The Making of ‘Saint Hillary’: Exploring The Media’s Early Role In Defining The First Lady

The following is an excerpt from Michael D’Antonio’s book, “The Hunting of Hillary: The 40-Year Campaign to Destroy Hillary Clinton,” out July 28. It is part of TPM Cafe, TPM’s home for opinion and news analysis.


This is a companion discussion topic for the original entry at https://talkingpointsmemo.com/?p=1321855
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CookiEgate!

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This makes very clear what we’ve known intuitively for years. The demonization of HRC was a cynical, sexist partisan play. And the New York Times wrote the playbook, in fatuous broad strokes outlined by self satisfied and lazy reporting like Kelly’s.

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But a former “lingerie model” who wasn’t born in the great and powerful AMERICA and hung with Jeffrey Epstein, etc., is simply fine, no problems there. I can’t handle it today.

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And guess which newspaper Kelly wrote for? Why, yes, yes, it was the New York Times! Right on the first guess! How did you know?

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Male reporters should be required to add a disclaimer to any article concerning smart and accomplished women that they are woman fearing little punks whose only claim to “superiority” is below the waist.

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What I could/can never understand is why the New York Times goes out of its way to pander to right wing Republicans who would never read or buy the paper.

Because the NYT insists for god only knows to continue to pander to Republicans who policies are based on the needs of billionaires override facts will always cause them to be in conflict with anything resembling real news, I refuse to spend a dime on the NYT choosing instead to read Paul Krugman online.

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It was pathetic and sad how the media just immediately bought the ‘I didn’t vote for HER’ campaign (remember all those stupid bumper stickers?) like any of those people had voted for Clinton.

That said, Chelsea is the member of that family who should be legally allowed to clip any media figure she sees fit. The disgusting discourse around her nationally when she was 14 fucking years old still makes my blood boil.

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The political desk is a complete and disgusting mess at the NYT and the opinion section is hardly better. I will defend most of the paper though. The people who don’t often get A1 headlines are still doing great work. But I also agree that the pathetic state of their front page coverage is worth cancelling a subscription over.

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Not surprising. Women in business have always been demonized as not quite ‘there’…hysterical, emotional, too invested in ‘home’…whatever. There is always a ‘but’…with Hillary they were scared shtless that she would take over when BIll was done and the sexists went right to work…Not my favorite person but look what the ‘boys’ are doing to Liz Cheney today…

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I don’t miss that piece of garbage one bit.

I think the greatest source of New York Times bias is sneering condescension towards what Rush Limbaugh used to call, “fly-over country.” The way they had it out for the Clintons from day 1, was as if the concept of a Rhodes scholar from Arhansas just about made their heads explode.

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If, from 1980 onward, the media had treated Donald Trump and his family the way the NYT and the rest of the media treated Hillary Clinton and her family, Donald Trump wouldn’t be president. He would be cleaning the bathrooms at Taco Bell.

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LOL! Thank you, Eustace!

I remember when my mother, who was 73 years old at the time the Cookiegate! scandal - greater than Teapot Dome, Watergate, or Iran Contra, BTW - occurred, and she said, “I don’t remember anyone asking Mamie Eisenhower if she could bake any fucking cookies!”

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This is excellent. And that is not to say Hillary is without her faults, but DAMN…no one could have overcome this insidious shit.

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Don’t forget George Will’s

This is our town

horseshit.

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HRC was targeted by the very powerful insurance industry & all the tentacles of their network throughout politics, industry, society and the media.

She never had a chance. No man would have either. Unfortunately, she was used as foil allowing them to fawn over WJC who was deemed to have the ultimate power.

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“… baking cookies”

And they probably didn’t ask Eleanor Roosevelt, either.

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“If this earnestness and ambition were worthy of mockery, what would Kelly have written of a First Lady who had no desire to do good in the world?”

That she was a perfect little lady? Come on, we all know the drill.

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And let’s not forget Guardians of the DC Norms David Broder and Maureen Dowd.

Broder has passed, of course (unsurprisingly, no tears shed from me when it happened), but if anyone wants to crucify MoDo, I’ll pitch in a few bucks for the 2x4s and the railroad spikes!

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