post about my post that is the 11th buzziest post of all time.

(Just trying to see how many times I can use the word "post" in one sentence. I hope I'm not dumb as a post. Don't you think "Dumb as a Post" would be a good name for a blog?)

But let me focus on #6. I see it's one of WaPo's "On Faith" columns, which you know I loathe. Let's read it:

Her greatest hypocrisy is in her pretense that she is a woman. The Republican party's cynical calculation that because she has a womb and makes lots and lots of babies (and drives them to school! wow!) she speaks for the women of America, and will capture their hearts and their votes, has driven thousands of real women to take to their computers in outrage. She does not speak for women; she has no sympathy for the problems of other women, particularly working class women.

I'm glad Wendy Doniger put that in writing, because it's what I think many Democrats think and I like having such a clear statement to point to. It's what I had in mind when I wrote:

The feminism of the last dozen years has been a dull, uninspired argument for keeping Democratic politicians in power.

But feminism is something that transcends party politics. Women have interests that the parties should have to compete for. I want a vivid debate about what is good for women. Sarah Palin represents one argument, and her feminism will require Democrats to improve their argument and not take women for granted. Sarah Palin brings feminism to a lot of people who've been scorning feminism -- because feminism has seemed like a strand of Democratic party politics.

There's nothing more feminist than a woman having a mind of her own and speaking it. Doniger's feminism says: Shut up and be our idea of what a good woman is.

Full post as published by Althouse on September 17, 2008 (boomark / email).